3/28/11 New Education Philosophies for ITA

Being in ITA and working for ITA, I like many others are guilty for designing lesson plans that create projects just for fun. The students usually learn the material and some are even excited, but without a clear meaningful purpose to the BTW project other than getting a 100%, they never really get into the program. That's why I am excited for the new ways of ITA to create projects with a larger meaning. Usually we give the students all the creative freedom they want with projects and the students automatically pick something they like or something random. If we are more structured with a topic, the students can still be creative and create a social justice project.

There will need to be a fine balance between how much structure we provide the students so that they do not lose all creative freedom. One idea that we could use is themed choice session. For example, all projects for session 3-4 could be about anti-bullying.

Time Line

• Session 2: In Community hour talk about Anti-Bullying
• Session 3-4: In lab projects that revolve around anti-bullying

While this may not work for every program, all the projects the students do could revolve around this theme. The students in community hour, PRIOR, to having these session will have already discussed this issue so that the students have already thought about the problem. Also this wouldn't need to happen the entire ITA time, but would be cool to do once a semester. Also, this might help if the very first choice sessions/community hour were themed around what this years showcase project will be.

Another way we can improve social justice projects is out of classroom learning experiences. These could be mini field trips on campus or with speakers inside. When I created my video project about the food pantry, it was helpful to volunteer their first and then start filming. This would vary depending on what the issue was about of course.