Good Day Google+ - Women in Science, Mathematics and Humanities

Poetry in motion. G+ has so much to see. As deep as any ocean. It's the only place I like to be. She blinded me with science. Hey there, plusers.

Welcome to Good Day Google+.

And today we're going to blind you with some science, mathematics, and humanities as we talk to these wonderful people from Indiana Academy about their school, about the projects they're doing, and about their 25th anniversary that's coming up. So if you have questions for them once we get started, please feel free to leave them in the comments section and we'll get to them. We'll put your comments up. But right now I am going to introduce my panel to you, and then we're going to start in the middle for me, and it's Joanna Liberty, my friend from ShiftCon, and you saw her on last week's show. How you doing, Joanna?

Good, thank you, Dennis.

You're becoming a regular on the show now.

Yeah, it's kind of fun.

You're an alum from '02, is that correct?

Yes.

Okay, very good. So we'll come back and talk to you a little bit more, and then next to Joanna, I have Laura Morgan Roberts, PhD. Oh, I love that. My brother's got one of those too. Me, I don't. But how are you doing today?

I'm doing very well, and I'm also class of '92.

Woo-hoo! So we got a good representation here of the school. So that's good, you know, it's always better when we hear things from people that actually attended there rather than just representatives. That's good. And then on my end, I have Jo Tewitt, and she is also at the school. And Jo, you are One of the department chairs, or—

I'm the Associate Director, Head of Admissions.

There you go, more important title. Yes, I forget everything. We are the one where the buck stops there occasionally, right?

Right.

Not always a good place to be, but—

No, it isn't.

Been there too many times myself. I used to have a sign on my office door, not that I had any kind of those responsibilities, just because It's an emergency for you doesn't make it one for me.

That is so true.

I love it.

So we're going to talk about the Academy and all the great things you do there. And is it solely a women's school?

No, it isn't. We have male and female students here. We actually have capacity for about 300 residential students and about 25-35 non-residential students. And We do have more female students than we have male students here. Some of that's due to the makeup of our facility and the way the residence hall is laid out, and some of that's due to just some national trending that's taking place in education.

So do you want to tell us a little about the school, or does someone else want to dive in? You know, like I said, this is your show. I'll come up with some questions I might have, but if we'd like to know a little bit more about the school and how it got started, history, or—

Sure, I'm happy to do so unless Joanna or Laura want to jump in.

Go for it.

Alright, I'll do so. Um, well, first of all, the Academy was founded in 1988 by the Indiana General Assembly, and we actually opened our doors then in 1990 to our very first junior class. We are set up as a 2-year program, so students come in for both their junior and senior years. And the purpose of the Academy is to educate gifted and talented or high ability students within the state. State. So the education they receive here isn't a typical high school education. It's truly created so that they receive a gifted education that's going to propel them quite well in their futures.

So do you get students from across the state then?

We do. We actually have all 92 counties in the state represented.

Wow. So it's a— now it's a high school then, or is it a college?

It is a high school, though students can earn significant college credit while they're here.

Okay, that's great. So, wow, that's— I've never heard of a program like that where, you know, coming from New Jersey where I thought we had a pretty good education, I don't recall anything like that. And this is a state school, though, correct?

That is correct. We are a public high school, and there are about 12 schools like ours in the country. We were actually the 9th one founded, so Indiana was pretty cutting-edge in the field of gifted education. I'm proud proud to say. There are other schools, though, similar to ours in North Carolina, Oklahoma, Alabama, Louisiana, Illinois. So there are quite a few of them. What makes the Indiana Academy truly special and unique is our focus on the humanities.

Okay, you want to tell us a little bit about that, how you focus on them? Because I know science and mathematics, but to me humanities is English, and that's where I'm going to leave it.

Okay, well, humanities encompasses English as well as, um, you have your history and your social studies, your foreign languages, uh, so it— there's lots of different, um, as long as it's not a math or a science, it's probably gonna fall in your humanities division.

Okay, alright, well, you know, I guess it's good to really get them attuned. Are they more focused in this school? Students?

I'm sorry, you're cutting out a little bit.

I'm sorry, I said, are they more focused? In the school, or do they have, I guess, are there more free time? I mean, is it individual learning? Is it focused as a class, or is it more independent learning? That's the word I was trying to think of.

There is a lot of independent learning involved. The way the schedules are set up is it's more of a collegiate-style schedule, so students are going to have what we call their core classes on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and then they have lighter schedules on Tuesday and Thursday. For example, they'll have their foreign language labs and science labs that take place on those days. So the classes actually go in quite a bit of detail. There's a lot of depth. Unfortunately, a lot of schools consider the way to deal with a gifted student is just to give them more homework, and that's not the— that's not the way to deal with them. What we do here is our curriculum goes into great depth. And then the students are not only responsible for classroom learning, but also for the learning that takes place outside the classroom. And so it— and the information, the topics are cross-disciplinary. So there'll be a single topic that you may investigate in the science class, but you're also going to be investigating that in your humanities and/or math classes as well.

