Creativity in Education

November 17th, 2014

Dear Parents and Guardians of the Madison School District,

My name is Dr. Abigail Fisher, and it is my pleasure to introduce myself as your new superintendent. I received my undergraduate degree from the University Wisconsin-Madison, and went on to receive my masters in Education from Northwestern after a lengthy career in government working on education reform throughout Chelsea Clinton's presidency. I have been appointed to your school district because recent studies have shown that the Madison area is lagging behind in the creative initiatives given priority by the current administration. I along with numerous other education reformers have spread out across the country to begin a new era in the American education system that will focus on the cultivation and maintenance of creativity in the children of this nation. Throughout the rest of this letter, I will detail the changes that will occur in the next several years both in our school district and school districts across the country. These changes will be finalized by the year 2035. I hope you are excited as I am to embark on this new adventure that will ultimately better our children's lives and the trajectory of this great nation.

As you know, the United States began a nationwide period of reform after we were ranked last in the 2030 World Happiness Report. This revelation among other measures of the average American's dissatisfaction with their work and home life finally repaired the bi-partisan rift and allowed swift action by Congress to right many of the wrongs causing our nation to suffer. Education reform became one of our top priorities in this fight against a nation of disaffection.

Our first course of action was to significantly increase the pay grade and level of education needed to become a teacher in the United States. These decisions were based on the successful results of the Finnish education system. Finland has consistently ranked highly in test scores and gross national happiness (GNH). Part of their success stems from dedicated and motivated teachers, who do not receive the same economic stigma their American counterparts face. We knew that a strong foundation for our new education system would be filling our schools with new and energetic faces, in addition to giving our current teachers new tools in the form of additional training and sufficient economic support. The Madison school district will be welcoming several new curriculum experts who will be floating between different classrooms throughout the year to make sure the transition is occurring smoothly. These experts all come from different backgrounds, with specialties in various areas of study. All teachers within the Madison school district underwent several courses this summer to master the new curriculum, and we feel confident that everyone is ready to meet this school year head on.

Now let's dive into this new curriculum. The Department of Education created a think tank which included experts like creativity specialist Sir Ken Robinson in order to restructure the education system to better encapsulate a full range of human interests. The administration felt that it was time to appreciate and cultivate the varied talents our children possess in a manner that fosters cooperation and creative solutions. We will accomplish this in our schools in several ways. An overarching change throughout all K-12 grades will be a year long project for each classroom, chosen by the students themselves. We believe that setting long term goals for a school year will give students a sense of purpose for coming to school each day. Class-wide projects also foster cooperation and collaboration skills. Students will be encouraged to use their imagination when coming up with ideas for this project, and there will be few rules regarding what can or cannot be done. One of our only requests is that the project interact with the larger Madison community in some way. Here are some examples of projects completed by other schools around the nation.

• Eighth graders in Austin, Texas created a community garden where the homeless could gather fruits and vegetables seasonally and learn to grow their own food;
• Third graders in Cleveland, Ohio wrote, illustrated and printed several picture books, teaching other children how to appreciate differences in friends and families; and
• Tenth graders in Milwaukee, Wisconsin partnered with local startup programmers and created an app to help students find tutors or study partners in real time when they are working on homework during or after school.

We know that our students will be up to the challenge of thinking critically and creatively for their project throughout this year. They will have their teacher's full support and a discretionary fund specifically allocated for this project.

Other ways in which our curriculum will be changing to promote creativity and individuality includes an emphasis on play time in elementary school. We want the unabashed freedom of expression and lack of fear regarding mistakes that we see so often in younger children to continue into middle and high school. To accomplish this, we have flipped the traditional K-5 curriculum on its head. It will now focus on getting your children to interact with new technologies, the arts and more traditional subjects in unique and (most importantly) fun ways. The Madison school district has invested in new toys and softwares that allow children to create on their own or with a group, including "Roominate," sets of building blocks that allow children to create their own circuits, and the latest early elementary computer games teaching children to code and safely navigate our changing world. To best promote creativity in these early years of development, we as a nation have decided to eschew traditional grading and instead lean on parent-teacher interactions to gage where a student needs attention.

Finally, we as a school district will be dedicating ourselves to the arts in order to encapsulate the interests of all of our students. We appreciate the fact that each student possesses a different set of skills and interests, and we need to be prepared to cater to every subject equally. The government has provided schools across the nation with ample funds to rebuild our arts programs with the same strength we put into science, math and language. Going forward, every student will have the opportunity to explore their interests in ways that will prepare them for adulthood and for careers which increasingly value creativity in our heavily automated world.

Related Resources:

• Anu Partanen. "What Americans Keep Ignoring About Finland's School Success." The Atlantic; 29 Dec 2011.
• Ken Robinson. "How Schools Kill Creativity." TED, Feb 2006.