Your Name and Title: Loren Abbate (Program Leader 2010-11)
School or Organization Name: Thinking Beyond Borders (TBB)
Co-Presenter Name(s): McKinley Follett (TBB Student '11, CU '15)
Area of the World from Which You Will Present: Colorado, USA
Language in Which You Will Present: English
Target Audience(s): Teachers and Students
Short Session Description (one line): Reflection of our experience from the perspective of a teacher and a student who traveled together on an 8-month global gap year program to tackle some of the most pressing, critical questions in development.
Full Session Description (as long as you would like):
In September 2010, Loren Abbate (teacher) and McKinley Follett (student) along with 12 others embarked on an 8 month journey with an organization called Thinking Beyond Borders (TBB). TBB is a global gap year program that inspires students to become agents of change through service-learning, homestay cultural immersion and academic study of global issues. As a nomadic classroom, we travel to Costa Rica, Ecuador, Peru, China, Cambodia, India, South Africa and the USA to study some of the most pressing questions around International Development. In our presentation, we will share some of the stories, learning experience, questions and projects and discuss our perspectives as a teacher and a student. We will discuss why this was a unique learning experience for both of us and how it was extremely different from a traditional classroom setting. Through an academic TBB curriculum, seminar discussions, reading list and media projects to raise awareness, we were part of a global education creative "think tank". During our travels we worked with partner NGOs to establish four meaningful volunteer work projects. Focusing on four major units, we take a closer look specifically at the themes of Environment, Education, Sustainable Agriculture and Public Health. We arrived back to the United States for a culmination unit to visit Washington DC and lobby for the issues we observed abroad as well as present for various classrooms to raise awareness about these topics. Our intention for presenting at the 2011 Global Education Conference is to highlight our unique teacher-student relationship during this program, share some photos and clips of student work/media projects and share some of the questions that made us think differently about our role as responsible global citizens. We will also share some of the challenges of participating this particular program and what could have been done better for an optimal learning experience. We hope this discussion will open eyes and opportunities for global educators and students alike.
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When will this presentation take place? Will it be archived to show at another time? Thank you.