Barbara Lawlor

Nederland

Last Thursday, January 11, 2018, a group of Nederland Elementary and Middle/Senior High School parents attended the screening of an awarding-winning film highlighting how schools should adapt to support student goals for success. The film, "Most Likely to Succeed", is an eye-opener; depicting how the world is changing because of technology.

College graduates, according to the film, need to take a look at what their goals are and how they will attain them, rather than following the memorizing and regurgitating learning method many of them learned.

Facts: 53 percent of recent college graduates are under or unemployed

45 percent of recent college graduates are still living with their parents.

Millennials will work at 15-20 jobs over the course of their working lives.

65 percent of today’s grade-school children will end up in jobs that haven’t been invented yet.

The World Economic Forum reports that creative will become one of the top three skills in demand by 2020.

Emotional intelligence (EI), never before in the top 10, will become the sixth most in-demand skill by 2020.

EI is the capability of individuals to recognize their own emotions and those of others, discern between different feelings and label them appropriately, to manage emotions in order to adapt to different environments or achieve one’s goals. Perceiving, using, understanding and managing emotions results in adaptive behaviors for better social and family relations, resulting in better work performances and leadership.

The film documented a school that is designed to utilize a learning model which resembles the Expedential Learning program that Nederland PreK12 schools are embarking on.

EL Education is school reform and development that includes learning expeditions, active pedagogy, school culture and character, leadership and school improvement and structures, to work together and support one another, to promote high achievement through active learning, character growth and teamwork.

Robotic technology will take over the jobs that require manual repetition and reciting information that can be found with the flick of a thumb. Workers will need to find ways to keep up with the rapidly changing needs of industry, to become more creative than an intelligent device.

The film took a look at a school whose students decide what they want to create and then they learn the necessary tools to accomplish that goal; it looks at the design of a learning space to enable more easily accessible interaction with their classmates.

NES principal Laurel Reckert, BVSD Director of Educational Innovations Kiffany Lychock and NMSHS principal Carrie Yantzer led the meeting before the film was shown, explaining the connections of educational success, EL Education and the innovations cited in the film. With Phase 2 of the Bond funds gearing up for construction, the philosophies presented in the film could be in Ned’s near future.

NES has a $5,256,150 bond coming in Phase 2 of the project with a $200,000 budget. This money is not for concrete or roofs or landscaping. It is for implementing ideas, for tools to learn in an expeditionary way.

Principal Reckert said innovation funds will be used to move walls and create different space. For example: removing the long tables in the cafeteria and have furniture that lends itself to conversation.

“I am going to a furniture vendor tomorrow,” said Reckert, a grin on her face. She planned a flexible space and a furniture scouting trip. Walls on which students can work. Writable tables. Furniture on rollers to be easily moved. Flexible seating in which children can wiggle and move, their bodies free to keep the blood moving instead of being folded up in hard immovable wooden prisons.

“Students need a comfortable learning space,” she told the parents.

The biggest changes will be a new playground, new office spaces and space for a full day preschool and kindergarten. Phase 2 will begin in April.

Included in the main construction project will be these improvements to the facility: a new roof, remodeled kitchen and cafeteria, carpet, tile and paint; paving and irrigation, restroom renovations and audio enhancement.

Security in the main entry will be redesigned and security partitions and electronic security controls will be installed. Upgrades to HVAC controls, lighting and the boiler will take place.

NMSHS will receive $6,602,600 with $600,000 included in an innovation budget. Much of the same construction will be done to the facility, including replacing the bleachers, providing a multi-purpose fitness room, modernizing the weight room and upgrading the baseball/playfield.

Innovation Funds will be divided into three projects. The first is to provide flexible furniture for the classrooms that will encourage risk taking, inquiry, social learning and learner led activities. The next project will be the inclusion of creative, collaborative space throughout the building and the outfitting of these spaces with furniture and tools that encourage students to collaborate, be learners and take their learning out of the classroom.

The third project is to open up the library and make it a learning common area, connecting the makerspace, student union and other public places on the first floor. This will allow for student supervision and will be accessible to students throughout the school day. A space will be created for students to learn in a social environment that allows them to leverage library resources and makerspace to encourage creativity, curiosity and innovation.

Administrators say the new space will allow teachers and students to apply innovative teaching and learning models that the present facility does not easily foster. These changes will directly align the focus toward EL Education.

The learning outcomes will result in students becoming leaders of their own learning. They will create solutions that impact our community, and the world.