Beechwood Independent School District is celebrating its annual EDGE Days, created to expand the district’s Educational Design Geared towards Experience (EDGE) program, an initiative designed to empower students with the skills and knowledge necessary to thrive in the ever-evolving global landscape.
Continuing for the second of its two-day schedule today, The EDGE program represents a forward-thinking approach to education, combining academics with real-world experiences to prepare students for success in the 21st Century.
During EDGE Days, 7th grade through 12th grade students get extra time in each class to engage in experiential learning, not just the EDGE seminar and EDGE minor classes, but every core content class. There is also an opportunity on EDGE day for students to lead extracurricular sessions for other students in a passion area. The teachers and students look forward to EDGE days each quarter.
With a focus on the Core Concepts, EDGE goes beyond traditional educational models to foster a real-world approach to learning for all K-12 students in the district.
“Beechwood is known for innovative education grounded in tradition,” said Beechwood Superintendent, Dr. Mike Stacy. “The EDGE program perfectly encapsulates this concept. While we are proud of our strong academic foundation at Beechwood and continue to focus on students performing well on state and national assessments, we also know that there is a great need to innovate in education to best prepare our students for their future. We also know from talking to over 100 business partners and 6 university partners that we need to engage our students in experiential learning to develop next-generation skills to give our students an “edge” and to best prepare them for college and/or career.”
The EDGE program started in 2018 after several years of research and planning by the district, which uncovered a number of issues facing business, industry, and universities: students and new employees lacked certain skills including critical thinking, problem-solving, long term planning, and creative thinking. EDGE begins in kindergarten at Beechwood. Beechwood adopted the goal that 100% of its students will experience personalized learning opportunities. Between kindergarten and 4th grade, the foundations of the core concepts of EDGE are introduced and reinforced through quarterly EDGE challenges.
Between 5th and 8th grade, each student gets to attend a “seminar” which refines the core concepts through a series of real-world challenges. At the end of 8th grade, each student will choose a “minor” class that they want to take in high school. The minor is a three-year specialized course of study. These minors have unique curriculum personalized by industry partners. Students are then eligible for a 4th year internship, early college or dual credit that is aligned with their minor.
Minors include:
• Media Design
• Informatics
• Engineering
• Culinary
• BioMed
• Performing Arts
• Fine Arts
• Entrepreneurship
• Environmental Engineering
• Education Mini-Minor
“Learning by doing is an essential part of a quality education. The EDGE program creates relevant experiences, the ability to learn through mistakes, and the challenge to reflect and grow in critical skills (core concepts). Beechwood students will certainly have the EDGE when they leave high school,” said 8th grade Seminar and Entrepreneurship teacher, Michelle Stamper.
As part of the program, students engage the community, businesses, industries and universities for curriculum development and experience alignment; over 100 business partners and 6 universities have helped Beechwood develop curriculum and experiences for students. Beechwood’s business partners enhance the student’s experience by delivering challenges, giving feedback, working with teachers on EDGE planning, providing mentors, internships and job shadows for the students, and more.
Keith Schneider with Square1 is one of Beechwood’s business partners, he said, “The opportunity EDGE provides students can be a game changer for them. For students, they have an excellent opportunity to impress some business folks that could be their future employers. There are still several students that I am keeping my eye on for just that reason.”
“I see so many students make decisions on careers based on what’s right in front of them. EDGE gives them the opportunity to actually dive in and either confirm their career choice or pivot which can save them a lot of time, stress, and even money as they take their next steps in their career,” Schneider added.
Beechwood is equipping all students K-12 with the skills and experiences necessary to thrive in any post-secondary choice. The long-term goals of EDGE include career exploration, talent pipeline development through partnerships and internships, and producing a student that leaves Beechwood with not only the skills to get a job, or be accepted into college, but rise within that career or university as a leader and a learner.
Beechwood Independent School District