The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
STUDENTS EXPLORE CAREER OPTIONS
‘Sharing Your Genius Day’ at Perry Middle School offers authentic learning experiences
They had to wait two weeks because of a snow day, but that didn’t seem to impede the collaborative creativity Perry Middle School students put on display in a variety of career disciplines during Sharing Your Genius Day.
The event, in its fourth year, provides sixth-graders with opportunities to experience hands-on authentic learning projects, career readiness and problem solving through seven pathways comprised of hospitality; health; engineering (greenhouse experts); art; tech; marketing; and media.
Each career pathway has its own design challenge that is supported with a teacher, high school mentors and community mentors.
Jodi Hicks, Sharing Your Genius Day coordinator, noted the event this year combined 12 community mentors and four high school teachers as facilitators.
“The one pathway we have trouble finding a community member to support is technology,” she said. “Steve Floro (high school technology teacher) and his students do an outstanding
“By identifying what career pathway they are interested in, they can start applying what they learn at school to what they want to do in the future.” — Amy Harker, director of student services and college and career readiness
job during the technology pathway (design) challenge.
“This year, we also have two keynote speakers: Ben Hicks, a photographer specializing in taking underwater photographs of sea turtles and other ocean wildlife, Skyping from Florida; and Pat Morse, the assistant chief of interpretive services at Penitentiary Glen Reservation.”
In addition, Sharing Your Genius Day serves as a culminating activity to a series of classroom lessons that lead students to the respective activities to perform design challenges.
In promotion of Earth Day, this year’s theme, environmental improvements, or, “A billion acts of green,” asks the question: How can we make the community better?
Throughout the day, the media pathway students worked on producing an iMovie about the other pathway design challenges that will be shared when the sixth-graders celebrate Earth Day on April 23.
“This day is really unique because it allows the students to explore several careers,” said Amy Harker, director of student services and college and career readiness. “By identifying what career pathway they are interested in, they can start applying what they learn at school to what they want to do in the future.
“We want to engage the students. Instead of hosting a regular career day where the students listen to someone talk, Sharing Your Genius Day provides an interactive simulation. Every product (created by the students) is something that is authentic. And it’s not just doing something to teach the lesson; it’s doing something to solve a problem that the students have identified.”
All students work in groups or pairs to tackle their design challenges as
“Wewantto engage the students. Instead of hosting a regular career day where the students listen to someone talk, Sharing Your Genius Day provides an interactive simulation. Every product (created by the students) is something that is authentic.” — Amy Harker, director of student services and college and career readiness
the community mentors provide feedback and ask questions to hone the students’ solutions. Many of the community leaders that participated in the past have continued to give their time in support of the day.
“Sixth-grade is our focus of this day because the students are young enough to be excited about multiple careers and old enough to identify their interests and talents,” Hicks said. “We are lucky that all of our schools connect so each pathway has a group of mentors and teachers providing feedback.”
One of those sixth-graders, Ian Obratil, working on his Earth Day promotional infomercial, said Sharing Your Genius Day is fun because it breaks up traditional learning routines.
“I am creating a theme for Earth Day where a person goes to the big city and sees trash on the ground. When he decides to pick it up and throw it away, he’s doing the right thing. These are the kind of characteristics we can describe to people in the story of working together for the environment,” he said.