One Calendar with Social Networking PowersStudio H Puts Design Thinking in Students’ Hands
Sixteen high school students in 11th grade at the School of Agriscience and Biotechnology at Bertie Early College High School are studying design thinking in hopes of a better future and to make a difference in the impoverished rural area of North Carolina.
Bertie County is one of the poorest counties in the United States. Eighty percent of the students here live in poverty, and their best hope for employment is a low-skilled job in agriculture or biotechnology. It’s not much of a future to look forward to.
So why have 16 teenagers in grade 11 committed to attending an experimental design course called Studio H (which stands for Humanity, Habitats, Health and Happiness) for three hours every day this coming school year?
According to Emily Pilloton, the founder of Project H, “Lots of people in poor rural communities like this have no idea what design means…[but] We’ll be teaching the students design thinking, leadership skills, shop skills and citizenship. Hopefully they’ll think of design as a different way of thinking, seeing and tackling problems. If they go on to work in, say, agriculture, it’s a great way of understanding why they might plant in a different way.”
Pilloton, the founder of Studio H, recently moved to Bertie County from San Francisco—along with project architect, Matthew Miller. The class will be held in a once abandoned car body shop behind the school that has been converted into a classroom, studio and workshop to house the project and it’s students. During the school year the students will be tasked with designing a community farmers’ market to sell locally gown produce. And if Studio H is successful in Bertie County, Pilloton and Miller hope to introduce it to other poor rural schools.
Read the full New York Times article about design thinking in Bertie County.
