Fortunately, in late 2019, that changed. District Superintendent Jeff Elstad partnered with Wold Architects and Engineers (Wold) to lead a series of community design sessions to get at the heart of what a new high school could mean for Owatonna. Alongside Wold partner Sal Bagley, they sought to get alignment on “why are we building a high school?” and “what are our community/workforce needs?” Eventually, they arrived at building a high school that focuses on community pathways and, critically, meeting the demand of local employers (trades and manufacturing).

“After the early 2019 vote fell just short, I spent some time getting to know the no-voters, listening to their concerns. You know, depending on the community, referenda often has to say no first to get to yes,” said Superintendent Elstad. 

Gathering the Community

First, the District and Wold conducted research and determined that career pathways needed to be a core focus in the community. Even before the pandemic there was a huge gap between the local employer demand and the number of high school graduates who were prepared to fill the roles. Using this as a north star, the leaders assembled a community task force consisting of ~25 members and multiple high school students to vote on whether a new high school would be most likely to satisfy this need. 

Once that decision had been made, a core planning group was assembled. This team helped design the building and consisted of predominantly school staff and both high school and middle school students who got the opportunity to design their prospective high school. Community and faculty listening sessions were critical in shaping the design of the new school. With the support of local foundations, they were even able to build a community meeting space for after-hours and weekend usage by the greater Owatonna community. 

Pathways through Partnerships

Regardless of the referenda, this school could not have been built without business partnerships. After the bond passed, an additional $26 Million was donated from local business partners, making it one of the largest gifts a public school has received and paving the way for community pathways and recognition. Federated Insurance, headquartered in Owatonna, donated $20 million plus the land for the new high school. The Lehner Corporation donated furniture and equipment to the school’s music space. The Mayo Clinic donated nursing equipment to support the nursing program. As of the 23/24 school year, there are 85 students in pursuit of nursing degrees as high school students.

Part of the pathways program is student internships, coupled with 40 hour mentorship programs. Before graduation, each student has at least two internship opportunities at Owatonna High School and these programs support career pathways toward nursing, culinary arts, digital fabrication, science and engineering, publishing and digital content creation. 

“Currently, we have a great relationship with Federated Insurance,” said Brian Coleman, Owatonna Career Pathways Navigator. “They provide internship opportunities in both the fall and spring semesters.  The positions range from Life Operations, Custodian, Print Center/Stockroom, Policy Assembly, Business Coordination Center, IT, Customer Accounts and Accounting.”

The district also has a growing exploratory middle school design. All 8th-grade students take a semester-long course called College and Career Readiness which meets for 82 minutes every other day. In this class, students take an interest inventory, explore post-secondary options, and work with Junior Achievement presenters on career readiness. 

Through innovative partnerships and career awareness models, Owatonna is setting an example for what it looks like to build a school that serves the community’s student needs, economic needs and future. 

The post Owatonna’s New School Sets Eyes on Local Pathways appeared first on Getting Smart.

The STEAD School

In Commerce City, Colorado, a new project-based school concept called STEAD is reimagining what it means to have a school and a farm in the community. Sitting on the footprint of a former 10,000-acre farm, this school is committed to continuing to develop leaders in agriculture through nimble, hands-on learning and flexible pathways.

The public charter serves 370 students in grades 9-11, with its first graduating class beginning 12th grade next year. Grades 9-10 are a cohort band resulting in numerous cross-grade learning experiences. 

Through partnerships with Colorado State University, Denver Botanic Gardens and Together We Grow, the school is able to deliver on four primary pathways: animal, plant, environmental, food science, within which there are over 3000 career possibilities. The school model also features accelerator weeks which give the students short sprint-like opportunities to develop projects, connections and learn what they like to do. 

On the campus is the Seed Lab, a one-acre farm, a greenhouse and three steel structures filled with flexible learning spaces. The one-acre farm grows vegetables and leafy greens that directly integrate with the school lunch and culinary programs. Moving forward, there will also be stables on the site where students will get hands-on veterinary experiences. To keep the summer garden alive, they launched STEAD Market where students are hired to run the garden and facilities over the summer. To graduate, these students complete a minimum of one Supervised Agriculture Experience (SAE) internship

When talking with students, we heard that they most appreciate the student/teacher relationships, which often show up in their ‘hive,’ an advisory model that supports students in portfolio creation, career exploration and more. 

They think of the campus as if it were a college, many of the buildings and spaces are named based on donors as a result of how they were able to source the funding and students find themselves frequenting common spaces and controlling their environment to maximize collaboration. STEAD students are also part of Future Farmers of America and soon will be the largest contingent in America.

Watershed School

Nestled against the foothills of Boulder, Colorado, Watershed School fosters a community of intellectually curious and socially conscious learners. Since it was established in 2004, Watershed has been committed to cultivating an educational experience that bridges academic rigor with real-world engagement, preparing students to become active participants in shaping a better world.

At Watershed, learning happens beyond textbooks and outside of classroom walls. Students are encouraged to explore their passions, question assumptions and challenge conventional thinking. The curriculum comprises both Skills and Expedition courses, with the intention of engaging students in work that matters and is based on the 25 global goals referenced in Difference Making at the Heart of Learning.

A cornerstone of Watershed is the belief that education should be deeply rooted in a sense of social responsibility. Students are actively engaged in service learning projects, tackling issues from conservation to community development. These experiences foster empathy, compassion and a deep understanding of the interconnectedness of our world.

