Celebrating Powerful Learning at Lone Star Middle School – Digital Promise

Celebrating Powerful Learning at Lone Star Middle School

October 23, 2019 | By

In collaboration with HP and Microsoft’s Reinvent the Classroom Initiative, Digital Promise Global is proud to announce Lone Star Middle School of Nampa School District in Idaho as the newest HP Spotlight School. The HP Spotlight Schools program recognizes schools that exemplify powerful teaching and learning school-wide.

Nampa School District’s Commitment to Personalized Learning

Digital Promise Global and HP nominated Nampa School District because of the district’s leadership in using technology for personalized learning. The Nampa Personalized Learning (NPL) initiative provides every student with a device and supports teachers in leveraging technology, while coaches in each school work with teachers to create experiences that give students ownership of their learning.

Following a series of visits with administrators, teachers, and students at Nampa School District, Lone Star Middle School was selected to be the second HP Spotlight School in the nation because of how it leverages the NPL initiative to expand powerful learning opportunities for students and teachers.

Lone Star Middle School Exemplifies Powerful Learning for Teachers and Students

While currently in its second year implementing the NPL initiative, Lone Star Middle School’s transformation began earlier. NPL coach Drew Williams led a committee of Lone Star teachers who created engaging and interactive professional development, and established best practices and protocols for classroom device use, all while taking steps to ensure that staff felt ownership of the changes. They also integrated the Common Sense Digital Citizenship Curriculum to ensure students were prepared to use their always available technology responsibly, which earned the school a Common Sense School badge.

Visitors to Lone Star Middle School will see the positive impacts of the school’s efforts to ensure powerful learning for teachers and students. Students guide their own learning, supported by teachers who offer options for how learning is demonstrated and provide access to a wide range of digital tools. As one example, Lone Star embraces student-led conferences. In special education teacher Cindy Snyder’s class, students lead their own Individualized Education Program (IEP) meetings by creating presentations that discuss their goals, their strengths and areas of growth, and other personal and academic topics they choose to share with their parents, teachers, and school administrators.

In honor of their recognition as an HP Spotlight School, Lone Star Middle School will receive customized professional development from Digital Promise Global so that they can continue to advance the use of technology to support powerful learning. Additionally, Digital Promise Global will donate a customized HP Learning Studio, a space where students will leverage cutting-edge technology for student-centered making and design, including media production, virtual reality, and digital fabrication. Students and teachers will provide input into the design of the Learning Studio space, repurposing a currently underutilized classroom.

Learn More from HP Spotlight Schools

Digital Promise Global will continue to share stories of learning from the HP Spotlight Schools. Through these stories, district leaders can explore how professional development and supporting risk-taking can lead to instructional innovation. Teachers can explore practical ways to support powerful learning and see examples of innovative technology use with Microsoft and HP tools.

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