Napa County launches a bold new initiative to try and close the education gap.
Even more remarkable, the story is taking place against the backdrop of a miserable economy, long-term unemployment, draconian budget cuts and a recognition that our educational system is lagging far behind those in other countries. It’s driven by the realization that if kids are going to compete in a fast-moving, high-tech, global market, they’ll have to be trained in a whole new way. And to make that happen, the community has stepped up to the plate.
NapaLearns, an organization founded in early 2010, led by high-tech entrepreneur Chuck McMinn and Napa Valley Vintners Chief Financial Officer Rick Jones, and supported by a list of well-known philanthropists, educators, visionaries and community members, was created to coalesce the minds and the money that can bring a new way of learning—the project-based, technology-friendly, digital education that’s being pioneered in Napa’s New Tech High School—to all students in Napa County.
Preparing for the future
“The school system as it exists has really been an aberration,” says McMinn, NapaLearns president and chair. “Before the 20th century, education looked a lot more like project-based learning. It was internships, apprenticeships; education was industry. It was only in the 20th century, when mass production came into being, that we began to mass produce people who would fit the assembly line.”
It may have been fine for our system to educate a workforce aimed for a manufacturing marketplace, but the United States is fast moving beyond that, he says: “The number of net new manufacturing jobs in the United States in the next 10 years is zero.” He explains that, in traditional blue collar industries, there will only be “replacement jobs,” jobs made available by those who retire. “So, if we’re trying to grow our economy, we’re going to have to grow it with the 20 million new ‘knowledge worker’ jobs that the Bureau of Labor Statistics forecasts we’ll need.”
McMinn is an old hand at new technology. Having created, financed and advised a series of high-tech startup companies over the last 25 years, he has a keen sense of the marketplace, both present and future. From his own experience, he’s found that, in this age of unemployment, while there are opportunities for those who are trained, our youth are, for the most part, unprepared. “Today, in Silicon Valley,” he says, “there are job openings. They can’t find enough engineers and marketing managers and people who have a high degree of understanding of the technology space. So even while they’re laying people off, they have thousands of job openings for people with the right skill sets.”
So where do you begin to transform a system?
According to community leader Dorothy Salmon, the decisive moment came when Napa’s Blue Oak School cofounders Tracy Schuler and her husband, Barry, were given a tour of New Technology High School in Napa, they were blown away, she says (See “First Class,” Jan. 2007). Barry Schuler, a visionary entrepreneur and former board chair and CEO of AOL, recognized the New Tech model as an example of how high school could better prepare students for college and career. He went to the Napa Valley Unified School District and offered to put up a $1 million matching grant; he then went to Napa Valley Vintners to see if it would put up another $1 million match. “The two grants together equaled $4 million in potential funding. Over four years, we were successful in meeting the match challenges—and this is just the beginning.”
The money was impressive, but the message was even more so, because it was coming not from the school system asking for help, but from the local business community, which was saying emphatically that high school graduates aren’t ready for today’s careers—that they don’t know how to work together, have no collaboration skills, aren’t very creative, and their math and writing skills aren’t where they need to be to qualify for today’s jobs. Business leaders wanted to help, and the greater community rose to meet them.
And so, NapaLearns
Rick Jones says he, Chuck McMinn and a couple of other people formed NapaLearns in April 2010 to raise the money to match NVV’s grant and then oversee the spending of the money. The concept caught on, and now NapaLearns has become a partnership that includes the community and all five Napa County school districts. It’s dedicated to bringing the technology-friendly, project-based learning approach to public school education from pre-kindergarten through high school.
“We’re trying to improve the public schools in Napa County across all economic and ethnic groups,” he says. “It’s a model that could be applicable in other places.” So far, he’s excited by what he’s seen of this mode of learning in action. “If you walk into one of the classrooms at New Tech High School, which is one of the first examples any of us saw of this approach, the students have their computers, but they’re talking about what they’re seeing; they’re working in groups and learning to communicate with one another about the ideas they’re having, rather than sitting there listening—or not listening—to the teacher at the front of the room.”
Now, the teacher can be free to facilitate as kids do their problem solving, exploring and researching on individual computers and within their working groups. Far from being “mechanical” or “inhuman,” Jones says, what he sees is real human engagement. “I think this, done right, at the hands of a teacher who’s been trained how to use the technology, can actually make it a much more human experience.”
In a way, far-thinking as this new education model seems, it’s also coming on a bit late, says Jones. “There should have been a sense of urgency [about this] over the last 15 or 20 years. Depending on how many countries are included in the study, we could be either 25th out of 30, or 47th out of 52. But we’re inevitably in the bottom quartile of most of these studies,” he says. “And every year, another class of students has either dropped out of the system or failed to meet the challenges of the real world we’re now in.” This, to Jones, McMinn, the Schulers and all the business and community supporters of this program, is simply unacceptable. But can you really turn around a school system?
Revolutionizing a school system
“Schools tend to be among the last entities to change,” says Barbara Nemko, Napa County Superintendent of Schools. “If you look at schools today, you’ll see many advancements, but it won’t be as startling as the difference between transportation today and 100 years ago, or between communication today and 100 years ago. Schools would still be recognizable.”
