50th
Ever Onward

You Can’t Spell Trinity without T… R… I…

An inside look into Trinity's cross-curricular commitment to building future-ready skills in Technology, Research & Innovation
Technology. Research. Innovation.  These foundational, future-ready skills, stretching across all academic disciplines, will be essential in every professional field — shaping and defining the future of work. Recognizing that these critical skills are fundamental, Trinity Episcopal School has made the commitment to incorporating them into the academic experience of every Titan. 

Previously considered three distinct areas of study and interest, teachers in the Technology, Research and Innovation departments unified in the winter of 2024 to create an interdisciplinary, cross-curricular department aimed at supporting every teacher and every student at Trinity.

A direct outgrowth of both of the school’s most recent strategic plans — identifying “Future-Ready Skills” and “Navigating Complexities” as key capacities for Trinity graduates — the new department is putting an emphasis on skill-building for an unknowable future.  

The Titan Trail recently sat down with the three leaders of the TRI initiative — Director of Technology Laurie Pierce, Librarian Spring Lavallee and Technology and Innovation Teacher Cynthia Chinworth — for a roundtable interview to learn more about how these three concepts are connected, why this shift is so significant and how what it looks like to bring these skills to life. 
 
Titan Trail: Why is this important for a Trinity student to graduate with these skill sets? And why are these things important more broadly for an unknowable future? 

Laurie Pierce: We're trying to help students adapt to this rapidly changing world. And the more future-ready skills that we can teach them the better — skills like flexibility, adaptability, critical thinking, how to communicate, how to be creative, how to collaborate with others, how to problem solve. And we're trying to make sure that no matter what challenges students are presented with in the future that they're prepared to meet them with these skill sets. 
 
TT: How is this approach different from the way technology has traditionally been taught?

LP: Technology tools are going to be constantly changing. In the past, a student might have taken a class in a computer science class where they learned one programming language, like C++. But every couple of months a new technology tool rises to the fore. So now we are trying to teach not only about the tools but about how to be problem solvers and critical thinkers. Because if we're just teaching kids to use a tool versus how to problem solve we're not equipping them appropriately for the future.
 
TT: If you could clear up one big misconception about your field, what would you say? 

Cynthia Chinworth: Innovation is totally different from technology. Innovation is the novel idea, while technology comprises the tools that you use to implement that idea. 

LP: A prevalent misconception is that technology only serves as a distraction in the classroom. While it is true that devices can divert students' attention if misused, they can also be powerful tools for increasing student engagement and promoting collaboration. Trinity's faculty uses technology to capture students' interests and enhance their understanding of complex topics while providing clear guidelines for appropriate use.

Spring Lavallee: Research is more than just Googling something. 
 
TT: What initiatives are you particularly proud of? 

LP: Over the last 10 years, we have really grown our curriculum offerings, with new hands-on courses in programming, computer science, game design, robotics, innovation, design thinking and more. Launching the one-to-one MacBook program in 2015 put everybody on the same platform and set the table for robust technology offerings where students can explore areas that weren't available to them before. On-demand tech support is readily available, thanks to investments in equipment and staff. As teachers implement technology into their own classes and curriculum, they feel supported and have the resources they need to be successful.

SL: I've also seen quite a bit of growth in collaboration with teachers. The library has traditionally been a resource available for students and teachers, however there wasn’t always the flexibility for the librarian to be in the classroom providing direct instruction or collaborative instruction with the teacher. But now, I’m teaching three classes a day; I'm in every single grade level; I'm in every single department. As professionals in our field, we're all trying to reach the students and give direct instruction on those skills they need to move forward.
 
TT: What are some of the ways you’re bringing these concepts into the classroom?

SL:  At the beginning of Titan Prep, I like to do a lesson on copyright, which becomes a great real-world example of why it is so important to cite our sources when doing research. I introduce it by talking about Taylor Swift, because even if the students are not big Taylor Swift fans, they might know that she is earning more money than any other musician in the entire world. We talk about why she is rerecording her own material licenses for her music and how she makes money.

And then we talk about how we are all creating content every day. So how do you protect yourself and protect your own creations? You've got to cite your sources; you've got to cite your information. It helps them understand the “why” behind it. And it's a really fun discussion. The students can appreciate that she's an incredible business woman, so even if you don't like her music, you're going to learn something.

CC: For me, the most meaningful collaboration was last year’s innovation week. We worked with every 9th grade student in their English classes and challenged them to create a brand new word. You could take a word and change the meaning of it. We see this all the time in slang, like with the word “cap,” which means “lie.” Or we had one student who blended a Dutch and American word together. The next step was for them to go out and try to implement the new word in usage. So a student would then take that and play with the word a little bit with their friends, create a video and introduce this word to other students. And then the whole school got to vote on what was their favorite word in it.
 
TT: What was the winning word?

