MPA Now Spring 2017

This edition of MPA Now highlights a host of both new and time-honored ways that MPA seamlessly integrates science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. The acronyms STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) and STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, and math) are in vogue these days throughout educational circles. Schools across the country have seized upon them to demonstrate their commitment to 21st century education. But the pedagogy behind these terms are not new to MPA.

Apple's late, often-cited CEO Steve Jobs attributed much of his company's success to collaboration between designers and computer scientists, famously noting, "It's technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the results that make our heart sing." The cross-curricular integration of science, technology, engineering, art, and math has been present since our founding in 1982. Furthermore, their grounding in a progressive, liberal arts, college prep curriculum is distinctively MPA.

Human beings by nature strive to innovate, improve, advance, solve, and evolve. The arts and humanities, along with science, technology, and math, provide a foundation and context for students to dream big and do right. This holistic approach allows students to transform the wildness of their imagination into inspiration for others through the development of skills in creativity, empathy, problem solving, perseverance, and more.
We live in a time when knowledge and information are ubiquitous and accessible in seconds. What is crucial for success in today's world is what we do with the knowledge we have. Critical, creative, and innovative thinking is the "new smart" in a world where machines will be, in many ways, smarter than we are. Cultivating such a mindset is the imperative schools must rise to meet. Entrusting students with the technology and tools needed to create, together with the mindset necessary to appreciate how they are embedded in and can transform our world, is the MPA way.

STEAM at MPA is not a fad or a buzzword, but a distinctive iteration of cross-curricular, hands-on, experiential learning. When students take deep content knowledge in those areas, and are asked to use it to address the problems they see, they become inspired to stir the human spirit, stand for justice, and shake the world.

Mounds Park Academy Now, more than ever.

Dr. Bill Hudson
Head of School