so what makes a homeless student come to
school every day with a positive
attitude and the resolve to achieve
their dreams where does the force that
drives the student with a severe
learning disability to sit in a regents
exam for six hours to the point of tears
refusing to give up where does that come
from what makes the student from an
abusive home come to school and treat
their peers with real love and respect
and equality and demand tolerance what
makes a father turn down a job and a
promotion to keep his son in the school
he’s in what makes students beam with
pride and jump at any opportunity to
brag about their school these are the
stories that we are seeing unveil
unravel every single day at P Tech a
little background
HFM p Tech T Tech stands for pathways
and technology Early College High School
that will be on the test is made up of
fifteen cooperating component school
districts that collaborate with over 40
probably close to 50 now business
partners in the Fulton Montgomery
Community College where we stand right
now through a participation grant with
New York State they send their students
to our school to not only start high
school in the ninth grade but to start
college and we know they start college
because F MCC census – bill it’s
competitive to get in as a matter of
fact three students for every seat
because of this we have these interviews
and in these interviews before the
students can can get in we ask these
open-ended questions our first interview
was with a student named Meg I’ll never
forget interviewing Mae Mae came in and
she just beamed and one of our
open-ended questions was how do you see
yourself improving or impacting the
community someday and she’s she’s she
replied I know this sounds weird but I
really like to solve homelessness with
dance and I looked at May and like go on
I always thought I could help people but
I didn’t know how it sounds crazy but I
think about what do I have to offer and
what does the world need well I love
dance and homelessness makes me so sad
so I think what if I were to open up a
traveling dance studio and travel around
and teach homeless people how to dance
and maybe they would get a job dancing
or maybe they had opened their own
studio or maybe they’d just be inspired
to do better and get their life in order
and go get a job get a get back together
with their family improve or just become
confident and then boom right there in
that moment I knew that it wasn’t a
students grades or their discipline
record that would make or break them in
this program it was their ability to
think outside the box be resilient take
risks use their own individual talents
to impact their world locally and
globally
I knew students like May were the future
of our school that statement is now one
of our core missions and Mays in her
third year here at P tech F MCC majoring
in business she just finished up her
first internship with a Fulton
Montgomery Chamber of Commerce thanks to
our amazing business liaison Nicole and
our partnership with the FM Chamber who
helps beat at connect in a very
seriously meaningful way with our local
businesses project-based learning drives
a curriculum at p tech that means all
content is delivered through projects
not just the memorization projects end
in a public display of knowledge a pitch
maybe a presentation a debate a
professional fair or even a trial by
jury students work in small groups on
everything they create an agreement for
participation and well for non
participation sometimes student hold
students don’t hold up their end of the
bargain
sometimes there are arguments and
sometimes people are absent or don’t do
what they they need to do to make the
group successful sound familiar life
real life
like your workplace maybe at P Tech
every student goes through a one-on-one
mentorship experience with a business
partner focusing on professional skills
when one of our new industry partners
Mohawk cabinet saw P Tech student named
Ryan to speak at an event they
immediately wanted to work with us their
CEO Jim was so happy with the results
that came from working with our students
he engaged our entire school to redesign
his webpage and offer the winning design
team a paid internship that would focus
on remarketing and redesigning the
Mohawk cabinets online parts business
long story longer Mohawk cabinet now has
an international web presence they went
from trade manuals selling the parts and
trade manuals and mailings to digital
globalization in just a few weeks thanks
to the students at P Tech I have to say
it was a little weird
handing the students their pay tech
paychecks from the internship at the end
of the school week but as weird as it
was it was ten times as awesome
some students didn’t know what a bank
account was so we had to help them
because they were collecting their
paychecks in their purse so we had to go
and open up a bank account which was
awesome and today one of our sophomores
Aislin is introducing Google Analytics
and website optimization to frozen parts
comm as a paid internship when I think
about the students that made an
authentic impact made on Mohawk cabinet
I can’t help but wonder what changed why
do they stay why do they choose to
achieve when they didn’t in the past why
didn’t they just give up when the chips
were down why didn’t they just quit what
is it about peak tech that makes them do
the things they do I asked one student
Nigel I asked Nigel if I could use his
name and tell a story he was very
