October 2010

Hailed as groundbreaking and a breakthrough in commitment to education, the Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College has partnered with Teach For America, thanks to an $18.85 million grant from philanthropist and entrepreneur T. Denny Sanford.

The resulting project, aptly named the Sanford Education Project, is a vehicle to infuse some of TFA's best practices to raise the status of teaching and education careers and serve as a model for teacher's colleges in Arizona, Andrea Stouder said. Stouder serves as the executive director of the Sanford Education Project.

“Our job is to help facilitate a change within the entire college," Stouder said. "If we win, everybody wins. If we do what we hope to do, we will leave a legacy on the Teachers College that will last, not run a program that will go for a few years and then disappear.”

My Life Venture instructor Sidnee Peck (left) listens on during a class discussion. MLV offers students the opportunity to explore the basics of entrepreneurship.

Behind Sidnee Peck, the giant slideshow has students’ mouths hanging open. She shows them that if they saved $5 a day and tucked it into a high-interest savings account, they'd have nearly $1 million by retirement.

"All of a sudden that pack of cigarettes or that coffee does not seem so appealing," she says to her class.

ASU students David Hayden (left) and Andrew Kelley (right) accept their award for their winning project at the 2010 Imagine Cup competition. Hayden and his team developed a way for students with poor vision to take notes with ease.

Being legally blind, David Hayden, now a Computer Science Masters student, was having difficulty keeping up with taking notes in the fast-paced math classes two years ago. Little did he know that the innovative solution he created to resolve this problem would land him in Poland in 2010 for the world’s premiere student technology competition.

Pat Sekaquaptewa discusses her work with the Nakwatsvewat Institute, a Native American, nonprofit organization that works with Native communities to develop and enhance their governance, justice and educational institutions.

For Eddie Brown it is a matter of reiterating what’s already known; American Indians’ history, past and present, is rich in innovation and entrepreneurial spirit.

The question becomes how to teach that history, along with modern day thinking and problem-solving to students so they can contribute to the sustainability of American Indian tribal communities.

Wynter Fenn is a Senior majoring in Justice Studies at Arizona State University. She is currently the president of STAND at ASU, a student-led group that raises awareness of atrocities abroad. Photo by Kyle Patton

Listen to Wynter Fenn's story below:

As the bell rings to release students for lunch, they all rush past me while my Holocaust Literature teacher inserts a DVD on 21st century genocide, anticipating students to stay and watch. I soon found myself in an empty classroom, viewing in awe the gruesome images of scorched bodies, emaciated children and millions of people crammed into a refugee camp.