'Creating a Better World

One Student at a Time.'

"In the end we will only conserve what we love.
We will only love what we understand.
We will only understand what we are taught."
--Baba Diom

A VISIONARY PROJECT

THE DAVINCI CENTER FOR SUSTAINABLE ARTS & SCIENCES is designed to set a new standard in how we pursue learning over a lifetime: from the ground up! The DAVINCI CENTER FOR SUSTAINABLE ARTS & SCIENCES combines green architecture and landscaping; an integrated, hands-on curriculum; and multi-generational learning partnerships, to cultivate the creative and critical thinking skills exemplified by Leonardo daVinci more than four centuries ago. DaVinci's interdisciplinary strategies are more relevant today than ever before, as we seek innovative solutions to the challenges of the 21st Centruy. The DAVINCI CENTER's goal is to develop a model for sustainable living, which can be replicated locally, nationally, and internationally. Collaborators in this visionary project include:

THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP ACADEMY a 9-12th grade collegiate/high school, and THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP CAMP a summer residential collegiate/high school eco-adventure camp for students in grades 9-12. The synergy of purpose between the founding partners includes:

-THE CREATION OF A MODEL FOR SUSTAINABLE, GREEN DESIGN

- THE CREATION OF AN INTEGRATED, HANDS-ON CURRICULUM

-AUTHENTIC OUTDOOR EXPERIENCES TO PROMOTE STEWARDSHIP, AND

-THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CREATIVE THINKING AND PROBLEM SOLVING SKILLS

DESIGNED FOR SUSTAINABILITY

THE DAVINCI CENTER, will be designed to become a LEED certified campus, featuring state-of-the-art sustainable technologies to reduce energy consumption, water consumption, and waste production, while creating a healthy, productive indoor environment. Geothermal energy will be used for heating, cooling, and hot water. Green roofs will capture and recycle rainwater, and a Living Machine will treat and recycle water. The buildings will utilize natural light and ventilation, sustainable building materials, and low VOC finishes.

DESIGNED FOR PERSONALIZATION

British Anthropologist Robin Dunbar theorizes there is a cognitive limit to the number of people we can maintain stable social relationships with. He believes the maximum number of people that allows each person to be known individually is 150, or less. The DAVINCI campus is designed to incorporate Dunbar's number to promote a personalized learning environment for students, teachers, and families.

The DAVINCI design concept is built around Small Learning Communities of 120 students each, housed in eight classrooms of 15 students. These self-contained classrooms will include boys and girls locker rooms with showers, and a kitchen. The design eliminates hallways, allowing teachers to monitor student behavior in areas traditionally out of view, and to provide common areas for cross-disciplinary collaborations.

Eight teachers and eight student teachers will collaborate in the core academic subjects: math, science, language arts, and social studies through an arts-integrated approach with a focus on environmental sustainability, communication arts, and adventure education. A 7.5-1 student-to-teacher ratio in a multi-age setting will allow teachers to individualize the program to the students' interests, abilities, and learning styles. The curriculum will exceed state and national accountability standards through an inquiry-based program of project learning. Students will be required to pass the COMPASS test to participate in dual-enrollment college classes. A thirteenth year will also be available to DaVinci graduates.

The DaVinci model is designed to expand the campus one small learning community at a time. The pedagogical and physical school design can be adapted to a variety of learning environments.

DESIGNED FOR HEALTH AND FITNESS

Students at THE DAVINCI CENTER will prepare meals in the classroom kitchen from their Edible School Yard. All aspects of growing, harvesting and preparing nutritious food will be incorporated in the curriculum. This hands-on experience will foster an appreciation of how the natural world sustains us, and promotes health and well-being. The aquatecture design will be part of an integrated water management system for garden irrigation, heating and cooling, and water recycling through a Living Machine System.

DESIGNED FOR FLEXIBILITY

THE DAVINCI CENTER'S small Learning Communities will be designed for adaptive use, and shared overhead. Classrooms will convert to camp use in the summer months by exchanging desks for beds. The Small Learning Communities will include residences for student teachers during the school year, and camp staff in the summer months. Sharing facilities will allow THE DAVINCI CENTER to attract and retain highly qualified faculty and staff, and to expand facilities and programs for the entire community.

DESIGNED FOR ENTERPRISE

As a research based, entrepreneurial learning environment, THE DAVINCI CENTER will promote real-work in the real-world. DAVINCI students will host a weekly Organic Farm Market with composting and recycling, and an Artist's Market as part of a Student/Mentor Program. Students will learn business management through this hands-on experience. Their earnings will be invested to purchase laptop computers, art supplies, and outdoor adventure gear to support learning. During the summer months, the student-run enterprises will provide scholarships to camp and day students.

