STEAM Mission Statement
The best learning is hands-on and done with other people. We work together to develop the skills and imagination needed to design, create, and utilize advanced technologies.
The STEAM program invites all members of the Windward community to make and learn together. We create open, accessible, equitable spaces for all students and community members to learn with and from each other. Our program values diversity, equity, and inclusivity and aspires to foster STEAM scholars who are also stalwarts of social justice. We challenge each other to create our best work. We celebrate each other’s successes and showcase our creations.
When we synthesize ideas from many disciplines, we are able to create elegant solutions for our increasingly technological society. STEAM encourages innovation by forging creative connections across seemingly disparate work in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics.
We are all capable of growth, and the STEAM program encourages bold ideas, tinkering, hitting dead ends, and trying new approaches, iteratively working through challenges in the service of achieving a goal. STEAM students and adults think creatively to solve problems. We create multiple possible solutions and prototype and iterate many times before arriving at final solutions.
We use tools responsibly, and we allow ourselves to dream up wild, creative solutions. We celebrate both our successes and failures when taking bold risks.
At Windward School, we celebrate and elevate art’s inclusion within the STEAM program. Within our art and design programs, we practice thinking expansively, working iteratively, and engaging in critique. This design process is mirrored in all other areas of STEAM from engineering and robotics to our STEAM Scholars program where students craft service based independent study projects.
The STEAM Scholars Program
Since 2013, Windward has offered an opportunity for upper school students with a passion in Science, Technology, Engineering, design Arts and Mathematics to be part of the STEAM Scholars Program. Students join at the end of Sophomore year and in recognition for additional coursework and outside of the classroom learning, they receive recognition on their transcript.