We’re teaching in the same format, for the most part, as we did 100 years ago, and yet, she says, “the kids are very different. We’re teaching digital natives. [Kids are] using technology all day long. We can’t tell them to check their technology at the classroom door.” For her, the NapaLearns ball started rolling after Barry Schuler threw down his million-dollar challenge to the community and NVV picked it up. Then, when McMinn got involved, a new nonprofit was formed and she climbed on board as well. “Chuck McMinn personally went to speak to all the school boards,” she says, “telling them about his experience with his own startups and how he had to hire off shore, since the U.S.-trained applicants weren’t qualified.”
“I think another reason it caught on so well is that, in this economy, it’s not accurate to tell students you just need to get a four-year college degree and then your life will work out fine. It’s no longer true. We know how many people in this economy complete that four-year degree and, not only do they not have a job, they’re $100,000 in debt.” So beyond high school, it’s no longer safe to assume that you just go to college and the rest of it works out.
The NapaLearns leaders are saying that what’s needed is a whole new way of learning. But what does this do to the curriculum? Will students be still taught the basics, as they’re learning all this new technology?
From product to process
While NapaLearns is promoting project-based learning, Nemko assures that the standards will still be taught. “We’re doing what the state says we need to do,” she says. “Technology is just a tool, it’s not the whole game. The game is still working in teams, doing presentations, collaborating, thinking creatively and learning communication skills.”
In other words, they’re teaching the same things—but learning new skills. An example, she explains, is teaching the trial of Julius Caesar. Instead of just reading from books or listening to the teacher lecture, “Here, students are working in teams, and they have a prosecutor, a defense attorney, witnesses and a judge. They put on the whole trial. So you’ve combined government and English in a project-based way.”
For her—for all NapaLearns supporters—technology is a tool, and information is something to find and work with to create and solve problems. “It’s not just finding knowledge,” says Nemko. “It’s working with it and using it to create new things.”
“Project-based learning is more of an approach to teaching what students are required to learn before they graduate,” says Jones. “That includes competency in all the curricula that are out there. All of the projects have to conform to the core standards of the state of California—or the multiple core standards of multiple states that define what it is students should be learning at each stage of their progress through high school.” So people need not fear that their kids aren’t getting taught the basics. Rather, they’ll be coming to the basics using the media they’ll need to participate in the building of their future. “It’s not as though we’re coming up with different subjects,” he says. “We’re just trying to make the learning process more interesting and more relevant.”
Start at the beginning
In a four-week pilot program conducted this past summer, NapaLearns reached out to Calistoga pre-kindergarten, English-learner students with a program designed to get them excited about learning and help them with some basic educational experiences using an iPad. “It was amazing how quickly the kids took to the iPads and how quickly they began to form the basis of letters and words,” says Jones. “Teachers all felt they’d made accelerated progress because of the iPad.”
NapaLearns Director Dan Lynch laughs when he talks about kindergartners and the iPads. “About two years ago, my son got an iPad,” he says, “and then his 3-year-old son stole it from him. He had to buy himself another.” To him, the magic of learning can be easily observed when you see a little kid begin to interact with an iPad—as you can do in any Mac store—their faces are all smiles and they won’t let it go. “It’s pure learning,” he says. “When you see a kid learning by doing and touching, and not having to use big English or Spanish words, that’s one example of the power of choice. They have a screen in front of them with 70 or 80 icons, and they just stumble around and play with things, like in a sand box. That’s how kids learn.”
What the adults learned was, first, that an idea like handing prekindergarteners iPads could actually be supported in the school system, and second, that children would respond with even greater enthusiasm and observable engagement in learning that they thought possible. The results boosted the group’s own enthusiasm and the commitment of the teachers involved and ultimately motivated donations of even more iPads to the program.
“Everyone was so amazed with the performance of those 15 kids,” says McMinn. “All four Calistoga elementary teachers said, ‘We need this for all our students.’ So we accelerated the program and now have iPads for all 80 kindergarteners in Calistoga.” NapaLearns purchased the first 20 iPads and then the group arranged for the donation of 30 more, and now the school district has contributed another 30; other Napa County School districts are following suit. On its website, NapaLearns has both a “Donate Now” button and a “Donate Your iPad” button for those who feel so motivated.
The proliferation of the iPads is an example of how the project-based, interactive and self-directed learning concept has caught on. It’s the kind of story that the people of Napa (who share the pride of a reputation for world class wine and food, not to mention beauty and quality of life) seem to love. “Napa County is known for its innovations, from great Cabernet to great kids,” says Salmon. “It’s really a powerful example of how a whole county full of people can make a difference when they work together. NapaLearns was created by a group of visionaries who never give up. We have board members who are totally dedicated to the community, and serial entrepreneurs, like Barry Schuler and Chuck McMinn, who are passionate about transforming public education.”
Salmon, a mother and grandmother, says her generation, the baby boomers, has enjoyed the benefits of their parents’ generation’s commitment to giving their children the best education possible. But somewhere along the line, she says, the boomers got too comfortable and lost sight of some early priorities. So this community effort is a way not only to give back, but to give forward—to prepare all our kids for their future. “If we don’t immediately begin preparing our kids for the world they live in and will be responsible for, we’ll continue to experience devastating economic impacts in the United States,” she says. “We have to do this now.”
She likes to quote Barry Schuler, who predicts that, someday, there will be a statue in Napa that reads, “This is the place that transformed public education.”
