Crossroads News
Design & Engineering Advisory Committee Visits Bay Area
Trip will inform new curriculum for K-12.
Six members of Crossroads’ Design & Engineering Advisory Committee recently traveled to the San Francisco Bay Area to visit institutions offering a variety of design thinking and engineering programs for students. The committee includes Crossroads math, science, technology and art teachers, parents, students and alumni.
The following members of the committee made the trip:
Kelly Castaneda, Upper School math chair
Dori Friedman, Middle School technology coordinator
Jeff Guckert, assistant head of school
Grace Hayek, Upper School science teacher
Joy Watt, Elementary School technology coordinator
Paul Way, Academic technology coordinator
The group visited Stanford University’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (better known as the d.school) and enjoyed a tour of the university’s Product Realization Lab. They spoke with the d. school’s K12 Lab Network program manager about class structure, the Stanford design process and best teaching practices. The team also visited four independent schools—The Nueva School, Lick-Wilmerding High School, Marin Country Day School and Crystal Springs Uplands School—that have incorporated design thinking and/or interdisciplinary engineering projects into their curricula. Additional inspiration was garnered from an evening spent at the Exploratorium science museum.
Paul Way reports, “We met with educators, visited maker spaces, discussed design thinking, checked out equipment and listened. The ideas and excitement for new innovations in learning was really amazing.”
The information gathered will be used to develop Crossroads’ new design and engineering curriculum, inspired in part by the Science Education & Research Facility under construction in the Alley. The new Upper School course will involve a combination of design thinking, building and making, and will build on the work currently being done in the Elementary and Middle schools.