Watershed graduates carry with them a sense of purpose and the transferable skills to make a positive impact on the world.  As students navigate the complexities of a rapidly changing world, Watershed provides them with the tools and the courage to help shape a world that is sustainable, equitable and filled with possibility.

Compass Community Collaborative School

Established in 2017, Compass Community Collaborative School in Fort Collins, Colorado, is a learner-centered competency-based public charter school. A sign hangs above the entrance to the school building that reads “WE STILL LOVE SCHOOL Real World Learning in Real Times.”

At Compass, the traditional classroom model gives way to a dynamic learning environment where students take ownership of their education. Students build their personalized learner record, through Mastery Transcript Consortium, moving through levels of autonomy based on mastery of competencies throughout their middle and high school years.

Treating the community as their campus, students collaborate with local institutions and organizations such as No Barriers, Colorado State University and OtterCares to do research, participate in internships, utilize outdoor learning spaces and dive deep into projects that address community needs. Compass is a part of the Big Picture Learning network, and real-world learning, authentic assessments, teacher professional development, post-secondary planning, leaving to learn experiences and advisory are all integral components of the school.

A typical day in the life of a Compass student begins with three Studio courses in the morning, such as Math, Spanish, and ELA, a 90-minute Advisory class, and then the rest of the afternoon is spent in their Venture course. Wednesdays allow for Electives and an extended deep dive into their Venture course. Compass designs each Venture to cover skills and knowledge across competencies while peaking student interest, frequently considering student input and requests as they develop and build new courses each year. One course currently being offered is “The Art and Science of Cosplay” where students design their own costumes incorporating coding in Python.

These schools are great examples of flexible learning environments and the many benefits of embedding in community.

The post Agency and Co-Authoring Thriving in Colorado Schools appeared first on Getting Smart.

With all the talk about school reform, transformation and redesign, student voices are often neglected or only given tacit acknowledgment. When we ask for student opinions or partner with students to co-design, the end result turns into a better opportunity for young people, and often for the rest of the school as well. Students have a lot of feedback – schools become stronger when they start to listen. The list below highlights key student opinions and initiatives based on a variety of surveys and conversations.

Listen to Students

Every year, several surveys describe the national sentiment of students including the Gallup Poll and Students-Speak.org. School leadership and staff can use these trends to design surveys to understand the needs and opinions of students. Survey resources such as Panorama provide frequent feedback checkpoints as well as resources for educators to act on the data that they see. An increasing number of states require student feedback data (ex. Idaho Student Engagement survey). Transcend’s Conversations with Kids, NGLC’s Student-Centered Evidence Toolkit and programs like 100 Days of Conversation are great ways to allow students to host, lead and share in community conversations about what school and community are for.  

While these surveys and conversations are critically important, taking action based on the survey results is essential. Without acting on the insights these surveys will look the same year after year.

Focus on Wellness

Gen Z and Generation Alpha have been dramatically affected by global unrest, the climate crisis and a pandemic. School must be a place that provides students with wellness support. Most markers of student wellness have declined significantly over the past decade — a trend that began before the pandemic. While half of schools feel that they can provide adequate mental health support, schools that check wellness daily through low-cost tools like Thrively’s Well Being Index or Rhithm (among many others) and schools that provide extensive wrap-around support (Community Schools) serve students better. 

Allow Student-Driven Civic Engagement

Young people want to engage with communities in ways that are purposeful and impactful. While some states such as Texas have enacted legislation to reduce this possibility by banning assignments that require interaction with local, state or federal officials, students want to engage with problems worth solving. Youth-led projects and organizations like UnTextbooked, Sunrise Movement and Civics Unplugged all provide great resources for building student agency and for teachers who want to better engage students. With voter turnout for 18-29 year olds hovering below 50% over the last fifty years, and not looking to improve, students deserve better. The role of the teacher should be to provide as many unbiased resources as possible to best inform students as the students choose challenging projects and practice civic engagement in their local, national and global communities. 

Involve Students in the Redesign Process

Students should be involved in learning design, as they are crucial members of the community. A recent survey from NASSP shows that students primarily feel involved in planning and prepping school events, but there are many other ideas to drive involvement that have a higher impact. Some states and/or districts allow for students to serve on the school board, adding invaluable perspective to high-level decisions. Many districts and states have included students in creating a portrait of a graduate and even their design of new schools. It’s important to get both prospective and current students into these conversations. 

We were recently joined by Shiva Rajbhandari on the podcast. Shiva is a current freshman at UNC Chapel Hill and avid climate and education activist who is, to date, the first student on a school board in the state of Idaho. In this episode, Shiva shares his story about student-driven climate action initiatives and the campaign for the school board.

Education About Education

One of the unspoken challenges with youth voice and involvement is that little is taught about education in K-12 schools. Every student experiences it, but few understand both the possibilities and obstacles to change.

Students want to participate in education redesign. YouthXYouth is a student-led global education redesign movement. Teens Take Charge is an impactful student-led campaign for redesigning the New York City Public Schools. OurTurn is a youth-led systems change organization that emphasizes overhauling the education system to better serve young people. IB’s Festival of Hope is one of the largest gatherings of student voices, where young people are encouraged to share their thoughts, feelings and experiences of learning.

