Blended Learning Summer Institute: This Friday twenty high school teachers gathered at our WeWork NoMad office to launch the Summer Institute. Stay tuned for more updates!

I’m excited to announce the launch of the UNIS Blended Learning Summer Institute. The mission of the Summer Institute is to foster new and effective ways, through best practices in blended and online education, to improve the personalization of learning and to inspire further innovation by connecting teachers and students with ed tech startups and developers.

The Summer Institute is comprised of several complementary facets.  As a part of the Blended Learning Lab, teachers work to build exciting learning modules (2-3 week units of study) for individual courses. Teachers are supported in this work by a Content Strategist (teachers and technology integrators with prior experience in blended and online learning).  The role of the strategist is not to build these individual elements, but to help the teacher determine how they should be combined to create a blended course that is more effective and compelling for students than the current course being offered.

The program is organized as a blended course with online and face to face meetings, peer coaching and peer review.  Teachers enroll in a blended Professional Development Course that will run before, during and after the Blended Learning Lab.  The course introduces teachers to the most effective teaching methods and activities in blended and online learning and model these approaches through its design and delivery.

Student technology leadership also plays a vital role in driving further innovation within the school.  Working to foster agency for their learning with technology, students work to develop various projects: IB tutorial program, genius bar/tech integration, student led technology conference.   

We open up possibilities for innovation and inspire student and teacher entrepreneurship and creativity by working with like-minded talented people in the same space. Twenty high school teacher and eight high school student participants will work out of the WeWork co-working space in NoMad. Stop by for a visit!