Why a Field Trip?
On December 9, 10 and 11, Syfr, in conjunction with the Texas Association of School Administrators and the Los Angeles County Office of Education, will be sponsoring a Field Trip to three 21st Century Companies. The three have been selected because they all transformed their industries with new technology, depend on creativity and innovation to hold their leadership position in their respect industries, and have unique management structures and approaches to their respective markets. Each company has been asked to address three questions during the day we visit.
- How has the expectation of a high school graduate changed in your industry over the past 20 years? Is your company involved with public education to provide a graduate that better meets the 21st century demands, and how can school districts become involved in your work?
- How did your company transform its industry? What do you do? How did the transformation process occur?
- How does your company manage itself to maximize creativity and minimize the ramifications of failure, which is a natural by-product of creativity? Are there lessons for school districts as they attempt to transform themselves into more responsive and creative organizations?
Daniel Pink, in his book A Whole New Mind, lists Design as one of his 21st century senses, and uses the sense of vision and drawing to illustrate his discussion of synthesis - or what he calls "Symphony." We have picked three companies to visit that rely on the sense of sight and vision for their work. Whether in medicine, with transforming technologies relating to sight guiding both diagnosis and practice like surgery, or our selected industries of design, movies and mapping, visual skills will play an increasing role in the coming economy of the 21st century. They are generally not a part of our school curriculum, nor fundamental to our teaching strategies. Our Fieldtrip visits will be as follows:
December 9, 2009 we will visit ESRI in Redlands, CA (60 miles east of Los Angeles). ESRI is the world leader in geographic information system (GIS) technology and prime proponent of geographic problem solving. The day at ESRI is scheduled from 8:30 – 4:30. Learn more about ESRI and the many facets of its work, including K-12 education.
December 10, 2009 will be with Pixar outside of San Francisco, California. Pixar is probably known to all of us as the leading movie animation company in the world, and is now the managing entity for Disney Animation. The day at Pixar is scheduled from 9:30 to 4:30.
December 11, 2009 is our visit with Autodesk. Autodesk revolutionized design and the design-to-manufacturing process. It is the leading software supplier and developer in this field. The day at Autodesk is scheduled from 8:30 to 2:00.
The registration fee is $1490, which covers all transportation, food and lodging costs once you are in California. It is your responsibility to get there and back. If you are not from California, you should fly into the Ontario Airport in Los Angeles and out of either the Oakland or San Francisco airports on Friday. You should arrive on the evening of December 8 (no dinner is provided that night) and leave after 4 PM on December 11. If you are from California, the registration fee includes all flights within California. If you do not require three nights lodging, you should register by phone and we will deduct appropriate amounts for lodging and food that you will not be using. ESRI is located in Redlands, California, and we will be staying at the Mission Inn in Riverside, California on December 8. On December 9 and 10 we will be staying at the Hyatt at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco.
Click here for the Field Trip agenda.
Due to the very limited registration for this event, registrations are transferable, but non-refundable once they are made.
Lodging for December 8th:
Lodging for December 9th and 10th:
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