Hmm, that's an interesting concept. I'm excited to learn more about this. My wife is a teacher and she's actually just gone back into the Florida school system.

Oh, okay.

Retired from New Jersey and she didn't want to work full-time, so it was a little difficult. Everyone wanted her immediately full-time, but part-time was hard to do. So I'm sure she'll be interested to learn more about this too, because I hear it all, just like she hears about Google+ from me, I hear everything about education from her.

Right.

It's kind of a double-edged sword, and we coexist very well.

That's good.

Now we'll get back to you on that, but let's move over to Laura. And Laura, would you like to tell us what you do and what you're doing at the school, or interests?

Yeah, I'd love to. First, I can start by, I guess, turning back the hands of time several years. And so I was I guess I was 15 years old at the time. It must have been 1989, fall of 1989. I think I was a sophomore in high school. I was in the Gary Public Schools in Lake County, so northwest Indiana, and I was already participating in a full-time gifted magnet program, uh, county school district-wide honors program that was a magnet school within a larger high school. My high school was Westside High School, and I was part of the honors program, and I had been with the same group of classmates in the gifted and talented programs through the magnet program in elementary school and also junior high school. And so here we were, and so our, you know, our coursework was designed to help to stimulate us, to help to push us. We also had an active set of social activities and, um, so, you know, fun and interesting things to do. I say that to say I was a happy student. I felt connected, you know, I felt integrated. I was involved in clubs, I was doing really well in school. I get this brochure in the mail and I was 15 years old and Maybe part of it had to do with the fact that my older sister was 17 years old. She's 2 years ahead of me. She was applying for colleges at the time. So she was, you know, starting as a junior in high school, going through all of that. So I already had this, you know, feeling of excitement and, well, you know, she's going off to college and then I get this brochure about a new high school. Residential high school opening on the campus of Ball State University. Go live on a college campus, gifted and talented education, brand new program. And, you know, I was extremely intrigued, just like you, Chef. Like, wow, this, you know, this sounds like a really cool program. I mean, at 15 years old, I guess I knew enough to know this is a good opportunity and we need to explore this further. So I did, and my parents were supportive. And I can remember coming down and interviewing and visiting and, you know, feeling nervous about the experience. A few other students from my high school were coming as well to be part of the inaugural class. But I mean, we just thought that it was an incredible opportunity for us to get a great education to be part of something that was exciting and new. And, you know, to really have this feeling, this shared feeling of community. I was aware of other residential private school options, and none ever appealed to me. I didn't have any interest in applying to any others. I just— there was something about the public community trying to represent all of students from all different parts of the state, that was really appealing and exciting to me. And I'm so glad that I decided to go to the Indiana Academy. And it was hard work. It was really hard work. I mean, by the time I got to college, I was so ahead of the game in terms of study habits and skills and discipline that, you know, I already knew, just kind of how to create a work plan so that I could really immerse myself in the material and enjoy the material. I learned how to build relationships with faculty. Many of our professors, our teachers at the Academy were faculty who had college professorial experience, and that's really how they taught our courses. You know, I am a professor now. I'll get to that. I'm a professor. I'm— now I teach in a PhD program in leadership and change. But prior to teaching at Antioch in the PhD program, I've also taught undergraduate and graduate courses in several schools, mostly business schools, but also in psychology departments. My longest faculty appointment prior to Antioch was at Harvard Business School, where I taught organizational behavior and leadership courses and a lot of executive education as well. And so given the amount of time that I've spent in higher education, the longer I'm here in higher education, the more I know what a privilege it was and what a just loving sacrifice that the faculty and the staff made in investing in the futures of a group of young people to really allow us the space space to grow and develop in our areas of strength. Many of the students who came to the Academy who were in my class, they didn't have the same feelings of being fully integrated and connected and finding a space in their home schools that, you know, that was as nurturing and affirming. And so I recognize that shared experience many of the other students in our in our class and the classes that followed also benefited from the intense community that is developed through the Academy.

So let me ask you a question. Did you still have fun as a teenager while you were there? Were you able to be a teenager?

Yes. Yeah, probably even more than we would have. It's like having a 9-month slumber party. I mean, we did have a lot of rules, and the Academy was most conservative. I was telling stories about this when I came back to the Academy. Gosh, I think it was probably 8 years ago, I spoke at commencement. And as I came back to the Academy and spoke at commencement, I had these flashbacks of like how we had to sign out if we wanted to leave the building after 4 o'clock.

Yeah.

