What is the secret?
“There is no risk-taking without a culture of trust and respect.” ~Tony Wagner at the Changing the Odds Conference. That is the REAL secret to why students at Rainbow Community School become innovators.
“Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.”
ISIS, Ebola, narcissistic politicians, constant change and churning. As parents, we have so much at stake: how do we protect our precious ones from the turmoil while still being aware of what is happening all around us? It isn’t hard to get swept up in a tide of despair. Or guilt — How many times have you wondered, “Why are so many people suffering, while my chief complaint is one of internal struggle? How did I get ‘lucky?'” It all seems so unjust. However, being despondent is certainly not what our children need from us. They need equanimity.
“Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.” His Holiness, the Dalai Lama.
My husband is an activist. Most of his time is spent attending meetings, events, canvassing, reporting the news, fact-checking…He has been able to turn his rage about the world into action. Others who feel they don’t have the time, become philanthropists. Some become teachers. And many of us become parents intent on raising conscientious children. We each have to do what we can, but no single one of us can do it all.
Slow Food/ Slow Education
I love this article by Shelley Wright. She sounds like she is describing Rainbow Community School.
Are You Ready to Join the Slow Education Movement?
The Intersection of Art and Science
Yesterday, a journalist asked me, “Why are the arts important?” As a school that is educating students to be inventors and innovators, so they are “…prepared to be leaders in building a compassionate and environmentally sustainable world.”
I love the first point in this article from Vanity Fair. The rest of the article is short and worth a read too.
Heart of the Matter: Educating the Innovation Generation, Part IV
How Can a School Promote a Culture of Innovation?
As I enter the “Omega” (7th and 8th grade) classroom at Rainbow Community School, a large Buckminster Fuller-designed dymaxion world map is on the floor, the basis for a game where students are moving around chips that represent various world resources.
Incorporating Systems Thinking
Two students with laptops are meeting with Jason Cannoncro, one of the lead teachers, about a grant proposal they are writing to create a local non-profit organization that will give homeless people work on the many organic farms in Asheville. Several students are puzzling over models they are creating of sustainable energy systems. One girl is playing a radio powered by a tiny solar panel system she designed herself.
How Can We Design Systems to Ensure All Humans Have Their Needs Met?
The curriculum at Rainbow Community School has been carefully designed and refined to prepare students for the culminating middle school unit described above.The essential problem that students ask and begin to solve in that unit is,
“How can we design our systems and our culture to ensure that all humans on Earth have their needs met, without depleting planetary resources?”
The Native Americans thought of sustainability in terms of seven generations. They might have asked the essential question for the unit in this format: “How can we provide dignity for each human and all living beings for the next seven generations?”In this unit students are asked to think about human equity and fulfillment, and how to get there. They are required to develop designs and prototypes for inventions that help sustain the natural world, while providing for a high quality of living. Students who are successful within this multi-faceted, complex unit are the next generation of innovators. How does Rainbow Community School prepare its students for this culminating unit?
You can find out how RCS prepares its students and more on part IV here.
RCS Director, Renee Owen has a series of Educating the Innovation Generation articles.
Click below to see the other parts:
Educating the Innovation Generation – Part I
