Lisa Gustinelli

Three eighth grade students in South Florida used design thinking to build a philanthropy with the goal of closing the digital divide in a rural farming area of their community

The class was intended to be an elective, a two day a week offering for middle school students in order to leverage student agency as part of their course selection. 

I was first exposed to the idea of design thinking through involvement in the IB world back in 2011 as part of their MYP course requirements. This way of teaching and learning (which actually dates back to the 1960’s as an engineering method) is now all the rage, and a popular new tool for educators as it has been revived by Stanford’s “d.school” in order to encourage individuals to create and innovate. At the basis of this creation is a methodical process that is based on solving a problem that will satisfy the needs of an end user. In short, the method has five steps

• Empathize

• Define (a problem)

• Ideate

• Prototype

• Test

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