I mean, we were— they had a very tight grasp on us because we were the first. So there was a lot at stake, and they really couldn't afford for us to get swept away into college life. But we had a lot of fun as high school students, you know, without getting ourselves into any sticky or dangerous situations hanging out on the college campuses. Ironically, one of the students who was a college student at Ball State University while I was at the Indiana Academy ended up marrying my older sister. Had nothing to do with the fact that I met him when I was at the Academy. It was completely unrelated. It's actually a different connection, which is another story. But that's really the closest that I ever got into hanging out with college students is now post- post the academy with my brother-in-law. But we were safe, we were secure, and we did have a lot of fun.

From what I'm hearing is I think the most important thing that they did for you was teach you how to learn on a level where you could really enjoy the material and succeed. I mean, I think a lot of schools, they, they give you the material, but they never really teach you how to absorb it correctly or how to, how to learn it without making yourself crazy.

Yeah, and we had to be creative. I mean, it was about innovation. It wasn't just about memorizing materials. It was, it was project-based learning. I mean, now I know the pedagogy, I have the paradigms to be able to make sense of what was happening, you know, years ago, and how that, why that fits so well for me and my learning style. And even now I'm teaching in a PhD program that is conducted, constructed based on a radical model of student-directed learning for scholarly practitioners. So I mean, I'm still in the space of finding innovative models of education. And when I think about the value of the academy and the Indian Academy and what it offers for our country as we still grapple with, you know, how do we engage students? How do we stimulate students? You know, it really provides a model of being able to engage and connect with students from their areas of strength. And I would love to see more students, more schools to take on the culture and the commitment that the Indiana Academy has represented. And I'm just so thankful that the school has been able to thrive and is now celebrating 25 years. That's just phenomenal. When we started, it was an experiment.

It looks like it was a successful experiment for sure.

Yeah.

And I want to say hi, Carolyn has joined us. Carolyn Lehman, it's very nice to see you. I know you're not Eric, it says Eric on you.

Yeah, nope.

I'm glad you could—

Can you guys hear me?

Yeah, we can hear you. And if you'd like to talk to us a little bit about what you are what you do now or how the Academy affected you? I'd appreciate that.

Yeah, so right now I'm a Chevron Phillips employee here down in Houston. Basically for the last 8 years I've been at the same company doing various different roles, and one of the things that I continuously draw upon when I'm doing my job is what I really learned at the Academy. It was emphasized again. I went to Purdue University graduated with a BS in chem— chem— in 2006. But the reason I was so successful at Purdue and the reason I'm successful today is because of the basis that I got from the Academy, where I was just able to learn how to troubleshoot, solve problems, be creative on my own. And to kind of echo some of the other things people have said, the culture of innovation that lives at the Academy is phenomenal. It's something that we try to do every day in Chevron Phillips. Is to build a culture of innovation. And, you know, there's a lot we can learn from the way things are done at the Academy. The sacrifices that people make to teach you, you know, their specialty— they have the PhD, they have the degree in their special field, and they're teaching you those things— that's huge and something that you don't really get every day, and you certainly don't get in a lot of different schools. And so having that experience was able to drive me to do what I did and in college, which I hadn't even really heard about chemical engineering until Dr. Adams told me that it existed. So he really just shaped me into the career that I have today. But just learning how to be able to be on my own and do my own work and collaborate with people who were of the same mindset and had the same goal. It's what we do every day in many of the jobs, especially in the field of science and the field of mathematics. We're always collaborating We all have a similar goal, and that's exactly what we did while we were at the Academy. So that's always been something that I've been able to take with me and use every day of my life, whether it's at work, at school, or even at home. And that's been, that's been really, really important. So just for me in the field of science, being able to be at a school where you're surrounded by just brilliant people in their fields, people that love to teach and love to learn It's just inspiring and something that I think you can't really compare or replace with anything else.

Very good. Sounds like you did get a lot from the school. I think that is important, like you said, to be able to inspire that kind of— to have that kind of atmosphere where you're really drawn to learn. It means so much, and people don't always think about that, about your environment. And you know, you get some great teachers, you get a great school, you got good students, but sometimes the environment just isn't right. And I think it's something we overlook. And by creating the proper environment and then teaching the students how to learn, you're setting up to be nothing but successful. At least that's my thoughts on it.

Carolyn, Laura shared how she heard about the Academy and why she applied. Do you want to tell us?

Is that for me?

Yeah.

Yeah, so it's kind of a funny story. My brother actually went to the Academy as well. And so sophomore year, they came to his class at Elmhurst in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and they told him about this Indiana Academy. And my brother is for Joanna, who knows him, and Joe, who knows him, he's a bit of a social butterfly, and I'm not really. So he was like, "No, no, I couldn't possibly go to this place and leave all my friends, and oh my gosh, you know, couldn't do it." And I just thought that was the best thing I'd ever heard of. And so I told my parents then, and I was, I think, at the time, maybe even 13. I went when I was 15, so I don't remember. I was 13 or 14, and I was like, "This is what I'm doing. I'm doing this next year, and I'm definitely going to apply." And then, of course, my brother saw the excitement, my parents were like, "Oh, that would be really great." So then he applied too and went. But I got a chance to know about it a year in advance of really having to do the application process. I got really excited about it and told everybody, you know, and people thought I was either crazy or parents were like, "No, I could never let my kids move out of the house before they were 18." So I got mixed reactions, but I knew from the start when I heard about the program, it was something that I would definitely love to be part of.

