If you are one of the blog followers you’ve read about HundrED in the past. HundrED is an organization based in Helsinki, Finland who specializes in K-12 education innovation. Each year they put a call out for innovative ideas to be submitted for review. Some are selected and become part of the HundrED collection that serve as resources for educators around the world.
DEDICATION
“We at HundrED are dedicated to helping every child flourish by giving them access to quality education. We believe that with education innovations we can transform school systems and equip students with the skills to thrive as global citizens.”
MISSION
“The world is full of hardworking educators who are driving innovative, impactful, and scalable approaches in education. Our mission at HundrED is to give them the recognition and visibility they deserve.”
IMPACT
“At Hundred we believe that through identifying, amplifying, and facilitating the implementation of education innovations we can transform education systems and equip students with the skills to thrive as global citizens.”
In fact Hundred has identified 694 Innovations which have impacted 4.77 billion students. To land on the 694 innovations a team of reviewers have read through 24732 innovations. I’ve been fortunate to be part of the review process as a member of Hundred’s Academy. Each July for the past four years I’ve been invited to review the new innovation applications. It is an amazing opportunity. Below are just three that I find interesting.
Global Schools Program – The mission of Global Schools is to create a world where every primary and secondary student is equipped with the knowledge, skills, and values to tackle the problems of the 21st century.
Play Africa – Disrupting the idea of a “museum,” Play Africa developed a flexible museum model to bring transformative learning experiences promoting creativity, innovation and connection to a divided society
Story Arts – Story Arts inspire creativity, critical thinking, communication, and empathy.
The HundrED Innovators represent countries from around the world. Along with the collections of innovations they have several different research reports and resources that are easily accessible on their website. All of the resources are available to the global community at no cost. I invite you to check them out.
What are the most impactful education innovations to look out for in 2024? Watch the livestream of #HundrEDSummit from Oct 31 – Nov 2 to hear from top education innovators and researchers.
I have the privilege of working with an educator from Kenya named Enos Magaga who goes by Magaga. He and his family are delightful and over the last two years I have grown to appreciate and understand them in ways I could never have imagined. I am so grateful.
Magaga is the STEAM coordinator for a program called BEADS for Education. He also serves as the Communication and Outreach Coordinator for BEADS. It’s a fascinating program that was initiated to improve the quality of education for women and girls. BEADS established a high school for girls called Tembea Academy located about an hour and a half from Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. Magaga teaches Math and Science at the school. The program has grown mainly due to the work of Magaga and other staff who are committed to girls education. They are not only teaching them ‘content’ but it goes way beyond that. Years of traditions that are detrimental to girls are being interrupted and girls are provided with the opportunity to reach their potential.
In addition to teaching at Tembea Academy 6 hours each week Magaga teaches at the local elementary school. His time there is through the Full STEAM Forward program where students are loving learning through hands-on experiences that connect them with educators and programs in other parts of the world.
Magaga’s committent to the arts came about when he participated in a fellowship program in arts integration that I was part of at Sweet Tree Arts. His pathway to there was through the HundrED program that I’ve blogged about in the past. We met bi-weekly for a semester and during every meeting his face lit up with joy. Magaga’s positivity is contagious. His beliefs are strong and embedded into his daily actions.
I believe in an education system that does not rob learners of their curiosity, creativity and imaginations and above all, one that serves to create a balance in the lives of all learners.
You can read an interview with Magaga and learn more about him and his sweet family on the HundrED blog at THIS LINK. I’m sure it will inspire you!
If you’re interested in connecting with a global audience of educators, please read this post. I’ve blogged about HundrED in the past. In 2018 I was selected as a HundrED Ambassador and was invited to attend the HundrED Summit in Helsinki in 2018 and 19. I met amazing educators from around the world. Some of my follow up roles with HundrED have been to assist in the selection of innovations that best represent HundrED’s mission.
What is HundrED?
HundrED is a global education non-profit, recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on scalable innovations in K-12 education. HundrED’s mission is to help every child flourish in life by giving them access to the best possible education innovations. HundrED annually selects 100 leading education innovations globally packages and shares their amazing work with the world, for free.
Applications are open for the HundrED 2023 Global Collection – DEADLINE: JUNE 1ST, 2022
Are you an education innovator? We want to hear from you! Submit your initiative to the HundrED 2023 Global Collection before June 1st, 2022. If you are not an innovator, but know an organization doing great work in the field of education, send us an email at research@hundred.org with a link to their website. APPLICATION.
