New Design High isn't an intoxicating feeling that designers get when nailing a project layout. It is a real high school in NYC that's a bit more special than the rest. If I could have picked a high school to attend, it might have been this one. New Design High School sounds like a totally creative, cool environment that is a rigorous college prep design high school. Their mission is to empower students with skills, tools and capacities to create attainable life plans....a design for life.
Located in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, NDHS uses the concept of design to assist in meeting the holistic needs of adolescents, including the academic, intellectual, social, emotional and artistic sides of students. NDHS integrates the idea, concept and process of design into a progressive, academic, high school curriculum, thereby offering a model of innovative and comprehensive education. The school community believes that design and the design process allow students to experience a more experiential form of inquiry-based education that is focused on understanding real world contexts, self-expression and problem solving. We believe that when students are engaged in the process of designing, they are learning to observe, seek problems, identify needs, frame problems, work collaboratively, explore and appreciate solutions, weigh alternatives, and communicate their ideas verbally, graphically and physically.
I found them via a video-blog link a friend emailed me and was quite interested with their approach. Check out the RocketBoom video to see behind the scenes at NDHS.
Image and text copyright NDHS
Comments