Excellent. Joanna, let's hear your story then, now that you've made everybody tell theirs.

I wanted her to share first because number one, it's funny. Number two, it's actually really similar to mine. We're both from the same hometown, but we didn't know each other before we went to the Academy. And, uh, my brother is 2 years older than me, so he actually went to Ball State. We moved down at the same time. He was a freshman at Ball State when I was a junior at the Academy. And he had heard about the Academy. He went to a public school in Monroeville, Indiana, Heritage High School, and there they told him about it. Now my high school, I went, we, our parents let us pick if we wanted to go to the private high school or the public high school. I picked the private high school because they had more Advanced Placement and difficult classes, which you maybe could guess that's something I'd be into. But at my high school they didn't have any information about the Academy. In fact, they they did call and tell my parents they thought it would be a bad idea to send me. But, um, so that was just kind of interesting. But at my brother's high school, they told them all about the Academy and supported kids that wanted to apply. So it was kind of completely different worlds there in the same area. But he found out about it, he got the information, you know, read through everything. He didn't actually end up applying, but like Carolyn, I saw what he had brought home and I thought, that's me. So I went to that. One of the things that I loved, I don't know if they still do it, but I was able to do an apprenticeship in forensic pathology as a senior. So I actually went to Ball Memorial Hospital and I sat in with the pathology residents as they were learning what they were doing and the different things they did. And I shadowed a forensic pathologist there. And so that was when I went to the first autopsy that I went to was there at school. And that's— you can't get that somewhere else. You know, that's— there's many things awesome, but that was one of them.

Is that like Rizzoli and Isles? Is that that kind of like Like this.

I know a little bit.

Not a lot.

Or like Ducky on NCIS.

Right.

And of course, do you remember who Ducky was originally? You don't because you're too young. Ducky was Ilya Kuryakin on The Man from UNCLE.

I'll have to look that up because I have no idea what you just said.

Played a Russian spy, so he was— but anyway, that's here nor there. I throw these trivial facts in just for no reason because they enter my brain, you know, and like men, we have a very difficult time suppressing what comes out of our mouth when it enters our brain. So that's my story.

I always learn something from you, so it works.

All right, so we're moving into the 25th anniversary of the Academy, and you, I'm sure, are planning some really incredible events. And what are you, what are you going to do for the 25th.

We are really excited to be entering the 25th year celebration. We actually kicked it off this past August. We had a huge program where we had several people come in and talk about the history of the Academy, the process that it went through in order to become an institution, and then kind of the history of from day one. Mayor Dennis Littleyy from here in Muncie, Delaware County, he came and spoke. He read a proclamation, so that was a fantastic kickoff event. Ball State has been fantastic.

They have—

they put on a program in conjunction with the Academy a few weeks ago recognizing all of the Academy alums that have attended Ball State and are currently there at Ball State. That too was a fantastic event. The Honors College associate dean was able to come over for that, as well as one of the vice presidents and the admissions department for the university. We also have been working with United Way, and we did a community outreach function with them where our students and our faculty and our staff went throughout the city of Muncie and cleaned medians and built houses and did repairs and worked in preschools and tried to give back a little bit to the community that's been so tremendous in supporting us here. Well, in addition to that, we do have a huge gala coming up in April. Now the details of that are still under wraps, so sorry ladies, can't share that with you yet, but it will be a huge event and hope Hopefully you all can come and join us for that. We'll get more details for you on that a little bit later, but we are really excited. We have almost 3,000 alumni now. They are just doing tremendous things. They're literally all around the world. We have a large number of alums here in the state, but as you can imagine, they've just gone everywhere and they're just doing tremendous things.. And it's so exciting for me sitting here listening to these three alums talk. I remember them when they were 15-year-old kids coming in, and I remember Tom also. I think I actually have his picture hanging here on my wall. And to see, to think of them as those 15-year-old kids and now listening to them as grown professional women, it's It's absolutely incredible.

Well, let's speak to that a little bit, and Joe or anyone else can chime in. What do you think the impact the Academy has had on your state, on the country, or the world?

Any of you want to jump in with that?

