Schools of the future

Redesigning schools and an entire education system is clearly a complex problem. We must reach out beyond our own experiences and ideas to reimagine what’s possible and challenge ourselves to come up with the best possible solutions.

Context is absolutely critical but its easy to get stuck with what has and hasn’t worked before and to start to manage our expectations for what we can achieve. 

Looking around the world for inspiration challenges our assumptions and helps us to expand the range of possibilities that we can consider. We call this process ‘horizon scanning’. It is a future-focused research method that helps us to discover how other places, sectors and initiatives have approached similar situations and innovated to get radical new outcomes.

This isn’t about looking for the answer in a single place.  None of the ideas or the practice we will explore here are exactly right for Bermuda in their current forms. However, when we begin to take examples from other places apart and a look at what makes them special, we can begin to identify what feels fresh and ambitious and what we think we can use in our own work.  

Exercise

This exercise can be done individually, but often the richness from horizon scanning comes when you talk to your peers about what you have each discovered as you may have been drawn to different things.

Here we have done the horizon scanning for you, and have shared three case studies about schools who are redesigning teaching and learning in equally ambitious but quite different ways.

Step-by-step guide:

  1. Read the three case studies here, or you can download them as seperate documents here too.

  2. Once you have read them, spend a few minutes thinking about what you found most interesting or inspiring about these examples. What in particular were you drawn to? What made you want to find out more? What did you feel challenged by? Remember, we are not seeking to replicate what other schools and educations systems do, so keep an open mind while reflecting on their approaches and what aspects of them might look like in Bermuda’s context, or in your local school.

  3. If you are working in a pair or a group, connect with your peers and share your insights. Was there anything you were all equally drawn to? If so, what do you think this might mean for your local school, and for education in Bermuda more broadly?

  4. If you have felt inspired, excited or challenged by these examples, you can share your thoughts on Twitter using the #LearningFirstBDA hashtag.

Case study: Australian Science and Maths School, Australia

Case study: Australian Science and Maths School, Australia

Case study: High Tech High, USA

Case study: High Tech High, USA

Case study: Te Kura, New Zealand

Case study: Te Kura, New Zealand

 
 
SUGGESTED TIME: 
20 minutes
LEVEL OF DIFFICULTY:
Medium
MATERIALS NEEDED:
The three school case studies 
PARTICIPANTS:
You can do this exercise by yourself, but even better if you can connect with someone to share your thoughts