The word ‘youth’ is a large bucket and the feedback is as varied as the youths themselves. Recent data from Youth Talks paints a ranging global portrait of what youth think school is for: from purpose and wellness to stability and financial literacy, our young people are seeking relationship, belonging and hope. We must give young people the confidence to imagine possible futures, both for themselves and for society. Futures thinking is a great way to get young people (and educators) to challenge their assumptions and collectively design. 

To get students involved, start by asking and listening. Don’t just ask for information on anonymous surveys, ask often and in a range of spaces including classrooms, schools and board meetings. Follow up with engaged co-redesign, transforming learning to meet the actual needs of the next generation of adults in partnership with the wisdom and experience of adult educators. Along the way, evaluate the role of students using Make Learning Personal’s Continua for Student Agency. The results may look very different from our existing system.

The post The Students Are Talking, It’s Time We Listen appeared first on Getting Smart.

At its core, the College Corps program is a first-of-its-kind paid state service and career development initiative established in partnership with community colleges and universities across the Golden State. One goal of this program is to assist students in graduating on time and with reduced debt, but what really sets it apart is its dual focus: while students earn and learn, they also make a tangible difference in areas such as climate action, K-12 education, and food security.

“These paid service programs are about restoring the social contract between government and its citizens,” said Governor Gavin Newsom. “This public investment builds upon California Volunteers’ army of service members, which is larger than the Peace Corps, and exemplifies the spirit and idealism I see in young people across California.”

“During one session with a student, she told me for the first time without prompting that she ‘believed in herself.’ It was my proudest moment. College Corps reminded me of the power of simple human kindness to combat challenges many communities face,” shared  Yessenia Sanchez, College Corps Fellow from University of California, Los Angeles.

Eligibility and Opportunities

The College Corps program is designed for full-time undergraduate students who are enrolled at a partner campus. Once inducted, these students can engage in a variety of service opportunities:

• Tutoring and mentoring K-12 students, running after-school programs, and offering assistance during summer programs.
• Engaging in climate action projects, which include composting programs, tree planting, and erosion control. (A few months ago, we sat down with Josh Fryday, California’s Chief Service Officer to discuss the California Climate Action Corps.)
• Contributing to community welfare by participating in initiatives like community gardening and working in food banks to address food insecurity.

Benefits That Resonate

Beyond the service opportunities, the benefits of participating in the College Corps program are manifold. Students receive a living allowance throughout their service term and can also earn an Education Award upon the program’s completion. This financial aid is a significant boost, helping students to reduce their educational debt.

Moreover, participants gain real-world job experience, ensuring that they are better prepared for their careers post-graduation. This is supplemented by professional development training and networking opportunities. Not to forget, students also earn academic credit, further enhancing the value of their educational journey.

The program also instills a sense of pride and accomplishment. As participants work towards a shared goal, they form new relationships with young leaders across the state. They are part of a community striving for betterment, inspired by gratitude and a commitment to positive change.

“My College Corps experience has inspired me to continuously find ways, both big and small, to remain involved in my community and in schools, especially since I will be teaching in my own classroom within the next year,” said Emilio Ruiz, College Corps Fellow from California State University, Long Beach. 

Climate Action Corps

This initiative builds on the recent success of the California Climate Action Corps, an initiative that recently made national news, and features a great interest form. From the announcement, “Five states across the country, including California, Colorado, Maine, Michigan, and Washington, have already launched successful Climate Corps programs, demonstrating the power of skills-based training as a tool to expand pathways into good-paying jobs. Today, five new states – Arizona, Utah, Minnesota, North Carolina, and Maryland – are moving forward with state-based climate corps that are funded through public-private partnerships, including AmeriCorps, which will work with the American Climate Corps as implementing collaborators to ensure young people across the country are serving their communities while participating in paid opportunities and working on projects to tackle climate change.”

Because of their early success with this program, California will be leading a community of practice for the states that most recently have adopted the Climate Corps: 

This initiative is one of many highlighted in our Green Pathways publication.

What does this mean? 

This program is not merely about graduating on time or reducing debt; it’s about cultivating informed, compassionate, and proactive citizens ready to lead the future.

In a world where education often becomes a solitary pursuit, California’s College Corps program is a testament to the power of collective growth and service. It’s an inspiring model for other states to emulate, highlighting the potential of community-centric education.

The post Connecting College to Communities: California’s New Service Agenda appeared first on Getting Smart.

In many high schools in the nation, the traditional course sequence and graduation requirements remain static: four years of English, three years of math, three years of science, etc. Both mathematical and language literacies still hold major importance for every graduate. And, as the world becomes more complex and unpredictable, new consideration should be given to the required core content. 

We talk a lot about the most innovative learner-centered schools that combine personalized, competency-based and project-based learning co-designed around real-world experiences. Here, content emerges from student interest in high-purpose topics while also linking to standards or competencies. These learning environments are challenging the Carnegie status quo and sit on the horizon of education. While important signals for the future of learning, they remain the minority.

Updating content areas would accelerate learning around three core types of skills expected by schools: core skills (typically the skills of writing, reading, mathematics, history, arts found in state standards), technological skills (industry skills earned through CTE programs, work-based learning, apprenticeships, career pathways, etc.), and transferable skills (durable skills, XQ). Weaving in the content below will create engaging and future forward ways to nurture the core, technological and durable skills while preparing young people to govern, contribute and thrive as adults.

Next-Gen Economics

Every learner should engage in learning about entrepreneurship. Releasing a generation of empowered problem-solvers equipped with the tools to contribute to ventures that have both financial and/or social impact, helps future generations find their sense of purpose and ownership. Uncharted Learning, the National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE), and KnoPro from NAF all provide resources to embed entrepreneurial experiences and content.

