I've been falling in love with Salinas, a sleepy fertile town that has been growing on me ever since I moved here at the beginning of the month to join FireHawk in teaching a summer intensive course in Vision, Storytelling, and Digital Media at Hartnell College. I was head over heels in love with my class from the first day...
I've always dreamed of having a room-full of bright young minds to explore with, and the reality has been all I could have ever wished for. My kids (I say kids but they range in age from one impossibly capable 15 year old to a deeply thoughtful and ex-homeless man in his 40s, with most of them bright sparks between 19 and 23) are incredible - sensitive, intelligent, curious and creative.
The course we've designed for them is a bit unusual; it's a multi-dimensional fabric of social, spiritual, technological and vocational threads - but they have taken everything we've given them and made full use of it. Let me take you back to the first week, for example, where we asked each of them to begin thinking about what having a vision might mean for them...
For many it was the first time they'd been asked this question, and we spent the time it took to uncover a vision for each student - first for their lives and then their community, before beginning to create digital art from what they found. Each student, whatever their background, level of education, or expressive style, threw their heart and soul into communicating their visions through video. With their permission, I'm proud to share the results of their work on the Vision Nest Studio video channel we created.
And that was only the first week! Stay tuned for more about Vision Nest Studio Productions (the "brand" that has come from this adventure for FireHawk and I), and to see the class' final video project - done in teams each focusing on a vision for (one of) the Agriculture, Health, and Construction industries in the Salinas valley in 2020.
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