DESIGNED FOR COLLABORATION

THE DAVINCI CENTER will offers a full schedule of dual-enrollment college classes to district students through our University partners.

DESIGNED TO HONOR EXPERIENCE

THE DAVINCI CENTER will promote sustainable change through multi-generational learning. Each new generation will learn the value life experience from their Mentors, as they gain in wisdom to face the challenges of leadership.

The daVinci Leadership Camp

THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP CAMP will be designed to emphasize the need to be better stewards of our natural resources and teach us how we can do a better job in living more sustainably on this planet. Addressing these critical issues requires a new approach to how we think about the future. THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP CAMP is dedicated to creating a lifestyle that does not undermine the vitality of the planet’s life support systems. The Camp program inspires a sense of hope and optimism in our youth along with the knowledge and tools to take positive action. The THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP CAMP will be located on the Lake Michigan shoreline, bordering hundreds of acres of state and federal wilderness. Students will connect with the region’s unique environment through slide shows, hikes, kayaking and snorkeling excursions, and group discussions. They will focus on biodiversity, and the human impact on the resources of the Great Lakes region.

With members of the THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP CAMP'S team of explorers, environmentalists, and educators as their guides, students will participate in long-term monitoring and restoration programs, learning important biological and ecological principles as they are challenged to think sustainably. Students will have opportunities to learn from state-of-the-art sustainable technologies on the campus; from the diverse ecosystems of northern Michigan; and from the highly qualified staff. The THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP CAMP program will use experiential education in the marine and terrestrial environments to teach students how nature works, what sustainable living means, and how to participate in the search for a better future.

PROGRAM GOALS

-Provide educational adventures.

-Inspire curiosity and appreciation for the region and thenatural world through exploration and discovery.

-Advance an understanding of connections: land to water, humans to nature, people to

people, and present to future.

-Encourage critical thinking and informed action toward responsible and sustainable living.

-Facilitate learning about the natural world while learning about self and others.

-Develop problem solving, interpersonal, and teamwork skills.

THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP ACADEMY

"You can't teach people everything they need to know. The best you can do is position them where they can find what they need to know when they need to know it." - Seymour Papert

A Culture of High Expectation

Rather starting with a discussion of basic concepts, students at THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP ACADEMY will begin by investigating the nature of the world around them in both the arts and the sciences. They will ask questions. They will use their senses. They will use their powers of reasoning. They will use their powers of intuition. With supportive guidance from parents, teachers, and community mentors, they will solve real problems in the real world, to grow in knowledge, sensitivity, and confidence. We call it DISCOVERY LEARNING and our goal is to engage students to be the architects of their own future by supporting a spirit of inquiry, which lasts a lifetime. By creating a culture of high expectation, collaboration, and service, we will prepare students for leadership roles in an increasingly complex global society.

"The goal of learning is to discover for oneself." --Jerome Brunner

A Student-Centered Approach

Is learning a noun or a verb? How you answer may reveal a lot about your philosophy of education. Learning as a noun suggests education is content to be absorbed: students in seats, teacher with textbooks in the front of the room: the guardians of important facts and information. Learning as a verb by contrast, treats education as an activity: the work of scientists, mathematicians, sociologists, writers, and artists; pursuing questions, testing hypotheses, and conducting investigations to better understand the world and their role in it. Thinking of education only as a noun misses the excitement of Discovery. Thinking of learning as a verb creates opportunities for students and teachers to engage the world, build their creative and critical thinking skills, and discover their purpose. Discovery Education is fundamentally about learning as a verb and encourages curiosity by helping students to refine their questions. Discovery Learning embraces the interdisciplinary nature of the real world.

"I hear...I forget. I see...I remember. I do...I understand."--Ancient Chinese Proverb

Discovery as a Process
Discovery Learning engages students in the process of hypothesizing, testing concluding, and re-testing. They begin with observations. They pose questions. They examine what is already known. They plan their investigation. They propose a Discovery Plan. They use tools. They analyze and interpret their data. They propose answers, explanations, solutions, or make predictions, and they communicate their findings. Discovery Learning requires students identify their assumptions, and use higher level thinking skills to consider alternative explanations.

Discovery as a Strategy

To facilitate Discovery Learning, teachers must rethink their classroom practices. They no longer hold the role of purveyor of knowledge, and students are no longer the recipients of their knowledge. Instead, teachers guide students in taking responsibility for their own learning. Discovery Learning seeks answers to student-generated questions, enhances attention to detail, promotes hands-on investigation, help students evaluate their findings in the real world, and analyzes patterns, while promoting flexible thinking. The goal of Discovery Learning is to create students who are prepared for real work in the real world as curious, detail oriented, analytical, flexible thinkers. Discovery Learning teaches students how to think, rather than what to think.

