By Mr. De Koker, STEM teacher 

The Middle School Exploration of Applied Learning program allows students a short experience in learning in a new way. These courses are offered each quarter (half-semester) and provide students with an opportunity to put their learning in their own hands. From crafting culinary dishes to trading stocks to blending poetry with engineering, students will take academic theory and knowledge and learn to use it in everyday situations. 

From the Exploration of Applied Learning coursebook, “In Poetry Engineering, students will discover that poets and engineers have more in common than you might think — both choose their materials carefully, work within constraints, and design something that has to work for an audience. In this course, students will make observations from different  perspectives, create design solutions — then write the poem that explains it. No prior experience needed — just curiosity, creativity, and a willingness to build something worth saying.” 

In Poetry Engineering, students explore challenges, design creative solutions, and translate their work into poetry drafts. This hands-on, interdisciplinary approach teaches students that engineering is a creative, human-centered practice, that our words—like structures—require careful craft and purpose, and that both disciplines can be a lot of fun.