Sure, schools need traditional after school activities… basketball, drama, newspaper… sure. They are all important. But this is the Science Leadership Academy. We build stuff. (And Christian, here are some photos for you!)

I can’t go into too much detail as to what you’re seeing — as I’ve promised the students that we’d keep it a secret until after the opening ceremony, but we were asked to develop a presentation during our official ribbon cutting ceremony, and well, we take that responsibility seriously. What you are seeing is day one of the official build of our presentation. Nakkera and Shareesa are the faces you see, and they are pretty excited about what they’re doing. The kids who were working after school today were the ones whose design plan won the most votes in the Intro to Engineering electives. The kids will get to show off their presentation in front of Paul Vallas, CEO of the Philadelphia School District, Jim Nevels, Chair of the School Reform Commission, Dennis Wint, CEO of the Franklin Institute, various media folks, their parents and their classmates.

Here, Mr. Van Kouwenberg, Chris and Donald explain their project to me for about the fifth time. (Really, why is an English teacher running a school where 9th graders take engineering? Good thing I learned a long time ago that the students are usually smarter than me.) At about fifteen different points in the explanation, I think I said, "Now… you are SURE this is going to work, right?"

They are sure. And hey, if they are sure, I’m sure. And they’ve got fire extinguishers and safety goggles ready, just in case it doesn’t work.