In an unprecedented way, the global pandemic has highlighted the importance of building social and emotional skills (SEL) to help children thrive in school, the workplace, and life. In this report we highlight 13 of the most impactful and scalable education innovations fostering SEL skills in students. In addition, the report offers 5 successful strategies for implementing these programs.
HundrED and Ukraine
Of course HundrED has Innovators and Ambassadors from Ukraine. They’re reaching out to these people and in this writing you can read about the crisis from a Ukrainian teachers perspective. In addition HundrEd provides resources on how to speak with children about the crisis in Ukraine.
Last week in Helsinki, Finland during the HundrED Innovation Summit 100 leading innovations in K12 education from around the world were announced. These free resources are part of the 4th Collection. The goal is to inspire a grassroots movement by helping pedagogically sound, ambitious innovations to spread and adapt to multiple contexts around the world.
Unfortunately, the in-person summit had to be adapted this year to an online opportunity. Luckily this didn’t get in the way of providing inspirational speakers, panels, and discussions for all participants. Educators were invited to share their creative ideas with an audience from around the world.
HundrED partnered with Lego to release a Spotlight Report on Creativity answering the question: How can we effectively nurture creativity in education? The report highlights that there are no shortages of ideas around the world that are scalable and impactful. You can access the report and read what was learned. I’m sure it will be important information for you navigating education at the local district and community level.
Lindsay, Alex, and myself – Helsinki, November 2020
One of the educators I met while in Helsinki, Finland in 2018 while attending the HundrED Summit was Alex Bell who is the founder and director of Portland Education. One of the first questions I asked Alex was, why would a guy from the UK name his consulting business ‘Portland Education’? I quickly learned that he had gone to school at USM in Gorham and loved Maine so much that he wanted to honor his time spent in our beautiful state, hence, the name. After the summit we stayed in touch with Alex. The ‘we’ is my colleague, Lindsay Pinchbeck, who I traveled to Helsinki with as Ambassadors.
Alex is a likeable guy who has big ideas about education and believes in the power of the voices of children. He was working with a group of educators in a different part of Malawi which paralleled our project in Malawi. Alex has a few projects going on in other parts of the world.
For one of the projects this year Alex teamed up with volunteers, educators, and organizations in the US create the world’s first free online film festival about how to confront, examine, reimagine and create our education ecosystem. Alex says: “If you’ve got kids, are a kid or care about the bigger picture of education in our society, then you really are going to want to watch.” The film festival will include some amazing and beautiful films all about young people and education.
Th!S is Our Chance film festival runs October 6-27, 2000. Sign up at THIS LINK.
I’m back at the Maine Arts Education blog for all you amazing blog readers, 1,472 of you – educators, artists, arts directors, community members and so many more people who I know read the blog every day. So much has happened during my hiatus in the world of arts education. I realize I can’t go back and provide you with ALL of the information that has come across my desk and that has been happening BUT I can share some of the highlights – starting tomorrow. In the meantime if you’ve had an event, attended one, know about an upcoming one and you’d like to send me the information and photos to include in the blog please don’t hesitate to email me at meartsed@gmail.com. Thanks so much!
I’ve been busy and I’m sure you have as well. Some of my highlights:
Meeting with the following educators planning our June trip to Mpamila Village in Malawi to provide professional development workshops in arts integration for 10 days for 20 educators from several villages in the Ntchisi district:
Lindsay Pinchbeck, Director and Founder Sweet Tree Arts and Sweetland School
Ian Bannon, Teaching Artist and Director of Education, Figures of Speech Theatre and Associate Project Manager, Celebration Barn Theater
Amy Cousins, Visual Arts Teacher Gorham Middle School and 2019 Maine Art Education Association Teacher of the Year
Hannah Wells, Teacher at Sweetland School and Illustrator & Designer
Hope Lord, Visual Arts Teacher Maranacook Community Middle School
Mid-Coast School of Technology
Sewing dresses and pants for the learners in Mpamila School. If you’re interested in supporting this work, please let me know. We have 100 dresses sewn and 70 pants (30 to go). We can use some support to purchase underwear to put in the pockets. T-shirts and beanie babies have been donated by very generous people.
Recently we took the Sweetland Middle School students to the Mid-Coast School of Technology for a tour. Amazing new building and the mural designed by students and a local artist at the entrance inside and out is amazing. We will be visiting a sailmakers shop next week and continue making our boat that compliments the Odyssey studies underway. Each week during photography the learners travel to Maine Coast School of Photography to use their facility. Our middle schoolers are participating in apprenticeships with a local photography, jeweler, actor, and at The Apprenticeshop in Rockland. They are having amazing learning opportunities with wonderful artists.
