Hayden Gore

International educator from the United States.

Learning happens best when I allow myself to let go of control, to give responsibility over to my students, to trust in their ability to rise to the occasion, and make decisions about their own learning. To be fair, there are times that the dynamics in the room are not right, that the stage is not properly set, that something or other does not come together and it falls flat. But that is the excitement of the attempt. The same excitement and nervous expectation that you get when you try something new, explore unknown territory, and test your limits. The potential for things going wrong is ever-present, but the reward when it goes right is incomparable.

Initial student prototype for an app that provides creative writing prompts.

My colleague and I spent 3 and a half hours one morning riffing on the "Fail Fast, Fail Better" unit. We did not know how it would end or even how it would work out. We put effort into envisioning what it might look like on the front end as a kind of mental exercise. But there was no predicting which way our students would take it or what kind of conclusions they would make. As we explored the idea of failure, we faced the reality that the entire unit could end up in failure. That's the risk we took as innovators, and that was the risk we asked our students to take.

Student diagram of an open source project. Medium: Expo marker on tabletop.

Our Design Technology classroom is a laboratory for experimentation, where we take systems of innovation, like open source or "Fail Fast, Fail Better," and put them to the test. The actual literature about those systems is conflicted, with diverging opinions on both sides of the debate. In a normal academic setting, we would read what others thought about them, come to an opinion, and then defend it based on our research. In DT, we resolve the question by actually putting the systems to work and seeing if they help us create more innovative solutions to problems.

Directing an investigation of a mock gravesite in Goma, DR Congo.

My students use design thinking to create innovative solutions to real world problems. To facilitate that process, I draw on years of experience directing forensic training programs in Nepal and the Democratic Republic of Congo, supporting the search for the disappeared in Peru, and working with Mayan communities to provide water and health education to rural schools in Guatemala. As a result, when talking with students about the problems they want to solve, I can ask the probing question that help to deepen their thinking.

I challenge students to live active lives and develop a passion for the outdoors.

More than a teacher, I am a passionate learner. And I pursue that passion wherever it takes me. I surf the ocean, explore wild spaces, bike, swim, hike and play. I preach risk-taking to my students and try to live by that same belief. Whether it's paddling out on a big Pacific swell or taking a year off from teaching to write a novel, I pursue my passion for learning so that I not only talk the talk but have experience doing the walking, as well.