Additionally, with both our country and many individuals experiencing significant debt, financial literacy remains low for graduates. Yet, it can have the most profound outcome on financial stability. Budgeting, credit, borrowing, and investing increase the long-term probability of financial stability for graduates. Both entrepreneurship and personal finance are well-represented in those who choose the CTE Finance or CTE Business and Administration career clusters, but this is not universally available. Many free or low-cost resources exist (see list here).

Artificial Intelligence

While school leaders and educators still are in the early stages of understanding the impact of AI, there is no doubt that it will rapidly become immersed in the education sector (likely in hyper-personalized learning of core skills and support for learning design and assessment). However, every graduate should understand the core principles of AI functionality and how to use it to augment intelligence and performance. These skills will be requisite in almost every future professional career. TeachAI.org recently released a guide for AI implementation while some districts, like Gwinnett County Public Schools, offer an AI CTE program pathway.

Civics and Citizenship

While often found in civics classrooms, the content remains less about good citizenship and more about the structures and function of government. While the structures and function are important, every student should understand their role in a democracy through political processes, how to move an idea to action, and community organizing for change. For example, the United States, with less than 50% of eligible 18-29 year old voters participating in elections, is in dire need of core education in civics. Organizations such as iCivics and Citizens and Scholars offer innovative and engaging approaches to civic education.

Media Literacy

Few other influential forces impact the current (and future) generations like digital media. The power of disinformation, misinformation, bias, etc. propagated through heavily financed algorithms will only increase. High school graduates need the tools and filters to process and evaluate everything they see online to better understand ways to get to the truth. Advances in AI around image, audio and video generation will make discernment of fact even more difficult. Resources such as Civic Online Reasoning at the core of every high school curriculum will have a significant positive change for future generations.

Healthy Living

Data shows the declining mental and physical health of adolescents. A generation struggling with mental and physical health increases the emotional and financial costs of a nation. While physical education programs have changed significantly over the years (like less dodgeball and rope climbing and more yoga and personal fitness), students still disengage from physical education. Accelerating, personalizing and customizing healthy living as part of core learning will increase the odds of healthy adults. Healthy food programs such as Food Corps and innovative physical education programs that focus on personal fitness can be integrated into the school day.

Place and Sustainability

Too many learners graduate high school with little to no knowledge about their local context and the long-term social, economic and ecological factors that drive the success or demise of a community. Every learner should graduate not only with a deep understanding of their own place, but should also know how to understand and impact future communities. Finding local purpose to inspire students through the creation of high-impact projects (Teton Science Schools’ Place-based Education, High Tech High) and building content around sustainability standards (Cloud Institute) can increase the long-term vitality of local and regional communities.

Neuroscience

One of the last frontiers in understanding the human body (along with the microbiome) is the brain. Every day, students are bombarded with outside stimuli that impact their brains from substances (alcohol, vaping, drug use, etc.) to technology (media, phones) – all while going through one of the more significant changes in the human brain – adolescence. Teaching relevant neuroscience could improve choice-making, mental health and learning in general (Global Online Academy, University of Wisconsin Neuroscience Training Program). By graduation all students should be able to describe the conditions and processes for how they learn and how they manage stress.

Data Science

Data science has surfaced over the last decade as critically important in many higher ed institutions and professions. Too many young people graduate high school never having had to create a spreadsheet, let alone organize, analyze and synthesize large amounts of data. Given the continued acceleration (again hyper-charged via AI) of data creation, every graduate needs to understand how to find, interpret, organize and analyze data in every form (YouCubed). 

Current Events 

While traditional history has expansive coverage in schools, most learners experience fact immersion rather than relevance and understanding. Every high school learner should experience history through a modern-day lens to both understand the throughline (see Throughline podcast) and the repeated themes of history — war, peace, power, oppression, freedom, religion, etc. — to find hope and skills to imagine a more peaceful future. Facing History provides a Current Events toolkit for those ready to jump in.

Systems and Futures

Understanding both systems thinking (the complex interactivity of multiple elements) and futures thinking (aptitudes for transformative vision-seeking over short-term solutions) is critical in a complex and uncertain world. By explicitly creating content and experiences around these concepts, young people are better equipped to anticipate and address current and future challenges.

To be clear, literacy remains paramount and a core pillar of society. While as a nation we still greatly struggle with literacy rates, we cannot wait to adapt our current content base toward possibility, opportunity and contribution. If a high school does not have the support or resources to complete redesign, rethinking the core curriculum may be an alternative first step when state or local policy allows. Replacing or merging the typical core content with the ten content areas above better supports the current generation of students to tackle an unpredictable and uncertain world.

The post The Content Every High School Student Should Learn (But Doesn’t) appeared first on Getting Smart.

For the last few years, we’ve been making the case that purpose and contribution are the core outputs of a society. Because of that, there are skills and habits that young people need to strengthen and flex with regularity in a learning setting. This will result in generations of difference makers and solutionaries, people who spot problems (inherited or otherwise) and respond rapidly and systematically toward a future that works better for all. We must not continue to perpetuate a world where our long-term outcomes are purely economic or academic. 

Powerful technology like AI increases the complexity given the challenge of bias in AI models, the susceptibility of humans towards influence, and the propensity for false narratives and information generated from AI sources. These challenges add a layer of increased urgency to the work of embedding purpose and imagination in our communities and schools. 

