Delivering the Promise

            There are times, as Head of School, when one wonders if we are delivering on the promises we make. We talk a great deal about our mission, values, and vision for example. Our kids are almost always polite in public, thanking their teachers after their classes, but how do they act outside the classroom? Does every teacher here really know his or her students well? Is it true that kids never fall through the cracks at Berwick Academy? Is it actually cool to be smart here?

            One bold promise we make is in regards to our Innovation Center. On our website, we put it this way: “The Berwick Innovation Center is an evolving program that reaches far beyond the physical Berwick Academy campus. BIC allows students the opportunity to follow their own intrinsic path to discovery.” During this particular year, having been to some conferences to promote the success of this program, I entered Monday’s event with a slightly more critical lens than usual. I wondered if this program we were so proud of was actually delivering the kinds of results we were talking about so boldly.

            While I had to be on the move for much of the celebration, I spent the bulk of my time in one room and had the chance to hear a number of presentations. One was about the construction of complex mathematical shapes through fabric and sewing, including the Klein bottle. The second involved a student who had purchased a 3D printer kit for $600 and built it at home but wondered if he could do better. Thinking about the usefulness of this technology and its need in underprivileged areas, he actually built a functioning 3D printer for about $130 dollars. It included free parts from a copier that he deconstructed and fishing line to shuttle the printing mechanism where it needed to go. Finally, a student who decided he wanted to figure out a way to re-carbonate flat soda. Separate from a detailed explanation of chemistry that was so far beyond me it was embarrassing, his presentation included some videos of exploding two liter soda bottles at his home. It seems students still love blowing things up, just like we did so many years ago.

            There were other presentations that also grabbed me, like one on music production – all of them, however, revealed our students in some state of academic “flow.” This psychological state of “being in the zone” is being written about more and more regularly in academia. What I saw was our students completely lost in their passions and their discoveries. It also looked intrinsic to me – it came from within them and not because their teachers or their school told them that they should be excited about their particular questions.

            I left Jackson library once again confident that this was a real thing. Our Innovation movement on this campus is changing the way we think about great learning. It is also helping us validate the unique interest of our brightest kids – reinforcing that it is, in fact, cool to be smart here. So with my confidence restored by the Innovation Celebration, I now turn my attention to a graduation speech. I find myself searching for yet another round of bold Berwick promises that we can test.