PRISM - Aka'ula School

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Exemplar Type: CASE STUDY
Title: PRISM: Aka'ula School
Grades: 3-5, 6-8
Discipline: Interdisciplinary | Math, Science, Social Studies, Literacy
Submitted By: Greg Smith


Summary: Teachers Vicki Newberry and Dara Lukonen at the Aka’ula School on the island of Molokai in Hawaii have for more than a decade been involved in an effort to engage their upper elementary and middle school students in issues linked to the environmental and social health of their home place. Called Promoting Resolutions with Integrity for a Sustainable Molokai (PRISM), Newberry, Lukonen, and their students have investigated a range of issues including solid waste disposal at their school and on the island, the impact of ecotourism developments on habitat, bilge water releases, the effect of grazing ungulates on native species, the environmental consequences of disposable diapers, and the restoration of traditional Hawaiian fishponds.

Big Ideas

  • Fairness applies to all. To us, to them and to the "we" that binds us all together

    Sustain-ability requires individual and social learning and community practice

  • We all depend on and are responsible for "the commons", i.e., what we share and hold in trust for future generations. Recognize and Protect the Commons

  • Individual Rights are upheld by Collective Responsibilities. We must reconcile them when they come into conflict with one another

  • We must pay attention to the results of our thinking and behavior on the systems upon which we depend if we want to thrive over time. Read the Feedback.

  • We are all responsible for the difference we make. Everything we do and everything we don't do makes a difference

Higher Order Thinking Skills

  • Emergent: Creative Thinking

  • Emergent: Design Thinking

  • Complex: Critical Thinking

  • Mindful: Questioning

  • Mindful: Reflective Thinking

Dispositions

  • Curious

  • Efficacious

  • Motivated

  • Caring

  • Collaborative

  • Place/Community Conscious

Applied Knowledge

  • Inventing The Future

  • Laws and Principles that govern the physical and biological world

  • Strong Sense of Place

  • Cultures, Traditions, and Change

  • Healthy Commons

  • Responsible Local and Global Citizenship

  • Multiple Perspectives

Applications and Actions

  • Create Social Learning Communities

  • Engage in Dialogue

  • Lead by example

  • Leave every place better than you found it

  • Be inclusive

  • Act wisely individually and collectively, with precaution and in context

  • Listen to one another

  • Serve your community

Community Connections

  • Develop sustainable community visions and re-visions over time

  • Students and teachers make authentic contributions to sustainable community development through service learning opportunities, project-based and place based learning opportunities for students that are laterally and vertically embedded in the core curriculum

  • Provide Internships for students

  • Make time to reflect on where we are, how we got here, how far we have come, how close we are to where we are going, and what we are going to do next