Welcome, Alisha Collins

Meet Alisha! Introduction by Jacob Lingley, Director of Instructional Design | Brilliant Labs

This past spring Brilliant Labs had the pleasure of welcoming Alisha Collins to our team as a Creative Catalyst to inspire teachers and youth to creatively explore teaching and learning. Alisha is an exceedingly talented educator and maker who captivated the attention of Brilliant Labs in 2017. During a trip to a conference in Boston, a few Brilliant Labs team members were moved by how Alisha was able to convey a sense of enthusiasm and accessibility for all maker materials. Over the past 4 years, Brilliant Labs has continued to collaborate with Alisha, including her work with teachers during a two day event in 2018. Needless to say, we are thrilled to have Alisha’s knowledge and experience join our team of educators here at Brilliant Labs.

We had the pleasure of connecting with Alisha to learn more about how she became an educator and a creative force in education. Let’s Meet Alisha!

Alisha grew up in India and studied at MIT Media Lab, Cambridge, MA U.S. and Srishti Institute of Art Design and Technology, Bengaluru, India.

You've been an educator for how long? I started twelve years ago and ever since then have been expanding my practice across a few countries in both formal and informal learning settings.

In your lifetime has anyone inspired you to change your

mind, for the better, to overcome an obstacle? After completing my undergraduate studies in Fashion and Textile Design, I joined a progressive multidisciplinary art Institute called Srishti for graduate studies. I had enrolled in an experimental program called 'Design in Education.'

me when we first met. That is the first experimental ways of integrating thing you are told at Srishti and then storytelling, craft, wellness, play, and encourage you to experiment and interactive technologies to create engage in your personal goals. Well, I participatory learning practices. joined the college to become an educator, but strangely, everything I Tell us about your favourite project. did at the beginning did not seem to It's hard to choose, but the 'Sensors be connected to education at all. and Vulnerabilities' project I did in Surprised, excited and a little 2010 remains my favourite. Through confused, I went to my mentor again this project I explored the benefits of and asked, "What am I doing here? I design-based pedagogy in education came here to learn how to teach!" and of poor urban communities to detect she replied, "You are learning how to the well-being of their community in learn". Bengaluru, India. Students between Since then, my focus has been on comprehend the content of the high consciously exploring the art of school physics curriculum, such as learning to better understand: Who is the wave spectrum, while the learner? What and why are they simultaneously making connections interested in learning? How do they to their environment in the context of learn? And most importantly, how can I design tools and experiences to further their learning? I initially started working with “A s educators, we need to secure curiosity and wonder in students and empower children from urban them to change their worlds. slum communities in Bengaluru, India. I would - Alisha Colins, Creative Catalyst | Brilliant Labs like to say that I taught those kids, but I think, in reality, they electromagnetic radiation. Using taught me. The experience broadened affordable materials, I introduced and my vision by providing insights into equipped the students with new learning and vulnerability including: technologies such as: physical what it means to be exploratory, what computing, spatial-augmented it means to be creative, what it means reality, and cartography. By making to be giving. Most of my learning has invisible aspects of electromagnetic come from engaging with children. By radiation visible through a 3D Map co-designing and co-creating with Installation youth experiences were them, I have explored kindling my own amplified and further inspired action curiosity in others. and community engagement. This What is your passion? I am connect classroom learning to a passionate about empowering broader context. children to actively engage in experimenting, designing, making What goals do you have as you work and inventing things. I strive to with Brilliant Labs? Brilliant Labs is nurture children's creative confidence an outstanding organization that with new technologies and encourage focuses on young people's interests their involvement in creative acts and passions, supporting them to within their communities. In my gain creative confidence with new practice, I explore experiential and the ages of 12-15 were able to better project indeed allowed students to

technologies. As a Creativity Catalyst, I aspire to further BL's vision by designing maker environments, tools and experiences to support novel modes of inquiry, passion, and expression with new technologies. I am working towards developing and implementing strategic initiatives that actively engage students, teachers, and families in creative learning experiences. In this fastpaced world, in which even current technologies are becoming obsolete in limited time, one can only thrive by adapting to new situations with innate curiosity and learning how to learn. I hope to continue cultivating engagement, design thinking, wonder, and serendipity within our organization's culture and spark meaningful collaboration.

What challenge would you give youth and what advice would you give teachers who are interested in bringing making to the classroom or how would they inspire online learning?

As a strong advocate of transformative project-based STEAM pedagogy, I believe learning is extremely personal. Any creative environment, physical or virtual, that values diversity, inclusion, and equity, can foster motivation, collaboration, a sense of identity and belonging; thereby transforming the creative self. With these insights, I navigate my own innovative learning experiences with compassion and curiosity.

As educators, we need to secure curiosity and wonder in students and empower them to change their worlds. Students should have the creative freedom to pursue their interests and make projects driven by their own curiosities and passions. To support this, we also need to nurture our own passions and interests and share our creative process. When we voice our passions out loud, other people can

connect with us and understand what we care about working toward a common goal. Along with passions, we should also embrace our vulnerabilities as they help us to find our innate capacity for resilience to seek new knowledge. The crucial aspect is to engage with these experiences with all our senses and listen to our intuition.

If you could recommend a good read for teachers, what would it be?

Lifelong Kindergarten: Cultivating Creativity through Projects, Passion, Peers, and Play – by Mitchel Resnick

The Having of Wonderful Ideas" and Other Essays on Teaching and Learningby Eleanor Duckworth

Evocative Objects: Things We Think With– by Sherry Turkle

Feeling inspired? Connect with Alisha!

Alisha Collins, Creative Catalyst

ALISHA@BRILLIANTLABS.CA @CURIOUSALISHACO

Questions about Brilliant Labs and how we can help? Connect with us: info@brilliantlabs.ca