You know, I can't answer that question from the institutional standpoint, But I can answer that question through the lens of what social media now allows. Appreciate about where everyone is and what everyone is doing, you know, from the standpoint of the alums. And, um, you know, I'm just, I just continually blown away by the ways in which the alums, you know, those that I'm in closest contact with, and those who I just, you know, follow, or we follow each other on Facebook, and I see, you know, what they're writing. You know, they're authors, they're prolific authors. I see them as grassroots activists. I see them as parents who are dedicated to helping their children to grow and develop and really carrying some of the models of learning that we were exposed to and that our families supported us in having. You know, encouraging our children to try new things, to challenge, to challenge themselves academically, not to be afraid and nervous. I mean, I, you know, I agree there were A lot of people, a lot of my classmates from home, when it came time to go to college, you know, their parents were not comfortable with them going out of the state for college. So certainly for me, living 3.5 hours from home, you know, as a 15-year-old, 16, you know, I was still 15 when I moved down to Muncie. That, you know, that was a big deal, but it communicated a level of trust in our ability to be able to lead ourselves and to make responsible decisions. And so I see that reflected through many of the alumni and the ways in which we really kind of charting our own paths. I mean, some of the alumni that I keep in touch with are They have, have professional careers as journalists, lawyers, fundraisers, and then they also are artists. And so I thought about that in preparation for this conversation, like what does it mean to have the humanities element in it? If it had just been the Indiana Academy for Science and Math, I probably would not have been as enthusiastic. The inclusion of humanities is something that distinguishes the Indiana Academy, is still holding a place for appreciating social context, appreciating history, taking up important questions about humans and the human experiences in the world. A deep emphasis on literature. I thought about that a lot as I was reflecting on my academy experience here, and it's the kind of exposure that we had to literature. I looked at the website now and see that there's an archival, historical archival project, right, taking place to retrace and continue to document the history of the Academy over 25 years. And I remember being on the team that put together the first yearbook for it, which was the old-fashioned way, you know, this really and publisher, but that, that was all part of the arts too. You know, there were partnerships and collaborations to make sure that we could have that well-rounded perspective, and I see that being reflected through the lives of many alums in exciting ways.

Excellent.

Jo, would you like to say anything on that, on the impact that the Academy has made in the world?

Yeah, I think Laura touched on the various careers that our students are pursuing, and they literally are in every facet you could think about. And one of the really neat things about the Academy, and it's a little bit different from those early years, we always had some, some AP courses. Now we have a tremendous number of AP courses as well as a huge number of dual credit classes our students can take. So when they're leaving here, they're maybe starting college as first or second semester sophomores. So one of the cool things that that's doing for the students, you would think, and as a parent you might hope that your student would graduate early, but no, that's not the case. What they're doing is putting together different types of majors and kind of forging their own paths into these different careers. And so it may take them as long or even a little longer, but they're graduating with multiple majors, multiple degrees, and opening up so many more pathways for themselves. And one of the incredible things with the social media, particularly our alumni are active on Facebook, and it's really neat to see them talking with each other. And the new alums that will be joining their ranks here in May, as they enter that social media site, our alums are tremendous in welcoming them and answering their questions and giving them direction with information about colleges and careers. And you and I both know the best way to get a job is through networking, and our alums network like crazy. And they're just fabulous with supporting each other. It doesn't matter if they knew each other in school or if they're 10 or 15 years apart. It doesn't matter. They're all part of the family.

Part of the same community. Well, that's, that's good, and that's a bond that they'll always have.

It is. And—

oh, I'm sorry. Oh, go ahead. Our students also, and our alums, are wonderful in staying in contact with our faculty and student life team. I think everybody always has their favorite teacher in school, and I know that Dr. Adams was mentioned a moment ago, and I would love to hear who the other favorites are, but we are very fortunate to have a tremendous faculty. We have been able to recruit them from all across the United States. They come to us from colleges and universities, from— as leaders in business and industry, as high school instructors. And the thing that kind of makes them stand out or unique is not only their, their resume, their background, but their passion for teaching their subject. They love their subjects and they expect every one of their students to love that subject too. So that is just, I think that is one of the things that truly makes the Academy special, as well as the student life counselors. And some of you, the older alums, will remember them as being the RAs. Well, now they're SLCs, And those student life counselors are also fantastic. Dennis Littley, those are the adults that live on the floors with the students and really are on call throughout the evening helping to keep track of the students and do those big brother or parenting type activities that help to keep the students not only in line, shall we say, but also help keep them grounded.

Yeah, that's important, especially in this type of situation where many of them are leaving their homes for the first time.

Right.

Staying out, you need— we all need rules of some sort, you know, whether we choose to follow them or not is our decision, but that's right, that opportunity to make that choice is very important, and having good people in that position is really important. Now I have to ask a question. I know the state has got to be incredibly proud of this experiment? I mean, have they gotten behind this anymore at all, or is there any— are any of them, the state representatives, coming down, or what is their view on this?

