Global Leadership

April 2023

Dr. Sally Mingarelli

Head of School, EF Academy Pasadena

Dear Families,

It is very exciting to be writing one of our final family newsletters of this inaugural school year. From our perspective, it has gone by so very fast; and yet your children have grown tremendously in this time. We have been celebrating recently the many markers of maturity, independence, engagement, and deep relationships that are present across campus every day. We are so proud of your children!

We are looking forward to our many end-of-year events to help our students celebrate both the relationships they have formed and the meaningful learning they have accomplished together this year. Coming up in May our collective sense of community and friendship will be honored at our very first EF Academy Pasadena Prom at a hotel ballroom in Old Town Pasadena on May 13, our final advisory dinner on the campus quad on May 17, and with a celebration of our inaugural students on May 23.

To celebrate the learning and Academic growth of our students we will have a Showcase of Learning on May 25 followed by our Global Leadership Symposium on May 26. Through the Showcase of Learning, students are selecting the piece of work from across their classes this year of which they are most proud.  They are reflecting on both the process and the product and the competencies they mastered through the work. Lastly, the Global Leadership Symposium will be the culminating event of our school year, showcasing students’ work in our signature program.  This event is open to the public, giving our students an opportunity to share with poise and pride to an authentic audience. We hope you consider joining that audience, whether you live locally or abroad. Our hope in planning this on the last day of school, Friday May 26, is that any families traveling to pick up their children might choose to arrive in time to attend the symposium. More details about timing and how to RSVP are in the newsletter below.

As we do each month, we use these newsletters to feature authors from around campus to help our families better understand the lives of their students at EF Academy Pasadena. This month’s authors are the Co-Directors of Global Leadership, Kaela Clapp and Erica Washburn. Enjoy their beautiful story of how our signature program came to life this year through the inspired hard work of our students and faculty.

Department Updates

Kaela Clapp

Co-Director of Global Leadership

Erica Washburn

Co-Director of Global Leadership

Dear Families,

As the conclusion of our inaugural year gets closer, we wanted to take a moment to reflect on the incredible journey our students have made through EF Academy Pasadena's  signature Global Leadership program. In preparation for our first Global Leadership Symposium on May 26th, we are excited to look back at how our students progressed through this program. Global Leadership (GL) prepares the next generation of empowered changemakers to meet the challenges of the 21st century by designing sophisticated solutions to address local and global issues aligned with one of the seventeen United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. 

Students learn best when they are engaged in relevant and important issues that impact their communities and the world. Likewise, we believe that students’ lived experiences and perspectives are assets that can be leveraged in everyday learning. Living and learning in an international community provides a unique opportunity for our students to fully grasp their shared responsibility to cultivate a more humane, sustainable, and peaceful world. Global Leadership provides students and teachers with dedicated time, space, and resources to explore, collaborate, and grow as global citizens together. Students seek to make the world a better place by engaging in issues of personal and global importance. In pursuit of this, each student this year has made progress toward the following Global Leadership competencies:

  1. Identifying what one wants to learn or accomplish and why it is important to oneself. 

  2. Seeking resources that will provide helpful support. 

  3. Investigating the true needs and concerns of a community.

  4. Collaborating and finding synergy in working with others, actioning team goals. 

Our very first class in GL began with a logo challenge where students had to start working with each other right away. In just a single class period, teams had to design a logo that meaningfully represented their initial understanding of what it meant to be a global citizen, global innovator, or global entrepreneur. The collaborative and competitive nature of our students quickly emerged as Cena was bustling with all 119 of our students pulling their ideas together. This activity set the tone for the rest of the quarter, which continued with students exploring their leadership styles, sharing and establishing cultural norms, and exploring the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

As the first quarter of school came to a close, GL groups entered the “empathize” stage of the design thinking process, where they began to identify something that was missing, something that could be improved, or something they wished their community had to make life better for others. In doing so, students proposed an innovative idea that directly and positively impacted a community, using one of the SDGs as a guide for their design. Working in collaboration with their group members, teams pitched their ideas to the “Sharks,” community members from around campus, who in turn gave teams meaningful feedback to adjust their project goals and take action throughout the rest of the year.

We've seen a lot of progress in project development since those initial presentations back in October. While some project concepts have endured, like a student mentorship group called “Big Sib” or a reef-safe sunscreen group called “Asé Sunscreen,” other students realized that their original project ideas didn’t quite align with their passions and interests. The first semester of school concluded with a Global Leadership Fair, where students were encouraged to reflect on what they cared about and why. Through this experience, teams could “choose their own adventure,” where students could (1) share their progress with their original ideas, (2) recruit new team members to fill identified roles, or (3) market their own individual skills to others to join a brand new team. Through this experience, students had to clearly articulate their skills, interests, and motivations in a communal setting. Iterative student reflection has been an important piece of the design thinking process and largely contributes to the success we’re seeing from our GL groups now at the end of the year.

Students and faculty returned from winter break rejuvenated and excited to make strides toward taking action on their GL projects. At this point in the year, GL groups were paired with faculty mentors and coaches whose expertise more closely aligned with the goals of our twenty different student groups. Many groups were ready to move beyond empathizing and defining identified challenges related to the SDGs, and progress to the ideating and prototyping phases of the design thinking process. As such, all twenty of our GL groups had the opportunity to formally articulate their ideas and needs to the Global Leadership Committee to share their progress and outline their action plans for the remainder of the year. The range of topic ideas and action plans was beyond impressive. Check out some highlighted GL groups at the bottom of this newsletter!

