News from the 21st Century Fund

The BHS 21st Century Fund supports faculty-led pilot programs focused on curriculum innovation, fostering academic success and inspiration for all students.

School Year 2016-2017

Proudly Presenting Our 2016-17 Line-up

Now in our 18th year, the 21st Century Fund is thrilled to be able to invest more than $250,000 in 2016-17 to foster a culture of innovation at BHS. The five exciting programs listed below, along with our Innovation Fellowship and Planning Grants, reflect our commitment to supporting new ideas and initiatives that enable BHS students to thrive in the 21st Century.

Rolling off our books this year are Drawing for Understanding in Field Science, which completed its 21st Century Fund piloting cycle and has been adopted into the school's budget; and the

Content Reading Initiative (CRI), which continues to impact literacy instruction for students as teachers attend national conferences and building-based faculty teams are formed in K-8.

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Racial Awareness Seminar (Malcolm Cawthorne and Kate Leslie)
Exploring the complexities of race within our communities

Offered to sophomores, this year-long elective educates students about racial identity early in their high school careers so that they can go on to create a safer, more welcoming environment at BHS. Students share their experiences and learn from their classmates to improve understanding across racial identification lines. The course gives students the vocabulary to engage with difficult racial issues and the skills to have fruitful discussions. It fosters a learning community that embraces and is empowered by the rich diversity of identities and perspectives at BHS.

Engineering Innovation and Design (Aubrey Love and Andrew Maglathlin)
Nurturing our young inventors, designers, artists and tinkerers to bring BHS fully into the "Maker Movement"

This class, currently in its year-long research and development phase, will provide opportunities for students to move beyond 2-D drafting and into the creation of real (3-D) products. The student-centered, multidisciplinary curriculum will integrate principles of engineering and aesthetics, and will utilize a "makerspace," a collaborative setting where students will share their various skills and angles of interest to conceptualize, design, test, refine and actualize their products. The addition of this course will contribute to the development of a cohesive Engineering pathway at BHS.

Film as History/History as Film (Mark Wheeler and Thato Mwosa)

Maneuvering word and image for truly effective communication in the
21st century

This full-year, multidisciplinary senior elective examines history and one of the most powerful ways in which it is remembered: the documentary film. Students look at historical events and eras as they are portrayed in written materials as well as on film, and explore the opportunities offered by and limitations imposed by both formats. Participants in the class produce a number of smaller projects in which they hone their analytical and practical skills, covering issues from research and writing to lighting design, cinematography and editing. Their final projects will be screened at a BHS film festival.

EPIC (Ben Berman and Stephanie McAllister)

An antidote to senioritis

The EPIC program ( Experiential, Innovative, Project-based Capstone) provides students with a high quality, hands-on, project-based senior year experience based on their own interests. With the guidance of BHS teachers, as well as experts and mentors outside of the school, students design, execute and present their own personal passion projects. EPIC is currently being taught for the second year. Curriculum changes and refinements were made after feedback from year one.

The Mindfulness Initiative (Liz Gorman)

Cultivating a healthy school culture that supports the well-being of BHS students and faculty

Through partnerships with Mass General Hospital's Benson-Henry Institute and Mindful Schools, this initiative brings formal training in mindfulness and stress-response relaxation methods to BHS faculty and students. The goal is to integrate these practices into the community's ways of teaching and learning to foster and maintain a culture of resiliency, compassion and good health. Mindfulness is now in its second year, and is being taught in junior and sophomore advisories. A second cohort of teachers has received training, and the practice has impacted a wide range of students and faculty.

INNOVATION. INSPIRATION.

EXCELLENCE.