Yeah, the state is tremendously supportive. As I mentioned before, Indiana was truly cutting edge in founding a program like this. They put a tremendous amount of resources behind the program. For example, they pay for 100% of a student's tuition coming into the program, and they pay almost 100% of the room and board for the program as well. Just a couple of weeks ago, we had two state— actually, a state representative and a state senator come in and visit. They attended a Preview Day program. Do you guys remember Preview Day?

Did you come to Preview Day?

Yes. All right. They came to a Preview Day program, and spent some time talking with us and learning a little bit more about the program. They were really excited with what they saw, had some great ideas, and, and it's— to answer your question though, in short, Dennis, yes, they are, they're very proud of the Academy, and I think they're very pleased with the direction that we've gone.

Talking about the statewide, and do you guys compete? I mean, it still is a high school And I would expect you probably don't have sports there because of the size of the school, but are there teams? Like, I mean, I was at a school and one of the big teams was a robotic team, and they were just amazing. Do you have anything like that going on where you compete nationally?

Well, we do. We have the types of clubs that you're talking about, the robotics and solar car. And actually, we may not have solar car right now right now, but we do have over 50 different clubs and extracurricular activities like that that do compete locally and nationally. But we do also have sports available for our students. They're able to compete with IHSAA sports. We have permission from the state to combine with Burris Laboratory School, which is a K-12 school located here on Ball State's campus as well, and we combine with them for sports. So we compete in a conference. We have pretty much all of the traditional sports except football and wrestling. We're not able to offer those two. But as our athletic director likes to say, we have been undefeated in football since 1929.

That's good. That's good. My brother and I had the distinction of playing on two teams with perfect records. Mine was 9-0. Unfortunately, his was 0-9. He never tells that part of the story.

Right.

But that's interesting to know that you do have that, and I guess it makes a well-rounded person. You know, people, some people view sports, especially if there is more of a gifted science background, as not essential, but I think it makes a person who they are, and it makes sometimes that blood, sweat, and tears that comes from it really does help you develop more tools to be successful.

It does, and it's still really important for these students to have some of those traditional high school experiences. They need to be able to participate in those clubs and sports. We also have prom and dances and, and that sort of thing, so that they're still getting that traditional high school experience and not missing out on those important social activities.

That's important. Alright, so what are the plans? I know we talked about the 25th anniversary, we talked about all the good things that have come. Now what are the plans for the future for the Academy? Where is it going? Are there any new directions? Is there anything that, that could make this even more exciting or a better place to be?

Well, we're always looking into different avenues, different things that we can add, making making sure that in every area we're staying on top of the most recent research in that area so that our students are getting the best possible education. Right now we're looking at perhaps adding international students to our program. That's still way out there, may not happen anytime soon, but we live in a global society and being able to understand, communicate with to appreciate varying cultures is really important to the Academy, always has been, and I think this would be a tremendous way for us to be able to expand that.

Absolutely. I mean, I think adding that taste of international flair would just broaden this perspective of the students even more, and it seems like that's the direction that you're going in with everything that you've done.

Absolutely.

Alright, well, you know, this has been incredibly eye-opening for me. And I mean, I always love when I am excited by a show and I learn something, you know, that makes my job a lot easier as a host. I get in there and ask questions and engage. So, you know, I'm really excited. I'm glad we did this. It's been really good, and I hope more people find out about this. And I wish more states would find out about this and use your school as a model. It would be phenomenal to see more of our children becoming the leaders, our future. It's our future.

I agree, it's absolutely our future.

We have one in Texas, and it's interesting because I talk to some of my coworkers who have gifted children, and I tell them about my experience at the Indiana Academy. There's a Texas Academy for Math and Science and a Texas Academy for Humanities, and I'm suggesting to them, you know, hey, your kids are 12 11 years old start thinking about it, and I get a lot of, "Oh, I couldn't let go of them that early." Let go, because they can really excel in those kind of programs. And it's hard to tell people what the value is that's above and beyond the academics, and it's so hard to just convey that, but I do try. Texas is one of the states that has that program, and I'm always out there telling people Hey, if your kids are that kind of slant, they have that academic slant, they're creative, they don't seem to fit in the public schools, or even if they do and they want some more challenges, go for that program.

I'm sure that the director of admissions there at TAMS appreciates the work you're doing for him.

Alright, well, like I said, this has been a great show, and I'm just going to go down the panel one last time.. And if there's anything you'd like to share anymore about the Academy or anything that you're doing that might focus, you know, what, what you benefited from the Academy, this would be a good time to do it. So I'm gonna start with Laura. And Laura, if you'd like to spend a few minutes and just tell us about the Academy again, or one last perspective, or what you're doing because of the Academy.

