Reimagining Education to Honor Children and Childhood
TO READ:
Sara Sadek, Brightworks parent, writer, educator, and advisor recently had a piece published on HTH’s Unboxed.
We hope you will find time to check out her beautiful article, Radical Dreaming. But for now, here is a sneak peak:
Reimagining Education to Honor Children and Childhood
March 12, 2025 •. By Sara Sadek
I never know what students will be up to when I visit the after-school program at Brightworks, a K-12 school in San Francisco where students drive their own learning. Sometimes, they’re slacklining between two redwood trees. Other times, they are hard at work in the art studio, making graphic novels with friends. Or deep in a chemistry set with an after-school collaborator, watching things fizzle, foam, and ooze. One day, I showed up to find a seven-year-old rollerskating in a celestial velvet tutu dress while flying a dragon kite, completely unbridled and free.
Brightworks makes this environment possible because they:
1) fundamentally believe in kids’ capacities to drive their own learning;
2) create a liberatory, collaborative partnership between students and teachers—who they call collaborators—and challenge the traditional power hierarchy between adults and kids; and
3) design an environment bubbling with provocations that spark wonder and curiosity amongst the learning community.
It also doesn’t hurt that their after-school program isn’t beholden to academic standards or curriculum requirements, allowing them to let a child’s interests lead without traditional school restraints.