CC: The winning word was “schmacky,” which was an adjective that means “something that is very good tasting.” It might sound silly now, but it really demonstrated to these students that language is innovation. Not only do people use communication as a way to innovate, but that language itself is innovation. Language, just like innovation, is ever evolving and changing.

That was a really powerful moment for me as a teacher to be able to ask, ”Can you innovate in English class, and what does that look like?” We gave students a platform to thrive and let them go. It was really cool.
 
TT: How are you combining skills with the availability of technological tools?

CC: There’s a unit that I teach in my Exploring Engineering class about harnessing, storing and generating energy and the students design actual wind turbines. And over the years, the tools have advanced, but the conceptual skills like problem solving and creativity have become even more important. 

LP: In the past, students would have only been able to design something conceptual, but now we have tools that can laser cut or 3D print. Now, students can realize their idea, build it out of PVC and wood and test their models out. Students adjust, change, iterate, see what works and what doesn't and troubleshoot. With the combination of skills and tools, they can go deeper than ever before.
 
TT: Where does AI fit into this and how are we teaching our students about its potential and pitfalls? 

SL: When I talk to students about AI, I remind them that it's just a machine. It's just an algorithm. Whatever you put in is what you get out. 

LP: No matter what generative AI platform exists in the future, teaching students how to successfully engineer a meaningful prompt is one of the most useful future-ready skills that we can give them.

SL: In that skill, I see a lot of connections with TRI. Engineering a prompt is very similar to defining a problem, which is very similar to defining your research question. So it's the same underlying skill for all of those, but it's just a different language and different process for them to understand it.
 
TT: What existing research and pedagogy is this grounded in? What proven models are you tapping into to support teachers and students?

SL: In the area of research, we use the “Big Six” research model. I tell students, it doesn't matter if you are researching where you're going to have lunch or if you are researching your 4,000-word IB Extended Essay — all research boils down to six steps: 1) Task Definition; 2) Information Seeking Strategies; 3) Location and Access; 4) Use of Information; 5) Synthesis; 6) Evaluation. And it's a circular model because sometimes you loop back, you have to go back through the steps.

I always go through and explain to students that when you think you are “researching,” you may actually be doing one of those six steps. It's also important to point out when they're doing these steps even though they don't yet have the vocabulary.

LP: For technology, we use ISTE’s (International Society for Technology and Education) standards for technology coursework and how to integrate technology into the curriculum. They have seven different standards (1.1 Empowered Learner; 1.2 Digital Citizen;  1.3 Knowledge Constructor; 1.4 Innovative Designer; 1.5 Computational Thinker; 1.6 Creative Communicator;  1.7 Global Collaborator) that help students demonstrate competency, make sure they're using technology in safe and ethical ways, curating and evaluating the best resources and tools, among other skills. 

Being an “innovative designer” means students are using the design process to solve and identify problems and create these new solutions, which overlaps with the “I” in our TRI initiative (innovation). “Computational thinkers,” means leveraging technology to do things like algorithmic thinking data sets; that has some cross-curricular impact on math and science. And “global collaborator,” which connects naturally with our IB World School mindset here, has students using tools to broaden connections and enrich perspectives. Being aware of multiple viewpoints on a topic is a skill which overlaps nicely with the “R” in TRI: research as well.

CC: We lean heavily on the Design Thinking Process, which is an established, circular paradigm: 1) Empathize; 2) Define; 3) Ideate; 4) Prototype; 5) Test; 6) Implement. 

What's the first word that you think of when you think of “innovate?” You think “creative,” right? So how do you teach somebody to be creative? What does that mean? So often, students have a narrow concept of what being “creative” means. But it’s so much more than visual or artistic creativity. The foundation of innovation is using something in a different way than it was intended for. And that's where the skills are taught: implementation, evaluation and communication. And then the hardest part is the self-evaluation and encouraging kids to be risk takers in the process. If somebody's creative, is that because they're inherently creative or because they've developed these skills?
 
TT: Can you recall an instance where you really saw this?

CC: Last year, in the Design Thinking class, I had a student who was very, very analytical and very engineer focused, and it was hard for him to let go of his engineering mindset. But that was a really powerful moment for him being vulnerable with me as a student and me being able to guide him through that vulnerability and discomfort around not being certain of the answer. He also taught me a lot about how to be patient through that learning process — so I'm grateful to him, because I was able to learn just as much as he did.
 
TT: Any final thoughts?

LP: This initiative is something that's been a long time coming for us at Trinity. In the last 12 years, we've gone from having technology as almost an afterthought, a one-off lesson every now and then, to being integrated fully into the curriculum. And we’ve seen the same thing as research and innovation has been fully integrated into the curriculum. 

SL: There have always been teachers who were trying to navigate these areas on their own. The big difference now is that our teachers have guidance, access to professional development with professionals in the field and help implementing these ideas into their classes. We're working on their unit plans to help make sure that the integration makes sense for them, that it's catered to their individual needs and more access to us as the professionals in these fields to be able to provide that guidance as well.
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