Well, I'll add a little more about what I'm doing because of the Academy. In, in terms of my areas of research, which are on really how to create the conditions that bring out the best in people. And in much of my work, I focus on organizational cultures and how organizational cultures, as well as interpersonal relationships, create a context that allow people to discover and engage their best selves and to bring out the best in one another. And so when I think about the kind of radical innovation that is required for our schools and our workplaces to start to really welcome and stimulate and affirm and appreciate the best of what each individual has to offer, you know, I think about models like the Indiana Academy for Science, Math, and Humanities that place an emphasis on the process of learning and growth and give people permission to become excited and enthusiastic about growing and developing in areas of strength. Because so much of our educational system, and I say this now not just as an educator but also as a parent, I have a first grader and I have an 18-month-old. Um, and so, you know, ever since the babies began going to any kind of care environment outside of the home, which, you know, my husband and I both work full-time, so that's been from day one. We've always been trying to find the right environment that's really going to nurture and affirm who they are and what they have to bring. We find that so much of the emphasis these days in education as well as in workplaces is on identifying and trying to find out what's wrong with people. You know, what people are not able to do, areas in which they're weak, and trying to funnel all the resources at a school level and at a district level into, you know, managing those gaps. And I, you know, I certainly support the notion of helping to build people up in areas of confidence, but But often that gets traded off completely from the importance of identifying and nurturing and cultivating people in their areas of strength. And if it's not happening in our schools, then you better believe it's not happening in our workplaces. And unfortunately, it's not happening in families either. So when we find a place that's figured out how to make it work, you know, the more that we can focus on and pay attention to those lessons, I think the better we'll be as a society.

Absolutely. You know, and finding out what you're good at and realizing that and being able to develop it is very important. Funny little story is my wife went back to work this year and her principal was talking about another new hire, and evidently the person told her all the things that she wouldn't do. I know everything she won't do, but I have no idea what she will We all do. So that's not a good way to present yourself. It always should be your strengths and your positives and what you can do, and then people will forgive what you can't do usually. Anyway, and Joanna, what are you doing? I know I'm putting you right on the spot now.

Well, first, because it is Halloween, I have to terrify you just a little bit. This is the scariest thing that I know of, and I'm afraid tick. So that was my Halloween thing for you. And, okay, so the next thing was on— I have like a ton of things that I want to say. I'm just trying to organize them a little bit. On the subject of what people go on to after the Academy, actually, and I'm surprised I don't really see a list of it, but that's something that would be interesting to pull the data for. But that goes back to what I like to do, the data science, which actually another Academy classmate just started started working as a data scientist really recently. But that's something that I would never even— would have even considered before the Academy. I wouldn't have thought that was even something I'd like to do. But we have people in the armed forces. We have people in NASA. We have people at Eli Lilly, Amazon, Google, Procter Gamble, Cisco, Intel, IBM, university professors all over. We have people Actually, all over the world. One of my friends is in Tokyo. We met through the Academy. Just a little bit of information there that we really do go all over. And then another thing I wanted to mention was that one of my favorite parts was the community service that we had to do to graduate. A lot of schools have that now, but when I went, that was like a new thing. So learning how to do— I mean, they taught us how to learn, but they also taught us how to be like functioning members of society that give back, you know. So doing community service was a big thing, and we're not just stuck in a bubble. I never considered myself a gifted and talented student, but I did start getting the extra homework really early on. Which is not fun. But, uh, the things that we had to do, we had to learn, and there's— it's called wellness education, but there's different categories: cultural, diversity, emotional, spiritual, physical, and vocational. We had to do a certain number of hours in each of those areas in order to graduate. So we didn't just learn from a book, you know, and I think that makes a huge difference. On what we go on to do. As far as what I personally do, I am— of course, you know, I have a website and I write for that. I write for other people. I do social media work and analyze data, which is my favorite. And then, ah, jeez, I don't know. I kind of do a little bit of everything. But without knowing that it was possible to do these things. Well, when I went to the Academy, I was sure I was going to be a forensic pathologist, and that's why I did that apprenticeship in that. But one of my teachers, one of my favorite teachers, Mrs. Haynes— I was in a class with Mrs. Haynes and Mr. Stewart, another one of my favorite teachers, and it's Integrated Studies class. And it was unlike any class I'd ever heard of before. It was English and history, or literature and history combined, and social studies combined, and we just did so much, and I mean from reading like Gilgamesh, and I think the very first week of junior year we read a letter from Washington, you know, the first president, to the future United States, like what his view of foreign policy should be and stuff like that. I've never lost that. I can barely remember what I ate for dinner yesterday, but I still remember that first week assignment from that class. And I actually put a link in the comments section with an example of, you know, one of the creative projects that we did as a group. And this was in 2000— it would have been in the fall of 2001. We made a video, which, yeah, now it's not a big deal. People make videos all the time and put them on YouTube. But we made a video as a group project talking about all these different things. Like, we spoofed QVC and stuff. And in that time, that was not something that people were doing, um, using a video camera and then one of our classmates editing everything. That was new stuff that would not have been even possible for me here at home where it's a smaller thing and we don't have as many. It's just a bunch of brilliant people in one place and it's amazing to see what happens. And then we go out and infect all of you, I mean help all of you. So yeah, that's what I got.

