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High Resolves

High Resolves has developed and refined an award-winning, comprehensive citizenship curriculum that is rooted in learning science.

Our vision is a generation of young people resolving to make a positive difference. Our curriculum includes: professionally delivered and film-based immersive experiences, which challenge students’ existing beliefs about the world; a library of teaching resource packs, which reinforce learning in the classroom; and real-world exercises, which provide opportunities for action-based practice.

Overview

Information on this page is provided by the innovator and has not been evaluated by HundrED.

Web presence

2005

Established

-

Children

4

Countries
Updated
May 2019
Around the world, we are seeing a rise in hateful discourse in communities and at the highest levels. High Resolves is tackling these pressing issues head-on by training the next generation to resist propaganda and division and stand up for what’s right. It is a program we urgently need right now.

About the innovation

Why High Resolves?

We founded High Resolves because we believe that the increasingly complex challenges of our world require a generation of young people to have the intention, skills, vision, creativity and confidence to accomplish what previous generations have failed to do: act in the long-term collective interest of humanity. Over a decade later, our dream seems more relevant and important than ever before.

High Resolves seeks to contain the contagion of hate, a rapidly-growing global pandemic, by teaching teens how to be responsible, engaged citizens. The rise of hate and intolerance is well documented – not only across North America and Europe, but the world. What’s more, with the rapid growth and prevalence of social media, hate speech has been able to spread more quickly and more widely than ever before. Facebook, for instance, reported that they removed “nearly 3 million pieces of hate speech between July and September, a 15 percent increase from [the same period in 2017].”

In order to address these problems, we created High Resolves as an immersive, educational program that targets the 10 to 18-year-old population. By the time young people turn 10, they have developed sufficient cognitive capacity and mental awareness to challenge their own thinking. Throughout their teenage years, children have brains with very high plasticity – making it the easiest time to replace corrosive mental schema with more positive structures. If we want to challenge racism, misogyny and other forms of hatred and intolerance, this is the best age to do it.

Geographically, High Resolves began with a deep focus on teenagers in Australia, where we have worked with over 260,000 young people in our multi-year programs. The program recently expanded to both the United States and Canada and has established our first three regional offices as well as other distribution channels in these markets. We are now expanding in developing countries like China, Brazil and India through partnerships with local players. We have interest from potential partners in another dozen or more countries like Armenia, Argentina, Rwanda and South Africa. We will drive our global reach through more dedicated resourcing for these partnerships to reach a million youth within three years.

Our solution is education through experience. High Resolves is an award-winning system for building mastery in the core competencies of citizenship – from independent thinking and inclusive leadership to effective collaboration. We all know that rote lectures are not effective in this domain. Our formula, based on learning science, shows that sustained personal transformations must begin with peak experiences that shift a person’s thoughts and feelings about themselves and the world around them. These shifts must then be hardwired into long- term memory through repeated practice in the classroom and project-based application in the real world. Real impact requires all three of these elements and we are one of the only programs that integrate all three aspects into the learning journey.

In addition, we created Videos for Change as a platform for young people to create powerful 1-minute advocacy videos on social themes. Originally a national competition in Australia, it has now become a digital platform enabling a global movement of youth exercising their voice to drive social change. Schools, camps, youth organizations and faith-based communities can all use their own instances of the platform to host local competitions.

Our new Composer platform is a truly disruptive innovation which translates the latest insights from learning science into a simple visual language, we have enabled education companies and schools to describe sets of learning experiences using different shapes along “strings” that work across traditional subject areas. Using the latest AI, our search engine allows school leaders to learn from others all around the world. For example, a social inclusion program in New Orleans that draws on content from six education providers can be discovered and tailored by schools in Sydney. Moreover, Composer enables a radical new approach to embed micro-assessments into curriculum to eliminate the need for expensive special testing instruments. We will formally launch the Composer with our ecosystem partners in 2020.

