Diary of a Solutionista: The Alchemical Properties of STEAM in education

http://wowktv.com/story.cfm?func=viewstory&storyid=95709

the gist: 

STEM education:
Science + Technology + Engineering + Mathematics = problem solving skills

STEAM education:
Science + Technology + Engineering + Arts + Mathematics = creative problem solving skills

Yesterday I read a column written by Jim Denova of the Benedum Foundation, and Gregg Behr of The Grable Foundation, entitled "Can Arts Education Be a Savior to the Economy?"

Combined with science, technology, engineering and mathematics - quite possibly.

Both men are talking about transitioning from STEM to STEAM in education, as studies have revealed that the STEM program students suffer from a lack of creativity.  Both Benedum and Grable (of Pennsylvania and West Virginia, respectively) have been leaning forward in terms their educational development programs,  and are now asking the question that will lead to their next level of integration and expansion.  Here is a grants project that the two foundations have undertaken together:
http://www.artsedcollaborative.org/newsitems/view/13

They also referred to the Newsweek cover article that came out last July.  The online version had one sentence that was very explicit about thought sequencing in relationship to creativity:

"To be creative requires divergent thinking (generating many unique ideas) and then convergent thinking (combining those ideas into the best result). " 

In creative problem solving, the A always leads the way, and then and then [choose an intransitive verb] filters, flows or penetrates into the STEM accordingly, creating STEAM. 

Devova and Behr make the point that creativity is a skill that can be taught. So inserting some A in the right dosage and in the right sequence should do the trick, right?  It's a bit more complex than that, but still very doable.

I've been working on various pieces of an educational development platform that's been "in-progress" since March of last year, based on the STEAMy teachable moments from my case studies in high performance design.  This year, I started reconnecting with middle school teachers to propose workshops and presentations; tutoring high school students in Math and English Language Arts, and teaching a cross-disiplinary seminar on sustainability at Pratt, which unfortunately got cancelled due to lack of enrollment.  I was off to a good start, but it wasn't time yet...so I headed back to Florida to do some more resting, researching, and re-writing.  I'll be wrapping up some thoughts and finishing off some proposals over the next few weeks - as time, nature and technology allows.  Wish me luck!