Be the change
In just a few months, a Christchurch school’s new innovation and entrepreneurship programme has seen students create an educational Māori culture social media lens with over 150,000 global engagements, pilot a wāhine in tech programme for Deloitte, and assist a health tech start-up company’s virtual reality therapy app.
Rangi Ruru Girls’ School has this year launched RangiX, a programme dedicated to arming its Years 7 to 13 students with future-focussed skill sets, tool sets and mindsets to thrive in an increasingly complex and dynamic world.
Centred around the three pillars of innovation, technology, and entrepreneurship, RangiX runs across pre-existing classroom subjects, standalone classes, co-curricular options, and online learning modules – all with a close tie to real-world opportunities and commercial and tertiary partnerships.
The programme at the independent day and boarding school is headed by Owen Flattery, the school’s recently appointed Head of Innovation and Entrepreneurship. He joins the school from Melbourne, where he drove the digital strategy at Lauriston Girls’ School.
“RangiX is about teaching students how to innovate to solve problems and to be able to create those solutions using digital capabilities,” he says.
“This is underpinned by the understanding that as the world becomes more technological, what becomes more valuable are the human skills and traits that bind us – communication, creativity and collaboration; empathy, trust, courageousness, resilience and kindness, and leadership and managing others – and RangiX aspires to develop these skills in our students.”
Principal Dr Sandra Hastie says RangiX addresses a crucial element of modern education: “We don’t know what jobs many of our students will do when they leave school because they are yet to be invented.”
“But,” she says. “What we do know is that students need to be creative thinkers, have the ability to see a problem and a solution and the ability to deal with failure and not give up and to develop resilience.”
RangiX is another way the school prepares students for life after high school in an increasingly complex world. As well as learning about innovative thinking and problem solving, students will learn about essential technologies, and crucially, RangiX connects students with industry and tertiary partners to create real-world opportunities for students.
You can find out more about RangiX at rangiruru.school.nz