Snapshot: Spring Break

While Spring Break is known for beach vacations and relaxation time, Harvard Graduate School of Education students are redefining that week off. Here’s a snapshot of three different ways HGSE students used last week’s Spring Break to focus on education and the future.

Research in Ecuador

Who: HGSE Adjunct Lecturer Christina Hinton, Ed.M.’06, Ed.D.’12; Mind, Brain, and Education students Emiliana Rodriguez and Tyler Miller; Human Development and Psychology student Cyntia Barzelatto; HGSE Teaching Fellow Lauren Schiller, Ed.M.’13; Universidad San Francisco de Quito partner Nascira Ramia; and Colegio Menor partner Scott Hibbard

Where: Colegio Menor and Universidad San Francisco de Quito in Ecuador.

What: HGSE students carried out real-world research about bilingual education and student care. They designed a study, created interview protocols, and collected data in collaboration with an Ecuadorian research team at Universidad San Francisco de Quito led by Ramia. Through this hands-on project, the HGSE students learned about the research process, as well as cross-cultural research. The students were inspired by their work in Hinton’s Research Schools class, where they had the opportunity to collaborate on a real-world research project with a school partner and prepare a publishable research article. As part of this course, Hinton, Schiller, Miller, Rodriguez, and Barzelatto are working with Colegio Menor and Universidad San Francisco de Quito on a collaborative school-based research project.

Why: The trip to Ecuador specifically focused on the study of care and bilingual education under the scope of Hinton’s, Professor Kurt Fischer’s, and Visiting Lecturer Bruno della Chiesa’s research schools initiative that partners HGSE researchers with schools around the globe to collaborate on school-based research, professional development, and dissemination of research findings.

At Colegio Menor, a bilingual school with a strong character education program that teaches students through an English-immersion program and then transitions to a mixed English-Spanish program. The teachers wanted to know about the impact of this approach on students’ social-emotional development. HGSE students’ research explored the development of care, and the effects of bilingual education on development through questions such as: How does care develop at Colegio Menor? Does English-immersion impact students' ability to express and receive care in the early years? Do students express and receive care differently in Spanish than in English?

HGSE interviewed 80 students in Spanish and English in preschool, fourth grade, seventh grade, and 10th grade. They next plan to analyze the data to map out learning pathways students follow as they develop care in Spanish and English. “Once we analyze the data, we will write a report that shares our findings and considers implications for practice, which we will share with administrators and teachers at Colegio Menor, as well as the broader educational community,” Hinton said. “The administrators and teachers will use this report to shape their practice and the children's experiences at school.”

[caption id="attachment_14387" align="alignleft" width="350" caption="Nancy Gutierrez, Ed.L.D.'13 (left-center), meets with EdConnect students at the New York City Department of Education."][/caption]

Career Treks to New York City and Washington D.C.

Who: EdConnect, hosted by the Career Services Office, offered 124 HGSE students the opportunity to connect with 39 employers such as Plan International, Children’s Defense Fund, Discovery Education,  Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Harlem Children’s Zone, The Posse Foundation, Teach For America, and many more.

Where: New York City and Washington D.C.

What: HGSE students traveled to one or both cities through EdConnect, which offers the career trek to cities each year at Spring Break. Students spent two days in each city visiting various organizations in the education sector to network and learn more about the types of places they can work following graduation. Students met with 16 organizations in New York and 19 organizations in Washington D.C. During the hour-long meetings, students have the opportunity to learn information about networking, hiring processes, and what the day-to-day work and culture of the organization is like.

Why: It’s important for students to network and develop new relationships – one of the goals of EdConnect. Following the trips, students have helpful points of contact at many of the organizations. “I think for many of us, networking is not the most natural thing to do, so having an ‘in’ to start with really makes that easier,” said Lindsay Denham, a student in the EPM Program who helped organize the trip. In addition, the trek also provides a chance to see exciting and inspiring work of people in the field. HGSE alumni, who were participants in 90 percent of of the presentations, not only welcomed students but shared how their time at HGSE translates into their current work, and will likely extend themselves to support the students as part of their job search networks. The career trek also provides a chance for students, who may be changing their future work environments, to get ideas of where to go next.

[caption id="attachment_14390" align="alignleft" width="350" caption="Harvard group outside of Aspire East Palo Alto Charter School."][/caption]

BRIDGE@Silicon Valley

Who: Seventeen Harvard-affiliated students and fellows including five from HGSE under BRIDGE@HGSE, a student-led organization that unites students, professors, and professionals from across Harvard to foster educational innovation.

Where: Silicon Valley, Calif.

What: Students traveled to Silicon Valley to interact with 13 different companies, organizations, foundations, and schools pioneering innovations and challenging traditional educational models. The trip offered an opportunity to enable students and alumni to cross boundaries and disciplines to help solve pressing problems in domestic and international education.

Why: The trip offered an immersive, educational experience for students interested in educational innovation happening in Silicon Valley by providing participants with unique, first-hand experience and insight in understanding the ways in which innovation is changing the education sector. Through the experience, participants saw how design thinking is implemented in a K–12 educational setting (Nueva School), university setting (Stanford.School), and professional setting (IDEO). Participants also learned about the Minerva Project, an effort to identify, educate, and prepare the next generation of global leaders. Additionally, workshops with Creative Commons demonstrated the ways in which CC is disrupting traditional educational publishing. “The trek provided an invaluable experience and an avenue to interact at a more personal level with organization’s actively innovating in the education sphere,” says Shima Gholamimehrabadi, a master’s candidate in International Education Policy. “There is only so much that can be gauged from reading about these organizations, especially those of which are relatively new and do not have much information available online. Surveying all of these organizations in less than a week by visiting multiple organizations a day enabled us to make easy comparisons between organizations’ mission and activities.”