Los Angeles Students Solve Social Issues In Aspen Challenge
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Tapping into the creativity of young minds, the Aspen Challenge always produces ingenious answers and fresh ideas to tackling real community concerns. The Aspen Challenge competition may be over, but Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) students are still working. The Aspen Challenge is a tangible experience for these young people and not a one-time project. Students have gone on to form clubs at their respective schools, engage other schools to participate in challenge solutions, and continue the conversation and planning events using social media.
In March, 16 teams representing 160 students and educators from across the district showcased their innovation and creativity when presenting their answers to social concerns. These concerns of water sustainability, managing personal finance, climate change, fighting bullying, alcohol abuse, negative media stereotypes and public health problems were presented to the youngsters front and center. Students worked for seven weeks leading up to the competition.
This year's winners, Westchester Enriched Sciences Magnet are doing more than preparing to showcase their timely community solution during the 2015 Aspen Ideas Festival to be held in Aspen, Colorado in July. The team has turned its "Building a movement to create water sustainability awareness in Los Angeles" into a living and breathing campaign. Their out-of-the-box thinking even caused the team to author a water sustainability plan which made it to the desk of city government leaders. They've also generated excitement over plans to develop community events surrounding water conservation.
Packaging The Presentation With Artistic Style
Armed with the Aspen Challenge "Playbook," these young leaders managed to once again amaze their adult advisors with their mature level of problem-solving skills and their ability to adapt artistic promotional and multimedia savvy ideas to capture the judges' attention.
Students were able to choose from a list of social problems presented by field experts. While their team coaches and school principals stood by their side, the students digested the presentation instructions of the Aspen Challenge "Playbook." Students understood that in creating their presentations they needed to remember points such as: Show not tell, be aware of body language and use the best artistic tools to reach their target audiences.
"They really took the lead," said Robert Newman, Special Assistant at the LAUSD Office of the Superintendent. "Adults did not tell them what to do, and for the most part we just got out of the way and let them inspire us."
And inspire they did. It was not just the content of the students' messages that struck a common sense cord, but it was also their artistic effort in communicating their messages that blew the adults away. Onstage presentations included videos edited by students that showed what they were able to accomplish over the seven-week period. The videos showed project planning and even some famous faces that savvy students were able to enlist as support for their cause. Students also presented a one-page paper explaining their selected challenge and solution.
There was also a question-and-answer portion that illustrated how well the students thought out their challenges and solutions. The teen's exhibits included: carefully displayed content, 3-D projects, dioramas, constructed replicas, drawings and photos, colorful poster boards, slide shows, and detailed edited video presentations on laptops.
Of course there was no shortage of social media tools in use either, as most young people were very proficient in posting messages online as well as building websites and using social media sites to get their message out. These young masters of promotion also did early leg work by creating and passing out original designed T-Shirts, flyers, buttons and even bracelets all bearing team challenge slogans and or symbols.
"This was an adventurous journey for each team," said. Dr. Brenda Manuel, an administrator at LAUSD's Parent Community Student Services Branch. "Each member brought his/her talent, creativity and dedication and in the process, gained a new voice as a leader."
The Aspen Challenge was launched by the Aspen Institute and the Bezos Family Foundation, with support from the Moriah Fund. The event adds a new U.S. city each year. Los Angeles was the inaugural city for the event in 2013, Denver accepted the challenge in 2014 and this year, Washington D.C. students also took part in the Aspen Challenge.
Nicole Bailey-Covin is a public school education writer for Examiner.com.
