Observation-Lindsay Community High School



Students at Lindsay school share lunchtime with their children.
If you're interested in learning more about Lindsay Community HS
for pregnant and parenting teens, here is a link
to a recent article about the school.
Photo: Sam Hodgson

When professor Heil set the assignment for a class visit to any school utilizing technology, I imagined myself spending a day comfortably seated in the back of a classroom at some wealthy, teched-out school. My preconception couldn't have been further from the reality of my visit to Lindsay Community High School. Lindsay is a school for pregnant and parenting teens located in a intimidating corner of downtown San Diego.  What I noticed first when I timidly entered a classroom was not the Smart board on the wall but the newborn cradled next to her teen mom. Was there technology in use? Once I was able to focus on anything besides the alien concept of babies in the classroom, I noticed that why yes, there was. At the time we entered, the students were in the process of working on blog responses to a recent reading they had done. The atmosphere was simultaneously autonomous and collaborative. Students were able to work at their own pace (good thing too, when one must sporadically pause to feed or sooth a baby) but the sense of community was palpable.

I must admit that while on our school tour my intrigue with the dramatic life story of our young, heavily pregnant guide (a former graduate of LCHS) overshadowed my interest in anything technology related. It wasn't until after leaving the school, while digesting the experience along with an egg salad sandwich, that I came to the realization that this particular school was the poster school for disruptive innovation.

Each of the students have such unique academic needs. They come in ages that in no way correspond to a set grade level. It would be nearly impossible for a mainstream high school to meet their needs. This is exactly the situation that calls for modularity--individually customized lessons that target the individual, not the group. I'm not saying that these girls could get a better education working individually from home, because school is so much more than curricular; it's social. The community built at LCHS has LITERALLY saved lives. Our young guide believes it saved hers. But to have the opportunity to use school for that community-oriented purpose, without sacrificing learning, would be ideal. This must be what Christensen, Horn and  Johnson were getting at in their book Disrupting Class: How disruptive innovation will change the way the world learns. Internally, I have been fighting with the concept of customization in schools because I thought it would equivocate isolation and loss of community. Finally, I see how the two worlds could merge with schools being brick-and-mortar institutions of socialization and computerized learning being an academic support system.