Discovery as a Skill
Good questions are those that have no obvious “right” answer. Good questions push students toward higher level thinking skills and problem solving. Good questions are generated from the students’ interests. Good questions cannot be answered easily, and sustain student interest. Good questions reflect the complex, inter-disciplinary nature of the real world. Good questions generate multiple questions to guide the student's Discovery Study Plan. While we are unable to anticipate everything students will need to know in the 21st Century, we can prepare them with the skills and confidence to Discover new answers.

Discovery as a Laboratory

Rather than simply reading a book or listening to a lecture, students make their own findings like real scientists, mathematicians, sociologists, writers or artists. Discovery Learning trains students, not to imitate the work of others, but to innovate through real-work in the real-world. Students explore their questions in state-of-the art learning laboratories, and the natural learning laboratories beyond classroom walls.

Research-Based Discovery

Incorporating the best practices of:

Dr. Linda Darling-Hammond

Stanford University

Small Schools

Dr. Peter Senge

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Learning Institutions

Dr. Robert Lee Moore

University of Texas

Discovery Math & Mentoring

Dr. Carol Ann Tomlinson

University of Virginia

Differentiated Education

Dr. Howard Gardner

Harvard University

Multiple Intelligences

Dr. Shari Tishman

Harvard University

Project Zero & Artful Thinking

Dr. Elliot Eisner

Stanford University

Arts Integration

Dr. Benjamin Bloom

University of Chicago

Thinking Skills & Talent Development

Dr. Maria Montessori

Secondary Pedagogy

John Dewey

University of Chicago

Student-Centered Learning

Rudolph Steiner

Waldorf Education

Jean-Michel Cousteau's

Ocean Futures Society

The United States Department of Education

The National Endowment for the Art

The Coalition of Essential Schools

The Henry Ford Learning Institut

The National Science Foundatio

The National Geographic Society

The Kennedy Center for the Art

The US Green Building Counci

The Prince William Network

The Discovery Channel

Big Picture Schools

The Green School

LEEDing by Example

THE DAVINCI CENTER will model sustainable living through the operations of the LEED certified campus, through an interdisciplinary curriculum, and through authentic experiences in the out-of-doors and the real-world. THE DAVINCI CENTER will serve as an international model for sustainable living while preparing students with the creative thinking and problem solving skills required to become leaders in the 21st Century. Discovery Learning will be student-centered.

An Academy of Discovery

THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP ACADEMY will be designed as a small learning community to enhance the connection between students, school, families, and the community. 480 students in grades 9-12 will be divided in communities of 120 students, and taught in classrooms of 15 students. On entry, students will be assigned a faculty advisor who will work with them throughout their entire high school career to promote personalize academic and enrichment experiences. THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP ACADEMY will emphasize place-based education, connecting students to the natural environments of the region. On entrance, each student will be provided with a laptop computer. THE DAVINCI LEADERSHIP ACADEMY will utilize the Internet to connect students to global study groups and online learning. All classrooms and laboratories will feature state-of-the-art learning technologies.

A Week at the Academy

Monday through Thursday, students will begin their day with a Yoga/Pilates class to develop a lifelong habit of health. Their academic day will include two three-hour inter-disciplinary Math/Science and Language Arts/Social Studies blocks, to provide in-depth opportunities for project-based learning. Following their core academic classes, students will have the opportunity to take master classes in the Arts and Sciences for dual-enrollment college credit.

Each Friday student-run enterprises, supervised by a faculty advisor and community mentor, will be open to the public. These Enterprises will include: an Organic Farm Market, a Visiting Artist/Lecture Series, and an Artists Market. Students will use their Enterprise earnings to purchase their laptop computer, contirbute to a Senior Service Trip. Graduation will include the presentation of Senior Projects, designed to help each student discover his or her purpose.

THE DaVINCI ACADEMY
MONDAY-THURSDAY

ZERO HOUR
7:15-8am & 8-8:45 am
Yoga/Pilates

Academic Study Lab

CORE CURRICULUM
9am – Noon Morning Block
Math / Science Interdisciplinary Learning

or Language Arts/Social Studies Interdisciplinary Learning

LUNCH Noon – 1pm
1-4pm Afternoon Block
Math / Science Interdisciplinary Learnin

or Language Arts/Social Studies Interdisciplinary Learning

4-5:30 ELECTIVES
(Open to District Students)
Monday/Wednesday

andTuesday/Thursday
Level I – Open Enrollment
Level II – By Audition/Application

Dual-Enrollment College Credit Available

FRIDAYs
9am-4pm ADVISORIES & ENTERPRISES
Student-Managed Box Office, Book Store, Art Gallery, Lecture Series,

& Organic Farm Market
4-5 pm ORGANIC FARM MARKET
7-9 pm FIRSTFRIDAYs

Visiting Artist & Lecture Series