Welcome

Last year's trip to Costa Rica showed us that education can, and should, be a life-altering experience. This year, a largely new group of students, have decided to learn about and travel to Puerto Rico. With this new topic and destination in mind, we have developed a year-long interdisciplinary class that is based on the same three core principles:

1) Travel to expand students' horizons
2) An explicit connection between the classroom and real world
3) The use of sweat equity for students to see that their efforts can make a difference

During the early fall, the curriculum was largely focused on developing the 21st Century Skills of problem solving, critical thinking, decision-making, and collaboration. This was initially done using group challenges in the classroom, but then became vitally important once we started raking lawns. In addition to being our major fundraiser, this hard work put students in positions that required group problem solving, as well as perseverance and responsibility – traits that we all know are central to changing the trajectory of their lives.

During the winter and spring, each student will be developing an independent research project on a chosen aspect of Puerto Rico. We hope that you will keep checking back as we share our learning, growth and adventures.

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Mariahs Reflection

I have never felt like such a big piece of a class or anything for that matter. Other students say they look up to me as a leader or a role model. I have never had anyone look up to me like students in this class say they do. I try to be positive and show them that I am a great positive leader and I will also point them in the correct direction. In a class like Sustainable Education, you will learn a lot about yourself as well as each student and teacher as individuals and not just another person.

I learned that no matter what is going on outside of the class shouldn't matter. I needed to focus on what was going on, not what happened, and it took a long time to learn that. No one can learn from any mistakes accept for their own. I have learned from my mistakes which makes me feel more grateful now than ever.

In our class it feels like such a great family, we don't always get along but that's the price you pay when you spend a lot of time together. I can’t really describe how much this class and the people in mean to me, but I can say it’s amazing! I absolutely wouldn't give this school or this class up for anything in the world. It’s so much more than that. Like I said were a family! Thank you, everyone, for believing in me and having such high expectations because if it wasn't for all of the pushing and pulling I wouldn't have been able to be as successful.




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