These films look specifically at ways in which school leaders and educators are testing and proving project-based models for a new, student-centered model of learning.
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An Introduction
These films look specifically at ways in which school leaders and educators are ... (More)
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Essential Learning at Hip Hop High, David "T.C." Ellis
David E. Ellis, the founder and director of the High School for Recording ... (More)
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Designing Schools for 21st Century Learning, Randall Fielding
Randall Fielding, AIA, is the Chairman and Founding Partner of ... (More)
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Online Learning for Disaffected Youth, Jean Johnson, Notschool.net
Jean Johnson has worked in the education field for 25 years ... (More)
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Project-based Learning at High Tech High, Larry Rosenstock
Larry Rosenstock taught carpentry for eleven years, after law school ... (More)
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An Introduction These films look specifically at ways in which school leaders and educators are ... (More)An Introduction
These films look specifically at ways in which school leaders and educators are testing and proving project-based models for a new, student-centered model of learning. This collection -- which includes profiles of school innovators David "T.C." Ellis, Jean Johnson, and Larry Rosenstock, as well as a profile of school architect Randall Fielding -- explores collaborative, creative, multi-disciplinary approaches to engaging students. Each leader has developed personalized, project-based approaches for students that encourage them to take ownership of the ways in which they learn and present what they know. Together, these films suggest just how much young people can achieve when their education is well aligned to their own natural interests. -
Essential Learning at Hip Hop High, David "T.C." Ellis David E. Ellis, the founder and director of the High School for Recording ... (More)Essential Learning at Hip Hop High, David "T.C." Ellis
David E. Ellis, the founder and director of the High School for Recording Arts (“Hip Hop High”), was born and raised in St. Paul Minnesota, and is a graduate of the St. Paul Open School. Mr. Ellis established himself in the music business in the mid-eighties as the first rap recording artist to release a record in Minnesota, the “Twin City Rap.” After a couple of independent record releases with regional success, he was recruited by Prince and Warner Brothers to record and produce records at Paisley Park. Eventually, Ellis started his own production company, Studio 4, where a number of young black artists who had dropped out of high school soon became a permanent presence. These young artists would ask Ellis questions about recording their music, copyrighting and publishing their work, reading and understanding a recording contract, and so on. Guiding them through the creative and business process of the recording industry, Ellis was struck by the way the youth naturally embraced academic subjects that supported their pursuit of music careers. With that realization, and after a two-year pilot program, the High School for Recording Arts was born. It received a charter from the Minnesota Department of Education and emerging as the only public school of its kind in the United States. At the High School for Recording Arts the classes are small. The education is tailored to students’ interests and needs, and guided by faculty advisors. But it’s the school’s respect for the hip hop back beat and poetry of today’s inner-city youth that make the High School for Recording Arts (HSRA) in Minnesota’s Twin Cities a model educational program for at-risk youth, grades 9-12. The High School for Recording Arts is a 501(c) 3 nonprofit corporation and remains the only recording arts school of its kind in the United States. Based on the small schools model concept, annual school enrollment averages 200 students; faculty and staff number about 30; the student/advisor ratio (HSRA teachers are called advisors) is 20 to 1. The school targets youth who have opted out of traditional schools in favor of a creative, non-traditional setting with an educational culture that better fits their learning styles and needs. HSRA students have the opportunity to (1) obtain a high school diploma while learning about the music/recording business and (2) create a professional, web-based digital portfolio that includes a résumé and college acceptance letter. Students are recruited through a variety of methods including public announcements, open house events, and HSRA student visits to area middle schools and through word of mouth and HSRA student referrals. To earn a high school diploma, HSRA students must master Minnesota’s content standards, complete all coursework required for graduation, accomplish the 12 HSRA validations of learning, and pass the state’s standardized assessments. David has recently been honored as an Oxford University Roundtable Fellow for his work with Studio 4/High School for Recording Arts. While at Oxford, David presented his work before leading educators from around the world to wide acclaim. -
Designing Schools for 21st Century Learning, Randall Fielding Randall Fielding, AIA, is the Chairman and Founding Partner of ... (More)Designing Schools for 21st Century Learning, Randall Fielding
Randall Fielding, AIA, is the Chairman and Founding Partner of Fielding Nair International, LLC (FNI), an award-winning school planning and design firm with offices in Minneapolis, Tampa, Madison and Melbourne, Australia. The firm has consultations in 23 states around the U.S. and 26 countries. Randy oversees FNI’s primary mission to improve learning by serving as a world leader in the creation of new and renovated educational campuses that are in consonance with best practice and research. Fielding’s achievements have earned him more than a dozen design awards from the American Institute of Architects, The Council of Educational Facility Planners International (CEFPI), the American Association of School Administrators, and School Planning and Management Magazine. He is internationally recognized as an authority on innovative school design and received the CEFPI Planner of the Year Award in 2007 — the most prestigious honor of any individual in the field of educational design. He has been selected to serve as an architect, consultant, presenter and/or keynote speaker in Australia, Azerbaijan, Canada, Cayman Islands, Chile, Finland, Great Britain, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Portugal, Qatar, Singapore, The Czech Republic, The Netherlands, Sri Lanka, Spain, Switzerland, and the United States. One of Fielding’s “signatures” is his ability to come down off of the podium, sharing ideas