excited I asked him these questions and
he told me before he came to P Tech that
his life was chaotic his sister had
passed away the year before and he was
angry angry at everyone everything and
at the world Nigel would attend 25
percent of his classes his eighth grade
year he even became violent sometimes I
wish you could meet this young
professional now polite poised
professional six
seedy and I just said he could identify
one thing that changed his perception of
school changed his life really and I
just said coach who never really coached
any organized sports with Nigel but used
to come in early to open up the gym so
the kids could play basketball and pick
up ball or run around or just hang out
before school so the students bestowed
upon her the most esteemed beloved title
of all coach
she gave me space he said she asked
about me personally how am i doing she
asked not just questioning me about the
class about my grades and harping on me
about how I was doing in the class she
believed in me you see folks Jamie
Dickenson like all of the teachers at P
Tech is a risk-taker an instructional
surgeon with heroic aptitude when it
comes to project-based learning but most
of all she believes in the students that
she teaches she will not be deterred
think about your most beloved profound
life-changing educational experience
think about that go there right now
picture the teacher the coach the
conductor the professor who was central
to this experience
did anybody picture themselves hacking
away at a pile of copied packets of busy
work at the kitchen table or hours spent
with the little green regents review
books copying spell work spelling words
ten times each or listening to a lecture
in the classroom filled with 200 I don’t
think so
those aren’t personal experiences those
are obstacles you have not succeeded
because of those mundane experiences you
have this succeeded in spite of them was
anyone reminiscing about reminiscing
about the standardized testing then why
may I ask do we continue to make
education look the way it currently
looks why are we continuing to crank out
worksheet packets as homework and call
it learning John Dewey called for the
change in 1899 we still haven’t
realized it yet peacock is paperless and
Wireless every student gets a one-to-one
MacBook they take it home every day no
rows no bells no lockers we have a
robotics lab and every classroom is
designed after the Google offices yet
all of these things are just things
tools really a means to the end but not
the end not the special sauce the
culture of this school
that’s the magic when student
ambassadors are asked talk to visiting
dignitaries like up here and when the
dignitaries asked them questions like
what makes your school so special time
after time students overwhelming and
respond the teachers saying they trust
us they let us take the lead they treat
us like adults they let us use our
judgment good or bad the experience is
ours when a child says the word like
ours we know that something special is
going on we’ve been trying now for three
years to try to figure out what’s going
on at P Tech and why what is happening
is happening and after a body of work
was discovered and quite honestly just
stumbled upon by listening to a podcast
called freakonomics I got interested in
behavioral economics Tversky and
Kahneman said it’s not the data that
drives perfect decision-making
no the experts that are creating that
data are wrong it’s your experiences in
the way you frame these experiences it
what you mean or the value of yourself
to your organization or to your school
just the past couple weeks I was at a
local school district giving a talk very
much like this hoping that some eighth
grade students would apply to our
program and when I start out is to think
about your perfect school you have all
the money you could ask for you have
access to the the best teachers best
technology best furniture what does that
school look like schedule anything is
yours go ahead and first it was silence
I want you to think about your perfect
school to when these students started
popping off they started saying things
like well we want to use our cell phone
all the time we want more space in our
lockers what what do you mean
well we’re sick of jam and stuff into a
small space and crowded with each other
we want more space and then another
student will call out yeah we want space
to plug in our devices and another
student would say hey we want to be with
our friends all day long we want to work
with our friends another student said we
want the middle of the day to stop and
we want to just do what we want to do in
the middle of the day we get to choose
and I was waiting for it another student
yelled out Golden Corral in the middle
of the school as surprised it took so
long and I was at Starbucks I’m like oh
okay this was actually longer than I
thought it would take for you guys to
get to the food but so noted the
students then asked we don’t want to be
lecture 2 anymore please stop lecturing
noted the students wanted comfortable
spaces they said soft rocking chairs and
chairs with wheels and the more they
kept the talking the more I smiled
they wanted to be in control of their
education they wanted it to mean
something to them and be real so at the
very end as students were throwing out
what their perfect school would look
like I just smiled back at them and I
said you just described p-tech want to
come thank you very much [Applause]