In a recent interview on the People I (Mostly) Admire Podcast, guest Kevin Kelly shares “Part of my critique about the A.I. folks who are concerned about the end of the world is that they overestimate the value of intelligence. There are a lot of intelligent guys who think intelligence trumps everything, but most of the great things in the world are happening not by the smartest people in the room. They’re happening with people who have enthusiasm, who have imagination. Smartness and intelligence is one component, but if you put a man and a lion in a cage, it’s not the smartest one that’s going to win. It’s only one part of what we need to make things happen in the world. And the key thing of that is imagination. Imagining what could be, what we’d want, an alternative way of doing things. And that’s not just I.Q.”

As we continue to think about the role that AI will play in society, we must also consider what the core variables are that must be kept alongside exponential information to better drive decision-making and lead to a better world. For now, we will call the dream of a better world ‘purpose’. In an equation where information is merely one variable in a combination of factors toward a better world, what are the other variables? How might we preserve, promote and proliferate those variables while also using smart tools? To some, this may be viewed as “What makes us human?” To others, this may be viewed as “What constitutes a community?” And to others, “How does an ecosystem function, sustain and grow?”

A Proposed Formula

With purpose as an extended goal, supported by meaningful income and access to information, we propose a clear formula as a North Star for living and learning in an AI-influenced world.

(Skills + Reported Knowledge + Observed Phenomena) x Purpose = A Better World

Skills. Durable or transferable skills are a critical element and will be at a premium for those emerging into the workplace. Creating the systems and opportunities for learners to practice and show proficiency in these skills will move the needle toward a purpose-driven future. Fundamental building blocks tools such as those in the core skill set (literacy in language and mathematics) and technical skill set (relevant technical skills that change over time) support the application of durable skills. For now, AI is capable of many mental skills, however, without the aid of robotics and other technological advancements, it does not yet possess the ability to fully occupy and affect the physical world.

Reported Knowledge. Reported knowledge is the accumulated set of digital information (seeing as most information has been digitized or originated digitally). This reported knowledge can be loose in validity but due to insufficient truth systems and exponential dissemination technologies, it propagates as fact quickly. With AI scraping and building from this reported knowledge, information will continue to be useful, but only under close scrutiny. The “hallucinations” of early AI tools such as ChatGPT indicate occasional unpredictable results and very confident false results. AI tools are not thinking tools, but intelligence augmentation tools.

Observed Phenomena. With the proliferation of reported knowledge, we, as a species, will rapidly become distant from first-hand accounts of actual phenomena. These superpowers, the ability to observe the world, communicate directly with other humans and verify proclaimed data will be increasingly difficult and must be explicitly taught in education systems. Place-based approaches can support these efforts.

Purpose. We multiply the sum of all by ‘purpose’ which is a key multiplier towards a better world. A purpose-less pursuit regularly results in growth for growth-sake and while purpose can be variable, when we say it we mean that it is aligned to “the benefit of all life” and is at least reflective of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. While shared values may be harder to come by in an increasingly complex world, some, like empathy, safety, kindness and mutuality (working together towards common goals) may transcend divisiveness and increase belonging. 

What happens if we ignore a variable in our educational systems? What happens if the multiplier (purpose) is not accounted for?

As stated in a recent article by Tom Vander Ark, “This change won’t be easy but this new era means young people can do more than ever–more than we dreamed possible even a few months ago. It’s time to invite them, especially learners furthest from opportunity, into a future of possibility, into work that matters. Their potential just got bigger and better.” 

In many cases, AI is a boon to the variables above rather than a threat, however, without a carefully calibrated purpose, the end result gets a whole lot murkier. Augmenting a design of the future with AI can certainly amplify purposeful futures for young people, but without careful evaluation of each element of the equation, future generations may end up falling into the trap of a highly developed AI world that misses the mark, or worse. 

The post Is Knowledge Power? What the AI Conversation is Missing appeared first on Getting Smart.

To make this statement, AI leaders are thinking far down the road and weighing the information that they have now with trend data and making the assertion that given disruption, we are dealing with an exponential rather than a linear curve.

Although many of the challenges we face in our VUCA World are immense in scale, scope and significance, thinking about the future doesn’t have to be existential and/or time spans of hundreds of years. In his recent book, Kevin Kelly shares that “we overestimate what we can do in a day and underestimate what we can do in ten years.” This inability to calibrate the relativity of time leads to stifled projections and, often, overpromises or underdelivers.  

In a recent workshop with the Stanford d.school, we worked through a variety of exercises that followed a new framework of five approaches they created for encountering uncertainty like a futurist. One of the panelists, Tim Foxx, Director, Center for School Study Councils at UPenn, shared the following words: “For some, to access hope they must harvest it from the future rather than the present.”

This leads us to the first approach, worldbuilding.

Worldbuilding

Worldbuilding is adding rich texture and detail to the futures we imagine. It’s about making futures tangible through complex, considered storytelling. In the words of the d.school, “[it is] an architectural blueprint of a future society […] which allows us to prototype and even experience in multidimensions.” Frankly, we don’t do enough worldbuilding in any industry. What is the possible future that we are collectively imagining? One thing is for certain, we aren’t there yet.

Example: Throughout time, marginalized and oppressed communities have looked to worldbuilding as a way of “harvesting hope from the future”. Afrofuturism is one example of a group using worldbuilding towards a common good. Think Black Panther, the writings of Octavia Butler, the music of Parliament Funkadelic and more.

