Idea School Premises

Our school, yet to have an official name (we're currently running with Idea School), is operating on several premises:

• Students most easily learn what engages and inspires them (interest based)
• Students need more real-world experience while attending school.
• Students will be motivated to accomplish something great and world/community changing if they are provided a supportive, yet challenging environment.

Based upon these things, we believe we can change the world. We are currently hiring teachers and are recruiting students. We have little money, no building, and a lot of work to do. However, we have a vision and a mission: "To greatly improve higher education by providing our students with a supportive community of active learners and teachers, who's aim is to create value while solving real-world problems. We do work that matters."

Ryan

Idea School Method

The school is student centered and project focused.

Students will come up with projects or business ideas that they want to enact. We initially require them to put it down on paper so that we can work with them on the idea, though teachers are discouraged from criticizing the idea itself. We want to see what happens when we turn our students loose.

After the student puts down the idea they meet with their "home teacher" who is much akin to a guidance counselor, though much more. The student and the "home teacher" discuss which classes would be best for the student to take with the student making the final decision. Classes could be:

• Marketing
• Human Resources
• Accounting
• Business Theory

 OR

• Legal Entities
• Fund Raising
• Networking
• The Ethics of Outsourcing
• Singing
• Painting with Acrylics

We actually want to stray from teaching subject matter technically, but instead provide a learning environment for a particular subject.

The classes are meant to supplement the student's knowledge so that they can test the skills and information necessary to complete their project, not just learn about them. The project could be a business that the student wants to found, it could be a non-profit/community organization, or it could be a way to fund and expand the influence of their art or music.

This is an exploratory school as well. Students are encouraged to test particular paths they are interested in, which is why classes are to be 1-2 months long (as opposed to 5 months) and why classes will be between $80 and $300 instead of $500 to $5,000.

When the student "graduates", they do not receive a certificate of any kind (this may change when we begin to do professional/vocational training, 1-2 years out) Instead, the student accomplished something real! Either their business is off the ground and they are now obtaining funding (VC, Angel, bootstrapping, etc.), or they have a sustainable platform for their art or music projects via fund raising and networking.

UWC very interesting

UWC

UWC's mission: UWC makes education a force to unite people, nations and cultures for peace and a sustainable future

Hiring teachers!

If you or anybody you know is interested here's the ad:

Our organization is looking for open-minded teachers to work with us while we develop a new education model. We are targeting collegiate students:

-College Dropouts
-New entrants
-Business Students
-Art Students

Teachers should possess the following qualities:

-Specific area of expertise (business, art, finance, etc.)
-Teaching experience or management experience
-Effective Communication
-No degree required

Compensation:
-Varies
-$20-50 per day
-2-4 hours per day
-1-4 days per week

In order to start the interview process we will need you to email a resume and cover letter to me at rr.chatterton@gmail.com telling us about yourself. Student-teachers are welcome to apply. You will be a key member of our organization going forward. We are looking to hire 3 teachers initially. If you are currently a teacher, this is fine. We will be delivering classes after hours in the afternoon and evening as well. This will be a very different teaching position compared to what many of you are used to and we hope you are up for the challenge. 

A call to action....

Our students need expert help to go... well, somewhere. They don't know exactly where they are going, and neither do we. Yet we keep asking them...

What are you going into?
What are you studying?
What do you want to be?

We need to stop. This is an uncomfortable question for most students, probably because they have no clue as to what they want to do with their lives.

I propose that students are explorers. They encounter new territory and search around for meaning. Once meaning is found, they set off to another place.

Students need to explore. They need to learn so that they can explore some more. Our students are charting new territory. There is no map to where they need to go. There never will be. So we need not teach them them how to better read maps, but how to better make maps, and navigate without them.

Exploration does not consist of taking a known path to a known location! On the contrary, it requires us to open our eyes, test the waters, and proceed boldly in the face of uncertainty. If we misstep, then we correct course and move along.

Our organization is engaging students here locally and helping them formulate and implement their ideas. We have to. It's the future.
 
There is no model for this movement. How could there be? We're still exploring and still creating it. I hope you create something similar in your community, or hell, copy it exactly (I'll post regular updates). We need it. The world depends on it. Go. Do. Now.

Watch this.

Our Manifesto

We're bored.

Let's be honest here. We're just bored. The way school works right now is boring.

Our friends tell us, "School isn't supposed to be fun. It's not meant to entertain you." They misunderstand us though. We're not saying that school should be like a video game (though maybe it should)we're saying that school shouldn't be as boring as it is now.

There is a difference.

We believe that school can be better. We want to learn in an environment that puts us in the real world tackling challenging problems that we care about. We do not want to sit in a classroom learning (or not learning, depending on how tired we are) about something that we do not care about. Why would we? We also understand the counter-argument to this. That maybe it doesn't matter what we care about, because society needs us to learn the things it teaches us, otherwise we won't know how to do things.

Wrong, dead wrong. We actually know that we will learn just as easily while being engaged in something that inspires us and changes our community. We want to change the world, and do homework that makes a difference.

We know that in order to engage our youth, we need to give them something to do that matters. It is no longer sufficient to tell us to tough it out. The world is changing, and we no longer accept your methods.

Day 1: First find, University Venture Fund

The Eccles School of Business has a special program called University Venture Fund. UVF is a student-run private equity fund that began in 2004 and raised $18 million from investors who are limited partners, meaning they depend on the work of the students to select investments that deliver a fair return on their money.

“When I sent out my resume consulting companies told me they were cutting back significantly on new hires, so I knew good grades alone would not get me the job I wanted, I needed work experience too… The experience just gives you a ton of confidence,” said University of Utah honors student Alexandra Weiss. “As a student, you can’t get that direct business education anywhere else.”

Only a handful of students belong to this organization and it seems to focus mostly on teaching students how to pick start-ups to invest in.

This is interesting to me. It shows that there is a desire to be a part of and to implement innovative programs where students are the performers and there are real stakes, not just theory in the classroom. This program seems small though, at least as far as student participants. However, they do claim to have been approached by a couple hundred student entrepreneurs across the United States. Which is not surprising considering that they can relate to each other on a student-student level.

Check it out here.

Ryan