-New Program Emphasizes Importance of Innovation Skillsets to Prepare Students for Tomorrow’s Challenges-
Teach For America Houston (TFA), a local nonprofit that works collaboratively with schools in the Houston area to expand educational opportunities for children has recently launched a new program called The Dream Lab. Part of the Teach For America Houston Network Learning and Innovation Hub, The Dream Lab is a set of immersive spaces where students leverage their imagination and creativity to innovate and solve problems affecting their communities.
“The Dream Lab is one of the novel ways we’re re-imagining the ways we meet the needs of Houston’s most vulnerable students and communities,” said Sarah Essama, founder of The Dream Lab and director of social innovation at Teach For America Houston. “It introduces a non-traditional approach to learning so that students are better equipped to handle the complexities of an ever-changing world.”
For more than thirty years, Teach For America Houston has been a cornerstone of the educational system, recruiting some of the most talented and brightest minds to teach in underserved and under-resourced schools across the area. The Dream Lab builds upon and extends the difference Teach For America Houston has and continues to make for Houston students.
“If there is anything we have learned over the last two and a half years, it’s the need to be innovative, and it’s a skill we must teach our younger generations so they can be adequately prepared for the future,” said Tiffany Cuellar Needham, executive director of Teach For America Houston. “We look forward to growing The Dream Lab initiative as we continue exploring ways to re-invent and re-imagine what schools can look like for students.”
“Teach For America Houston’s goal for The Dream Lab is to provide an unconventional learning experience that is engaging for students while stimulating students’ leadership, innovation, creativity, and “out-of-the-box” problem-solving. Students immersed in the Dream Lab experience are asked to participate in design challenges to develop right-brain use and innovation skills.
To date, Teach For America Houston has hosted two other Dream Labs for 4th graders – one at Dogan Elementary and the other at Wharton Language Academy. Their specific activity was using technology to design their innovative dream space where their peers could have fun, learn, and develop their leadership skills. Some designs included rocket ships taking students from one room to the next, a swimming pool filled with fruit punch, and a post-workout “cool down center.” According to Teach For America Houston, feedback from these participants was overwhelmingly positive as students emerged believing they could innovate and uniquely contribute to the needs of their community using their imaginations.
“All students should have access to education that prepares them to become leaders and change-makers of tomorrow. While we have made great progress on this front, we know we have a lot more work ahead of us. Programs like Dream Lab will help us realize our mission of ensuring that one day all children in our country will have the opportunity to attain an excellent education,” said Essama.
On Friday, Sept. 23, Teach For America Houston will take the Dream Lab concept to high school students in partnership with DivInc Houston, a nonprofit focused on generating social and economic equity through entrepreneurship. Twenty-five 9th graders will spend the day at the Ion strengthening their innovation skills as they go through a mini-innovation accelerator to conceive how they would creatively solve problems in their own communities. The Dream Lab, specifically designed for English language learners, is significant in Teach For America Houston’s quest to create educational equity for all students regardless of their socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds. Essama is spearheading the event with her colleagues, Candy Fernandez, director of school impact for Teach for America Houston & space design coordinator at the Dream Lab, and Amanda Moya, program director at DivInc Houston.
For more information about Teach For America Houston, visit https://www.teachforamerica.org/where-we-work/houston.