Example in Schools: In the education world, many folks are discussing an education ecosystem; we recently published a resource on the Unbundled Learning System. This ecosystem, although we have not yet seen a comprehensive picture of what world this might build, is a potential form of worldbuilding.

Trace Change Over Time

It’s crucial to learn from the past, so as not to make the same mistakes. We must “learn to see change in waves of patterns, cycles and trends. [We must] toggle between short-term possibilities and long-term promises.”

Example: Over time we have seen innovations that have followed an exponential growth curve. Whether it be economists measuring wealth, global trade influencing supply chains, etc. By looking at these curves we can better understand the potential impacts of a technology like AI and plan accordingly.

Example in Schools: John Dewey and others were saying many of the things we are saying today in the early 20th century. They were responding to industrialization. What are we responding to? How can we predict the next triggering event rather than react to it?

Seek Visions of Coexistence

Possibly the most crucial superpower of the 21st (and perhaps the 22nd century) will be to “learn to dream, imagine and build together.” This superpower differs from collaboration and creativity. It requires a multiplicity of possibilities, a radical empathy and an unrelenting hope.

To paraphrase the poet, author, activist and facilitator Adrienne Maree Brown, “We’re living inside the imagination of someone else.” It doesn’t work for most people and it certainly doesn’t work for the planet.  It’s time to imagine a new one.

Jane McGonigle from Institute for the Future says, “When something of massive consequence happens that no one predicted, we often say it was simply unimaginable. But the truth is, nothing is impossible to imagine. When we say something was unimaginable, usually it means we failed to point our imagination in the right direction.”

Example: Alongside the announcement of the Green New Deal, this video was put out as a political advertisement. Regardless of your view on the vision, the willingness to imagine was a welcome respite to the otherwise cynical barrage of political advertisements.

Example in Education: The Knowledge Society, a great program for young people to pursue emerging technologies and global challenges, encourages questioning and visioning the future. To respond to complexity, we will require nimble and powerful learning engines.

Seeing in Multiples

When was the last time a question you asked had a clean and clear answer? This approach to the future empowers you to “see in multiples,” and “allows us to get comfortable with plurality and ambiguity.”

Example: Climate solutions are complex and without seeing in multiples, it would be even more challenging to meet the great demands of the energy transition. Designing solutions that include a variety of energy sources (such as wind, nuclear and solar) is one way that multiplicity can drive change. 

Example in Schools: Unfortunately, it is still a rarity to see students on the school board. Although they are the core stakeholder in learning, they are frequently not included in the decision-making because, oftentimes, students are viewed as a vessel to be filled. A multiplicity mindset allows educators to view students as both mentee and mentor; someone to learn from while also being someone to share learning with.  

Empathy for the Future

So much of thinking about the future requires us to get outside of our own limited perspective to put ourselves in the shoes of those that we, and the earth, do not yet know. To design a just and equitable future we must first “seek to understand the full range of moral, ethical, social and equitable implications of different futures.”

Example: Roman Krznaric talks about “being a good ancestor.” Too often, we think about the future as a place to deal with our refuse (landfills, non-biodegradable plastics). Empathy for the future is a shift towards compostable goods and a dramatic reduction of single-use plastics.

Example in Schools: We know that innovation and disruption can move rapidly, sometimes overnight. One example of having empathy for the future is preparing our teachers (and thereby our students) with the skills mentioned in this blog. The future will not wait for us to catch up, it’s coming to us.               

Imagining new possibilities helps us to think beyond the box and identify new ways of thinking about new pathways for students. New technologies and trends that inform new learning models and skills shape new opportunities.  We are all futurists and are all capable of imagining what could be. Every decision we make shapes the reality for future generations. We must embrace not knowing, and prepare ourselves with new tools and mindsets that enable us to grapple with what could be and pay attention to signals that help predict and prepare for upcoming challenges.

Interested in learning more about futures and collectively imagining an education system that works for all learners? Sign up for our What if? Newsletter and get a weekly prompt, as well as join the queue for future design sessions and events.

The post The Time For Futures Is Now appeared first on Getting Smart.

One great example of this, recently highlighted in the New Yorker, is Connecticut Technical Education and Career Systems (CTECS). CTECS is a state-run vocational education program that offers high-quality technical education to students in Connecticut. It was established in 1910 and has since grown to become one of the most comprehensive technical education programs in the United States. With a focus on providing students with hands-on training, CTECS has earned a reputation for producing highly skilled professionals who are in demand across a range of industries.

CTECS offers a wide range of technical education programs across 17 campuses in Connecticut. These programs include courses in areas such as advanced manufacturing, automotive technology, culinary arts, information technology, healthcare, and many more. The programs are designed to prepare students for careers in their chosen field, whether they are looking to enter the workforce immediately or continue their education at a higher level.

Curriculum Development

The CTECS curriculum is shaped by a number of key stakeholders, enabling it to stay relevant and robust amidst technological changes.

Certain projects, like the development of a sustainability-minded e-house, are being funded and driven by interested community partners like the Connecticut Green Bank. CTECS also hires and leverages trade experts at the district level, attending trade shows, etc. Beyond that, there are program advisory committees and input from the state department of labor, ensuring workforce needs are being met throughout the state.