The combined impact of these highly engaging learning experiences is a tangible enhancement of the participants’ sense of collective identity and an increased likelihood that they will act in the long-term collective interest. Ninety-five percent of participants rate our program as highly engaging; 91 percent achieve the targeted cognitive outcomes; and 87 percent achieve the targeted affective and behavioural outcomes.

Our work is becoming more recognised for its distinctiveness. High Resolves was awarded the Patron’s Prize from Good Design Australia for excellence in user experience design, surpassing all companies and industries in Australia in that regard. In November, we were awarded the John P. McNulty Prize, which celebrates the boldness and impact of individuals who are using their expertise and entrepreneurial spirit to address the world’s toughest challenges.

High Resolves provides schools with the support and resources to be as systematic about citizenship education as they are about the maths or science curriculum. And, given the state of the world, we have no choice but to do just that.

Implementation steps

Get in touch

We have a lot to offer schools and we know sometimes it can be a little daunting. Feel free to reach out to us and one of our friendly staff members will be in contact to help get you started! https://highresolves.org/contact-us/

Read our Theory of Change

Our Theory of Change articulates the chain of logic that connects our distinctive contribution to the collective transformation we seek. https://highresolves.org/our-theory-of-change/

Access our free resources

Why is repeated practice so important?

It takes repeated practice to shift any new schema from working memory into long‐term memory. Without this shift, we are not likely to see ongoing behavioral change.

We have designed a library of complimentary teaching resource packs (TRPs) that help teachers deliver classroom experiences that reinforce the peak experiences. We also offer professional development for teachers to support the effective implementation of citizenship education in their classrooms.

If you are outside of Australia, Canada or the U.S. but would still like to access our resources please send us an email https://highresolves.org/contact-us/

Bring Videos for Change to your school

We know young people have a lot to say about the social issues that affect them, but they are often not given the opportunity to be heard. Videos for Change provides a platform to amplify their voice to an international audience, with last year's winning videos reaching more than 600,000 people in 91 countries.

Videos for Change is a real-world, student-led, project-based learning experience that empowers high school students to be advocates of social change. Students create one-minute videos to inspire others to take action on a social issue they are passionate about. This engaging learning experience allows students to develop the critical global competencies needed to be active, responsible and engaged citizens and can be delivered as a unit of work, part of a wellbeing program or simply used as an assessment item across multiple subject areas.

If you would like to implement Videos for Change at your school send us an email at vfc@highresolves.org and one of our staff will be in touch.

Interested in our Peak Experiences for young people?

Peak Experiences

When we speak with people who have successfully incorporated a path of service into their lives, they frequently refer to some peak experience during their youth that transformed the way they thought about the world. We believe citizenship curriculum must begin with immersive sessions that offer an experience of awareness and self‐discovery that can alter mental schema and associated emotions. At High Resolves, we have developed a series of award‐winning, professionally delivered experiences that trigger transformative “ah-ha” moments that are key to deep learning.

Beyond our professionally delivered immersive experiences, we have also been working on ways to enable teachers to deliver peak and near‐peak experiences on their own. Our new Base Camp Series offers curriculum which uses provocative films and videos as a discussion stimulus for small and large groups.

Email us to find out more at https://highresolves.org/contact-us/

Attend our annual summit for education leaders

The prioritisation of global competence as one of the key pillars of learning required for the 21st century is being recognised by education systems globally. But how would you design a rigorous model for building the requisite competencies? And which content and pedagogical techniques should you deploy to ensure students gain real mastery in these domains?

Ed Summit 2019: Lead the Change will bring together global thought-leaders, trail-blazers and disruptors from the education sector and beyond to look at the evolving face of education and provide education leaders with the tools they need to create an action plan based on best practice from around the world.

To be held on Friday, 2 August at Swinburne University, Melbourne, Australia. Secure your ticket now https://highresolves.org/ed-summit-2019/

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