We’re excited to announce that all of the work from this year in GL will be showcased in our Global Leadership Symposium on May 26th. This will be an opportunity to hear from each of our student groups about their Global Leadership projects. Projects range from education and advocacy campaigns, to innovating solutions to pressing problems, and developing new inventions and products. In this final interactive exhibition of learning, students will have the opportunity to showcase their work to local community members, Pasadena government officials, and surrounding middle school students and teachers. We would also like to extend an invitation to any friends or family living or visiting Pasadena at the end of our school year to attend the Global Leadership Symposium. We’re so proud of the work that these students have done this year, and we can’t wait to have these teams leading the community through engaging exhibits, educational lessons, and outdoor activities. If you’d like to attend, please email our Head of Admissions, Bobbie Jo Dobbs, at [email protected]. We hope to see you there!

Finally, we’d like to take a moment to look ahead at years to come. The personalized nature of this program has given students the time, space, mentorship, and resources to allow students to progress at an authentic pace. The daily work of each of these student teams is tailored to their specific needs. As such, students continuing at EF Academy next year and beyond will continue to have the opportunity to develop authentic solutions that the world needs. Future opportunities will include community  engagement and service learning, where students will engage in field study related to their projects; community partnerships, where groups can collaborate with local communities and organizations; and mentorship opportunities, where students can be coaches for other classmates just starting in the program. We’re excited to see how our incredible student body continues learning from and with each other year after year to make our world a better place.

Students and faculty returned from winter break rejuvenated and excited to make strides toward taking action on their GL projects. At this point in the year, GL groups were paired with faculty mentors and coaches whose expertise more closely aligned with the goals of our twenty different student groups. Many groups were ready to move beyond empathizing and defining identified challenges related to the SDGs, and progress to the ideating and prototyping phases of the design thinking process. As such, all twenty of our GL groups had the opportunity to formally articulate their ideas and needs to the Global Leadership Committee to share their progress and outline their action plans for the remainder of the year. The range of topic ideas and action plans was beyond impressive. Check out some highlighted GL groups at the bottom of this newsletter!

We’re excited to announce that all of the work from this year in GL will be showcased in our Global Leadership Symposium on May 26th. This will be an opportunity to hear from each of our student groups about their Global Leadership projects. Projects range from education and advocacy campaigns, to innovating solutions to pressing problems, and developing new inventions and products. In this final interactive exhibition of learning, students will have the opportunity to showcase their work to local community members, Pasadena government officials, and surrounding middle school students and teachers. We would also like to extend an invitation to any friends or family living or visiting Pasadena at the end of our school year to attend the Global Leadership Symposium. We’re so proud of the work that these students have done this year, and we can’t wait to have these teams leading the community through engaging exhibits, educational lessons, and outdoor activities. If you’d like to attend, please email our Head of Admissions, Bobbie Jo Dobbs, at [email protected]. We hope to see you there!

Highlights: 2022-2023 Global Leadership Groups

Big Sib

Big Sib is committed to responding to UN SDG #3: Good Health and Well-being. In order to improve the mental and emotional well-being of incoming EF students, this group created a mentorship program to support new students integrate into the community.
 

Global Leadership Promotional Tea

The GL Promo Team is committed to responding to UN SDG #11: Sustainable Cities and Communities. In order to create a more welcoming environment for new students and comprehensive summary of what GL includes, this group is creating a website to help new students transition into this program and to provide an additional resource for already existing students to orient themselves.

Different Is Not Wrong
DINW is committed to responding to UN SDG #10: Reduced Inequalities. This group created a podcast, a website, and an animation to educate younger audiences about diversity, inclusion, and belonging.

Peer Tutoring
Peer Tutoring is committed to responding to UN SDG #4: Quality Education. This group is a student-led program that offers peer-to-peer tutoring on any subject area that we offer at EF Academy. 

Biking for a Better Tomorrow
Biking for a Better Tomorrow is committed to responding to UN SDG #13: Climate Action. This group has collected and fixed up donated bikes and designed a checkout system for students to use bike transportation to reduce less sustainable forms of transportation. 

The Cube
The Cube is committed to responding to UN SDG #8: Decent Work and Economic Growth. This group’s work is focused on helping to rebuild the economy in Ukraine by designing and selling NFTs and donating profits to foundations in Ukraine. 

Upsych
Upsych is committed to responding to UN SDG #8: Decent Work and Economic Growth. In order to promote the issue of unfair working conditions and pay, this group created an upcycling clothing brand. They will debut their brand with a fashion show to spread awareness over the pressing issue of sweatshops and unfair pay. 

Eco Campus
Eco Campus is committed to responding to UN SDG #13: Climate Action. This group’s work is focused on establishing a recycling system on campus to reduce plastic waste in the environment. 

Eternal
Eternal is committed to responding to UN SDG #7: Affordable and Clean Energy. In order to solve the problem of non-biodegradable lithium-ion batteries, our group is working on creating a new battery that is accessible and biodegradable.

Visit us at the Global Leadership Symposium on May 26th, 10:00 am - 12:00 pm to interact with all of our amazing GL teams!

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