Driving the Future of Education
“Driving the Future of Education” to showcase Student-Driven Education Reform Proposals.
(Lafayette, Louisiana) Louisiana middle and high-school students will develop proposals for improving technology in education under a seed grant from the prestigious Richard Lounsbery Foundation. The grant calls for the Cinematic Arts Workshop at UL-Lafayette, along with 3D Squared, a leading workforce development organization, and Dancing Ink Productions, a New York based technology advocacy firm focused on the evolution of the global culture and economy, to work with students to develop proposals around improving hardware, software, internet access, and the use of video games, virtual worlds, digital and social media in education. Student teams will have six months to work with educators, industry mentors and parents to develop proposals and present their prototypes online in virtual worlds and social communities.
“We are excited to be working with 3D Squared and Dancing Ink Productions on this cutting-edge project” said Charles Richard, Director of UL-Lafayette’s Cinematic Arts Workshop. “We have seen the power of 3D Squared’s programs up close, and we are
pleased to be working with Dancing Ink Productions, who are global leaders in advocating for use of collaborative technology in diplomacy and education,” Richard said.
“The young people of Louisiana have demonstrated their creativity and seriousness during our Digital Workforce Intensives over the last year,” said Spencer Zuzolo, President of 3D Squared. “We are looking forward to working with them to develop their ideas for using technology to improve education.”
“The Lounsbery Foundation has again demonstrated a strong vision for ways to harness creative power and explore policy change through technology,” said Rita J. King, CEO and Creative Director of Dancing Ink Productions. “We are grateful to be working with Lounsbery again. Our educational systems need to embrace technology so that we can grow a highly qualified digital workforce for the rapidly expanding global culture and economy.”
The project will build on the work of 3D Squared’s series of ‘Digital Workforce Intensives’ over the last year that showcased middle and high school students working in teams, with online tools and industry mentors, to develop proposals for solving Louisiana’s social and economic problems. The intensives also focus building communication and teamwork. Students will use online collaboration
tools such as Ning, and the online virtual world-building platform Metaplace™ to develop and publish their ideas. The project is scheduled to launch on October 1st. Top student proposals will be formalized and presented to leading policy makers in Washington, DC and Louisiana.
The project is already receiving notable endorsements and support. Fortune 500 company Manpower, Inc., a world leader in the employment services industry, supports the effort. “Preparing the next generation of virtual and digital workers for tomorrow’s workplace is a critical issue,” said Melanie Holmes, VP for World of Work Solutions for Manpower North America. “Manpower is pleased to support the innovative work of 3D Squared, the University of Louisiana Cinematic Arts Workshop, and Dancing Ink Productions in this effort to engage the future workforce so their technology needs are met now.”
For potential collaborators, partners and sponsors, please contact RITA J. KING (914) 420-0258 or email: Rita@dancinginkproductions.com
Participants
ABOUT 3D SQUARED
3D Squared is a leading workforce development organization focused on establishing an industry standard workforce pipeline for the 21st century digital workforce. 3D Squared seeks to prepare young people as well as adults to compete and succeed in the 21st century global digital economy.
ABOUT THE CINEMATIC ARTS WORKSHOP
The Cinematic Arts Workshop is a creative learning enterprise at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette. The Workshop was designed to complement the university’s Moving Image Arts curriculum, an interdisciplinary program in development at the University of Louisiana. Based on the principle of active applied learning, the Workshop’s prime function is to facilitate interdisciplinary collaborations between students and professionals (including off-campus producers as well as faculty) in the expression of art and ideas through digital media. Along with generating a number of national award-winning documentary films, examples of the Workshop’s efforts include contributing to the creation of educational computer games for middle school science students, and producing original media to support the School of Architecture and Design’s entry in the national Solar Decathlon competition. This year, the Workshop launched ‘Local Produce: A Marketplace for Homegrown Media’, an Internet-based economic development initiative aimed at promoting and digitally distributing new media works by emerging digital artists and young filmmakers who lack access to the larger mainstream media distribution markets.
ABOUT DANCING INK PRODUCTIONS
Dancing Ink Productions (DIP) is a full-service creative company that develops business strategy, policy, immersive narrative and mixed media, mixed-reality content including games, conferences and cultural intelligence for a new global culture and economy in the Imagination Age. DIP works across multiple social media platforms and within virtual worlds to introduce organizations to the idea of sharing meaningful ideas and collaborating on cost-cutting, solutions to amplify creativity and innovation while bringing together geographically dispersed members of the evolving global workforce, culture and economy. For clients taking their first steps in the digital culture, we streamline the experience and create strategic plans for participation. For experienced clients, such as IBM, the American University in Cairo, Manpower Inc. and Linden Lab, we collaborate on identifying and sharing a brand’s core narrative through creative mixed-media including data visualization and documentaries. DIP works with governments and organizations to contextualize the evolving culture of the Internet providing cultural intelligence and strategic foreign policy guidance toward and a fundamental understanding of how culture is shifting in the Internet era.
Rita J. King, Dancing Ink Productions
rita@dancinginkproductions.com, (914) 420-0258
Spencer Zuzolo, 3D Squared, Inc.
spencer@3dsquared.org, (512) 363-3795
Charles Richard, Cinematic Arts Workshop
cerichard@louisiana.edu, (337) 303-6200