Teaching within these programs also requires some specific life experience. Teachers within CTECS must have at least 8 years in the field and maintain their licenses so that they are able to work within the community. Upon being hired, they must also take a few college classes that are reimbursed by the state. The CTECS network does its best to match what these potential teachers were making in their previous industry.

Community Connected Projects

Through this program, the students and the faculty co-run a business, The Student Workforce, that does real projects throughout the community. Aside from community members being able to bring their cars into the school for support from the young mechanics, members can apply online for the school to come do electrical, plumbing or other construction work on their house.

The school-run business will then vet the projects based on curriculum alignment and the size of the job. There is a maximum of 18 students per teacher for safety reasons and out-of-school projects must be able to utilize all 18 students. “The projects are meant to enhance learning and supplant budgetary restrictions,” said Brent McCartney, Architectural Construction trade consultant for CTECS who also oversees the Student Workforce. S “Teachers are selective with jobs to ensure the most diverse experience for students. This means some jobs are passed over to prevent redundancy.”.”

Once the project is done, the school is paid (usually about 1/5th the cost of a professional project). This revenue goes right back into the shops to help buy equipment, etc.

These students are also able to participate in a rigorous work-based learning program where they are able to leave school to work full or part-time jobs if they meet certain criteria.

In Conclusion

This program got off to a bit of a slow start, however, with the rising interest in trade-based professions, demand has surged in recent years. “For this next enrollment period, we got 7000 applications for our incoming class. That’s more than double the available seats,” said Kerry.

The next phase is the launching of a robust Career Center to better inform parents as well as students about the myriad work opportunities and to help industry partners more directly reach the students with news and announcements about project opportunities, event opportunities and more.

Across the country, there are skilled worker shortages and growing global challenges that will require reskilling and redoing infrastructure at a never before seen rate. One of the keys to addressing this shortage is to encourage more young people to consider a career in the trades. Many high school students are pushed towards traditional four-year college programs, even if they are not interested in pursuing a degree. However, CTECS offers an alternative path that can lead to a successful career without the need for a college degree. By providing students with a practical education that leads directly to a career, CTECS is helping to fill the skills gap in industries like electrical work.

The post Putting the Connect in Connecticut: Powerful Pathways to Employment from High School appeared first on Getting Smart.

We had just read Thomas Moore’s Utopia in class and my mind was full of the possibility of “What if…?”. I went to my parents, the bearers of good ideas, and asked them if they had any ideas of what I should learn about. (What a question.)

Fortunately, my dad told me about something that set me on a journey of discovery – one that is finding renewed and even more vibrant relevance in my life today.

My dad, an architect, told me about the concept of biomimicry—how wind turbines were often shaped after the designs and curvatures of bird wings and dolphin fins, how termite hills were uniquely well adapted for cooling structures through their systems of tunneling and how materials sciences were bound for a breakthrough. He softly encouraged me to learn more.

I went to my local library and checked out Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature by Janine M. Benyus. Over the course of my research (aka looking at pictures, diagrams and bolded words), I began to see things through a new lens off the page. I started spotting places where our world rubbed with friction against nature’s design and places where they met in harmony. It would not be a surprise to me if this project, and others like it, are why I get so energized around interrogating society’s status quo. Is it by design? Is it arbitrary? Have we been paying attention?

In a recent episode of On Being, Janine was interviewed by Krista Tippet, bringing rushes of this project back to the fore. In this conversation, she says one of the more miraculous things: “[life] creates conditions conducive to life.” It’s a simple sentiment, but incredibly complex. I began wondering if that’s how I live my life—if that’s how we design schools and communities.

Janine also alluded to the revised design principles of biomimicry. Her book was the first time I saw a replicable blueprint for design. Since then I’ve seen many more (design thinking, etc.), but this one stuck with me. The revised 26 Principles of Life are:

My eighth-grade self wound up designing a rough blueprint of an electricity-free microphone modeled after the body of a cicada, one of the loudest creatures I knew of on a decibel-to-centimeter scale. To this day I have no idea if it would work. The learnings from this project ran much deeper than a product. It shaped the way I navigate and see the world today.

Imagine a world in which these principles were core teachings of school and projects. What if the purpose of school is and always has been, to quote Janine, to “create conditions conducive to life?”

The post An Unexpected Pathway: How Life’s Design For Life Changed Mine appeared first on Getting Smart.

As the waves of change lose their longevity, one might wonder why we’re already talking about the next industrial revolution when it seems we just entered into a new one. Well, it’s because Industry 5.0 is an urgent and necessary complement to the world of work, one in which purpose is sought with profits, and companies are expected to be a part of the solutions our societies seek. The work-based learning pathways that incorporate apprenticeships and mentorship leading to family-sustaining wages should also include opportunities to develop entrepreneurial thinking and sustainability elements critical to a thriving and regenerative economic ecosystem.

As the world scrambles to find solutions to the damage we’ve caused to our people and planet, one thing seems certain – human ingenuity is essential to rethinking systems and finding alternative ways of doing things. This requires skills beyond problem-solving. It requires complex thinking, problem-finding, understanding interdependency and systems…basically, we need innovation with purpose. As Zoe Weil would say, we need solutionaries. By intentionally including traditional entrepreneurial skills such as leadership, design thinking, finance, marketing, and creativity into any pathways program, learners develop agency to not only earn a family-sustaining wage but potentially build opportunities for others (and themselves) in the future.

That being said, this is a two-way road. Many schools and programs around the world are doing a great job at instilling some of the above skills but without creating scaffolding, supports or pathways for their learners. This is a huge missed opportunity for both our people and our planet.