Through my HundrED work we’ve connected with an arts integration program in India and are excited about planning with them on a project for the fall.
Arts education events including this past weekends performances of Maine Drama Festival at Camden Hills Regional High School – wow, the students were awesome!
I look forward to hearing from you with your news to share!
Whenever we are discussing helping schools change, there is one fundamental skill everyone mentions – creativity. Almost everyone seems to agree that we need to be a lot better in teaching this fundamental skill to future generations in all continents. This Spotlight will highlight some of the great education innovations focusing on cultivating this skill around the world.
Creativity is crucial to solving problems, both small and large. Whether personal challenges or those that impacts billions, creative solutions are in high demand. Creativity is also a mindset: being able to adapt no matter what happens. We believe that every child has the ability to be creative, and that ability can be improved as they grow. The question is how.
HundrED and The LEGO Foundation have teamed up to answer that question. Together, over the next 12 months we will shine a Spotlight on education initiatives from around the globe that are fostering creativity. Submit your innovation on creativity to be considered for the Spotlight. LEARN MORE!
We all know that the world has become a smaller place and that we’re all connected in some way. Education and educators are no exception.
I had the opportunity to attend the HundrED Innovation Summit and participate in Education Week in Helsinki, Finland, November 5-8. Lindsay Pinchbeck from Sweetland School in Hope and I are Ambassadors for HundrED and we continue to share the amazing work of HundrED.
During the summit we met educators, young people and teachers from around the world who are doing amazing work, projects that exemplify HundrED – To help every child flourish in life, no matter what happens. Watch the video of the wrap-up of the summit.
Some of the Innovations from HundrED are below. You can learn about more at THIS LINK.
In addition to teacher Innovators and Ambassadors there are now Student Ambassadors. The program is all about sharing ideas. If you go to the page you can search in a variety of ways. I invite that you take some time to explore and learn from others AND consider applying to be an innovator for next years HundrED collection.
In one week Lindsay Pinchbeck, founder, director and teacher at the Sweetland School in Hope and I will be landing in Helsinki, Finland for the HundrED Innovation Summit. We are thrilled to be invited and looking forward to meeting educators from around the world and visiting with those we met last year who are returning. I’ve blogged about HundrED before but for those of you who are unfamiliar hopefully this post will inspire you to take a look at the HundrED website and tap into their amazing resources.
I plan on blogging from Helsinki next week so keep your fingers crossed that my connectivity works from Finland!
WHAT IS HUNDRED?
HundrED.orgis a not-for-profit organization that discovers inspiring innovations in K12 education. HundrED’s goal is to help improve education and inspire a grassroots movement through encouraging pedagogically sound, ambitious innovations to spread across the world.
The purpose of education is to help every child flourish, no matter what happens in life. In a fast-changing world, education must adapt to keep up. The world is full of inspiring innovations, but they can struggle to spread beyond their immediate environments. That’s why HundrED discovers, researches and shares impactful and scalable K12 innovations with the world, for free.
This (under 2 minute) video says it well.
CHECK OUT THE RESOURCES
You can become a HundrED Innovator as well and learn more about the many many innovations included in the site. There are amazing educators doing amazing work around the world and many have been recognized by HundrEd and have profiles on the website. You can learn how to become a HundrED innovator and see the many profiles of Innovators by CLICKING HERE.
OUR WORK (and play!)
The invitation to attend HundrED during November 2018 was based on the work that Lindsay and I have been participating in since 2016 with the Go Malawi program. We offered arts integration workshops when we traveled to Malawi for almost three weeks that summer. We were recognized by HundrED as Ambassadors – you can read about our work on the Go Malawi site at THIS LINK. Check out Lindsay’s profile on the HundrED site or Argy’s profile.
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.
Argy Nestor
Arts Educator, Blogger, Artist, Connector meartsed@gmail.com
https://sites.google.com/view/anestor/
Argy’s Blog
The purpose of this blog is to share stories about people and places; and to celebrate the amazing work (and play) that students, educators, and organizations are doing in and for arts education. In addition, the blog has a plethora of resources and innovative ideas. This forum gives blog readers the opportunity to learn from each other. It is essential that we listen, learn, and collaborate in order to build on teaching practices for the benefit of every learner in Maine and beyond.
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