with heads of state, educators, and children with equal passion. This spirit of sharing extends to two million people each year, through DesignShare.com, an online forum for innovative learning environments that Fielding founded in 1998. He continues to serve as DesignShare’s editorial director, but the focus of his work is to lead communities in the design of environmentally responsive campuses that foster personalized learning and strong connections to the community. Fielding’s design work leverages more than 500 case studies from 30 countries — the largest library of innovative school designs in the world. The interactive planning and design process pioneered by FNI is also grounded in a seminal book that Fielding co-authored with Prakash Nair, entitled The Language of School Design. The book establishes key learning modalities for success in the post-information society, and provides a series of design patterns to support these modalities. Randy uses the design patterns as a tool in evaluating existing and proposed facilities, and as a launching point for developing customized solutions for each individual community, campus, school or district that he works with. In addition to serving as a lead design architect, teamwork underpins all of Fielding’s work, which takes him around the world to collaborate with public and private institutions, educators, developers, and local architects. Whether it’s a high school near ground zero in New York City, a series of vocational schools for the tsunami-damaged areas of Sri Lanka, a school for at-risk students in Minneapolis, a K-12 campus in Indonesia, or a college preparatory school in Switzerland, he finds more commonalties in each community than differences. -
Online Learning for Disaffected Youth, Jean Johnson, Notschool.net Jean Johnson has worked in the education field for 25 years ... (More)Online Learning for Disaffected Youth, Jean Johnson, Notschool.net
Jean Johnson has worked in the education field for 25 years following a spell in industry. She began her teaching career in East London schools working with difficult and disaffected teenagers. In 1993 she began working with new technologies and was one of the first teachers to pilot the use of the internet in schools. She was part of the early developer group of schools for Oracle’s Think.com, contributing to the final design of the software. Since then she has been involved in a number of high profile on-line projects both in the UK and abroad, working with schools as far apart as Sweden, Finland, the USA, India, Japan and New Zealand. Projects have included Web for Schools, Learning in the New Millennium, Schools on Line and the Virtual Classroom. Her work within Europe was influential in developing a model for the use of the internet in schools in the European Union. In 1998 she was presented with an award as Teacher of the Year. Johnson went on to develop and lead the Notschool.net research project, working in the field of social inclusion for disadvantaged youth, focusing particularly in the creative and innovative use of multimedia to develop learning. In 2005, she formed TheCademy, a charity committed to inclusion with Notschool.net as its flagship project. Her team won the prestigious 2005 e-well being award for digital inclusion, Johnson has written a number of reports and papers, including extensive work on internet-based accreditation and content delivery models. Notschool helps kids explore what really interests them by constructing an online curriculum around those interests, consequently re-engaging them in learning. In partnership with the local school council, Notschool carefully guides its “researchers” back onto a path to graduation and eventually to college or university. -
Project-based Learning at High Tech High, Larry Rosenstock Larry Rosenstock taught carpentry for eleven years, after law school ... (More)Project-based Learning at High Tech High, Larry Rosenstock
Larry Rosenstock taught carpentry for eleven years, after law school, in urban high schools in Boston andCambridge. He served as staff attorney for two years at the Harvard Center for Law and Education, and was a lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for five years. Rosenstock was principal of the Rindge School of Technical Arts, and of the Cambridge Rindge and Latin School. He directed the federal New Urban High School Project, was president of the Price Charitable Fund, and is the founding principal of High Tech High in San Diego. Rosenstock’s program, “CityWorks”, won the Ford Foundation Innovations in State and Local Government Award in 1992, and he is an Ashoka Fellow. High Tech High eliminates traditional boundaries between "technical" education (code for tracking low-income kids) and traditional college preparatory, liberal arts-style secondary education (typically provided to students from higher income backgrounds). In its place, High Tech High offers a highly stimulating educational environment that encourages students to immerse themselves in real-world career experiences. Instead of attending regular classroom lectures, taking tests, and turning in homework assignments, High Tech High students spend four years working primarily on individual and group projects that provide hands-on experiences, and are complemented by academic curricula. Students are assessed for their work in teams as well as individually. Nationally recognized as "the high school of the future," High Tech High serves as a public "learning lab" and hosts at least 1,000 visitors a year who are interested in learning about the model. Rosenstock introduces innovations at the staff management level, as well as in the architecture of the school. He has persuaded the State of California to pass new teacher certification legislation, and as a result, High Tech High can now recruit and hire teachers like physicists, mathematicians, and computer technologists from nontraditional backgrounds. These accomplished professionals join High Tech High because it is a place where they can continue to be creative and at the same time teach and give back. Perhaps Rosenstock’s greatest innovation is his vision for the curriculum. Prior to launching High Tech High, Rosenstock served for two years as the director of the New Urban High School project. This study involved a nationwide effort to find, describe, and design new models for America's high schools. Through this effort Rosenstock identified the core best practices from the highest-performing schools in some of the worst neighborhoods. Several core school-design principles emerged from this study, including: personalization–students learn better when teachers know them well; adult-world immersion, like internships and projects based in the community; and a common intellectual mission, by which every student receives an equal education without distinctions like "college prep" and "technical" (or vocational technical) preparation.