Jo Prockop

"There has been a shift in education, over a number of years, in terms of how we understand learning to occur. Gone are the days of thinking that learning is really happening if the teacher stands in front of the classroom and simply delivers instruction. Teachers used to be responsible for imparting knowledge; they were the experts at the front of the classroom.

Thankfully those days are gone, because we understand now that's really not how children actually learn. Real learning is socially mediated; learning happens during the interaction between students and teachers, between students and content, between students and one another. That happens when we can work collaboratively around the table, around ideas, around certain ways of understanding the world. So with all of the brand-new spaces for learning that we now have throughout the campus, whether it's the Yen humanities building, or the STEM spaces in Stainton Hall, or the new Middle School classrooms, or the Edmund V. Cervone Center for Learning classrooms, we are always thinking very intentionally about what we understand about learning and about how we can reflect that knowledge in the physical spaces we create for students."