The Opportunity of Social Entrepreneurship

The idea of social entrepreneurship started to gain recognition around the 1980s and has since gained momentum globally. Social entrepreneurship bridges the mission-driven approach of the non-profit with the quest for sustainable revenue streams of a for-profit. At its core, it is a business with a purpose to generate a positive impact for society – or the environment-  through its products or services. It is an essential model in a world where nonprofits compete for a limited pool of funds.

In places where it is easier for companies and individuals to register as a mission-driven organization, data tells us that the opportunity is there. For instance, in the European Union the social economy equates to about 8% GDP and 13.6 million jobs. In the U.K., the social economy adds about £60 billion to its economy. As we search for data – or the lack thereof -on the social economy in the U.S. we can only wonder if we might do more to fuel human ingenuity and drive us out of this for-profit versus non-profit dichotomy that prevents us from unlocking the potential of our own social economy. Perhaps by exposing students to the field of social entrepreneurship we do more to support Industry 5.0 in which students are generating wealth while also solving problems and adding value to society.

There is no better practice field than schools for nurturing entrepreneurial skills, ideas and talents which is why we must find ways to embed sustainability into what we are already doing. Not only does this better equip our youth for jobs of the future, but they understand that sustainability isn’t just about doing good – there’s also opportunity in doing good. Purpose and profits are not necessarily combat against one another as the usual rhetoric might portray. Infusing “purpose” behind existing pathways that exist in our schools is one of the most practical ways to facilitate the rise of social business as a pathway. Many schools are already doing great work.

University Charter School

Entrepreneurship programs at the secondary level are numerous and traditionally have fallen into business tracks. School programs that deliver on a purpose mindset and entrepreneurial mindset take traditional business courses and change them into robust entrepreneurship opportunities to allow students to design and create. University Charter School in Alabama built a Rural Business and Entrepreneurship program within a K-12 setting. As a five-year-old school, students have already launched a coffee shop, bait and tackle supply business, and food delivery service. It’s in how they operate -from supply chains to packaging – where students get the opportunity to assess their footprint and how their business offers value to the community.

Harvesting Housing

Social entrepreneurship often arises from those who have identified a problem, and are using business principles to solve it. This methodology can encourage students to tackle place-based, community challenges in creative ways. A group of students from Immokalee Florida, the children of migrant farmers, spotted a need within their community. The red tape and convoluted processes around housing made for inhospitable conditions, difficult legalities and contracts that served property owners rather than the tenants. To combat this, these students created a company called Harvesting Housing, an awareness-building engine and potential resource for affordable housing opportunities for migrant workers.

Mauka Market

In Hawai’i, entrepreneurship and place are inextricably linked. Students often identify climate challenges and address them with innovations of place or returning to more ancestral practices. One example of this is Mauka Market, a regenerative farmer’s market concept created by Trinity Asing, an alumni of the student entrepreneurship accelerator Nalukai.

“My senior year of high school I started a farmers market as part of a class project on how we could make our school more sustainable. This made me fall in love with entrepreneurship and sustainability,” said Trinity Asing in an episode of the Getting Smart Podcast.

Her co-guest and former teacher Aaron Schorn (also a columnist) shared “When you work with others you [start to] care about the problems they face, the communities they’re in […] Making entrepreneurship place-based is so vital.”

There are countless other examples of schools empowering young people to pursue entrepreneurial skills, but it’s time we start thinking about how to transition entrepreneurship for profit into entrepreneurship for purpose and what K-12 systems can do to support young entrepreneurs on their journey into their best next step. No matter the pathway, consideration of resource use, waste production, energy consumption, supply chain origins, etc. can support employees who consider the balance of economic and ecological drivers in daily decision-making.

Students achieve incredible feats when given the platform to do so. While we don’t expect every student exposed to social entrepreneurship to become a social entrepreneur, we do believe the skills that translate from this sort of exposure help them to form a valuable toolkit. The ability to apply entrepreneurial skills towards challenges, and more importantly towards creating value for society set them up to create value for whatever profession they might choose. To help students hone these skills, it’s vital we help students understand the skills they gain from their endeavors so they understand how these might transfer into the workplace, or towards a future venture. Too often projects or courses might feel like one-and-done. Student ventures must be treated carefully. We need to create spaces where it’s okay to fail (and again no failure if students understand the skills they’ve flexed), but also where it’s okay to take those ideas to the next level. National competitions can be embedded within every pathway to help students see possibilities.

While there appear to be many programs popping up to support and fund the entrepreneurial ideas of young people, they may not be easy to find. Here are a few of our favorites championing pathway funding or programs for entrepreneurial ideas/young changemakers:

• Ashoka has been a pioneer and thought leader in the entrepreneurship space since the 1980s. They have great resources and programming to support young social innovators.
• Earth Foundation donates money to youth-led projects that address the environment.
• The IB has launched a Festival of Hope to give youth a voice. As follow-up, they’ve partnered with HundrED to support young innovators and actors.
• The Youth Entrepreneurship Challenge from NFTE is an 8 month opportunity to build and pitch a business.

We’d love to hear more examples of this work: student stories, entrepreneurship challenges that you’re familiar with and more. Leave them in the comments below!

The post A Purpose Proposal: Entrepreneurial Thinking and Sustainability Must Be Core Components of Pathways appeared first on Getting Smart.