Rewriting The Rules At the School of the Future, students like Quetta Fairy are experimenting with a whole new way to learn.
"Miz Mary" Microsoft's Mary Cullinane says the company's "interest in education is very much a vested interest."
Related Stories"What I'm curious about is whether Microsoft will continue to develop authentic relationships with the school's staff, students, and local community in the years to come," Long says. "Starting a school is one thing. Sticking it out as a key partner as the school faces normal growth challenges, acquires new leaders and programs, and embraces the ongoing realities of urban education is another."
For now, Microsoft seems determined to stick it out, helping develop new curricula, integrating new Microsoft technology into classrooms, and burnishing the project's public image. After Cullinane finishes fielding questions from our tour group, it's on to the next task: preparing for the arrival of a group of educators from Kuwait. A few students who have been using Rosetta Stone programs (not a Microsoft product) to teach themselves Arabic will step in as assistant tour guides; more-seasoned translators will help ensure that the Microsoft message passes through the language barrier intact.
"This school provides proof positive of what can be done," Cullinane says. "Our goal now is to share it as widely as possible. We don't want to limit it to the parameters of 'If a company like Microsoft and a school district like Philadelphia decided to build the School of the Future, what would it look like?' Now the question can be, 'If a country like the United States and industries like technology, manufacturing, and service decided to make education their number-one priority, what would it look like?'"
Elizabeth Svoboda is a freelance writer based in San Jose, California, and a contributing editor at Popular Science.
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