Pretty cool, you said a lot right there. Great environment, I'm glad you all got to to be part of it. That's very inspiring to hear. It makes me feel good about America and about life when I hear these things. And let's move back into Cheryl. There we go. Confused me. I saw Eric there. My mind went— but anyways, your takeaways then. What, uh, What can you attribute the school to for really helping your life, or where do you think the future is, or anything you'd like to speak on one last few minutes?

Sure, so I really don't think I would be where I am today without what I learned at the Academy. My parents, when I was starting high school, my mom had not yet been to college and my dad had an associate's in electrical engineering technology. So from their own backgrounds and experiences, they just were limited in what they knew was out there in the world to do. And that's not anything against them, it's just their backgrounds and then of course what they impart on me and my brother. And so going into high school, I really didn't— I was kind of like, oh, you know, college is there and you're supposed to go, but then I, you know, my mom didn't go, my dad really didn't go to 4-year school, so it wasn't really a set thing that I was going to go to college. And then I got to the Academy and really saw what people do when they really love to learn and get together and have that culture and you build each other up in that culture and learned about all the things you can really do in the world and just opened my eyes and was able to really get me a different experience. I also did a senior Maymester at a local Delaware machinery, at that company, and learning about engineering and what that was. I had no really previous exposure to that at all, and so all of that exposure really led up to what I chose to do in college and what I do now. And I think that the power of that is hard to really put into words, but when you can experience that feeling of being basically having that eye-opening experience, you just can't trade that for anything. And now, you know, when I was younger, we didn't necessarily have the means to do a lot of travel. My family always made sure we did a vacation every year, but it was usually, you know, to one place or pretty small and didn't get to travel much, especially not outside of the United States. And that's something that I absolutely love to do now. And we take— I have a 4-year-old son, and we took him last year to Istanbul and had a blast. I mean, he's just, he's getting to have these experiences because I find it so important to understand culturally what's going on in the world. When I went to the Academy and it was 40% Asian students, I was like, wow, we had one Asian student in my entire high school. And now all of a sudden there's all these Asian students there, and I'm like, where did they come from in Indiana? And then I go on to Princeton, and all my friends were from different backgrounds. I had 3 friends that were Muslims from Malaysia, a Buddhist Chinese guy, I mean, just like all these hugely different backgrounds.. And we were all really great friends. We all still talk to each other. And just having the exposure to that in high school, you know, they were like, "Wow, you hung out with people, you know, from Asia when you were in high school?" And so they were just interested in me and my experience, and I was interested in hearing about theirs. And it just taught me, you know, to go after that cultural expansion and learn what's out there and learn what people are doing and what goes on in your neighborhood and your state and your country. Isn't what's going on everywhere else. And to be able to appreciate that was huge. I think that that's really shaped me as a person, it's shaped me in my career, and it shaped how I think about universal issues and what's going on, you know, everywhere else in the world. And that's something that really just— you can't even hardly describe. I'm sure it sort of sounds like I'm describing it, but I don't feel like I'm getting, you know, the whole the whole point across, just because it's so hard to put into words what that really means to somebody. And then therefore, you know, what you can do as an individual in the world and how— what kind of an impact you can make, things like that, the choices that you make every day and what that does to the people around you. I think it's just something that you can't— you just can't understand until you go through it.

I think you just said it all right there when you said the impact you can make on the world because so many of us don't think that there is anything at all we can do to make a difference or leave a mark. So I think that you can make an impact is the most important. Thank you. Ah, getting me all worked up here. Okay, Jo, and any last words from you?

You know, listening to all of them is just— it's so fantastic to hear their stories, and I'm in a position where I'm able to hear lots of amazing stories from our alums and the impact the Academy's had on their lives and then the impact they're having on the world. It's just, it's tremendous. As head of admissions, I would be remiss if I did not mention that to learn more about the Indiana Academy, you can go to our website at www.bsu.edu/academy We're also very active in the social media world. You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, and of course Google+.

We'd like to see a little more activity on Google+ though.

Yes, yes, I will work on that, I promise.

Okay, but this has really been a wonderful event, and I thank you all so much for taking time out of your busy day to do this. You know, I just love having people that are passionate about what they do and really can explain it to everyone else. This should be something that the whole school gets to watch. I mean, because your alumni are just amazing.

They are, they're tremendous.

And, you know, to show them how— what is possible, that everything's possible. Absolutely. Thank you so much. You so much and thank you all for watching. It's been a good day on Google+. Thanks to the Indiana Academy and I hope to see you all soon. Have a wonderful weekend, happy Halloween, and we'll see you soon.

You too.

Thanks.