NuVu is an innovative full time and trimester-length school whose pedagogy is based on the Architectural Studio model. Engaged in collaborative projects built around themes that encompass complex aesthetic and scientific/technical questions as well as real-world social issues, students are taught within the multidisciplinary framework of the design studio rather than traditional subjects. NuVu capitalizes on the immense resources of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University to focus on hands-on problem solving, encourage an inventive culture, promote peer teaching and learning, and cultivate students' curiosity.

Each Term runs for 12-13 weeks. And consists of 8 or 12 Studios with a broad range of topics and disciplines. Each student enrolls in a sequence of 3 two-week studios and one 3-4 week Open Innovation Session. The Term culminates in a final public exhibit in which students showcase their projects from the Term. One Year at NuVu runs three Terms. Enrollment for the entire Year gives students an opportunity to explore multiple creative ideas, learn about diverse fields, develop a particular project or idea in-depth over a sequence of Studios, and have a rich and diverse portfolio of projects. A number of students choose to enroll at NuVu in lieu of a traditional High School Education. These students have the opportunity to learn skills and methodologies more deeply and their work regularly appears in museums and receive national accolades and news coverage. Recent graduates have been accepted at Brown University, RISD, Olin, UC Iovine, and many other nationally ranked colleges and universities.

NuVu students acquire a highly personalized understanding of the world and how they relate to it and can fully participate in it. They develop multiple solutions to problems and learn the importance of moving from one solution to the next, combining, exploring and thinking of the possibilities. They also learn how to change their perspective on an issue quickly. They learn that solutions depend on perspective, and only by understanding an issue from multiple perspectives can they fully explore the terrain of possibilities.

NuVu challenges students to learn in new ways: analytical thinkers are inspired to explore their creative selves, while creative students expand their capacity to think and learn analytically.

NuVu has three additional programs. The first, a themed day and residential summer program housed at NuVu and the MIT Department of Architecture graduate studios that provides local and international students the opportunity to enroll in up to three individual 2-week sessions. The second, the Innovation Camp for Educators, engages participants in innovation education through first hand experience in the studio environment. We empower educators to develop clear action plans to introduce and enhance creative learning in schools.
We offer a series of week-long teacher trainings over the summer to encourage the introduction of creative thinking in traditional classrooms. The third, NuVu-X, assists public and private schools throughout the world in implementing NuVu pedagogy in their own schools through comprehensive custom program design, robust training and resource support, and locally stationed NuVu coaching staff.

PROGRAM AND SCHEDULE

Each NuVu trimester runs for 11 weeks, during which each student participates in a sequence of four Studios based on the trimester's theme. During the first week of every trimester, students learn essential presentation and prototyping skills that are practiced during the studios. Studios within each trimester's theme are based on an apprenticeship model. Learners undergo a series of graduated problems under the close supervision of a master practitioner/coach who constantly assesses and offers feedback to the students. The final two weeks of the program are devoted to preparing a final exhibit to be reviewed by experts in various subjects related to the trimester theme. The NuVu day includes 5 hours of instructional time; students experience a minimum of approximately 260 hours of instruction during each trimester.

STAFF

Each Studio is overseen by a coach who offers support to students as appropriate to the Studio problem and trimester theme under the guidance of NuVu permanent staff. The Studio coaches come from a range of backgrounds and bring a diversity of expertise; coaches include PhD students at MIT and Harvard, entrepreneurs who have their own companies, artists who work around the world, and professionals developing innovative products in various fields. In addition, NuVu staff work closely with secondary educators and experts in curriculum and assessment design to ensure the maximum educational impact of each NuVu Studio and program.

Saeed Arida, Chief Excitement Officer, PhD, Design and Computation, MIT
Saba Ghole, Chief Creative Officer, SMArchS, Urban Design, MIT
David Wang, Chief Technology Officer, PhD, Artificial Intelligence, Aerospace Engineering, MIT

Spyros Ampanavos, NuVu Coach, MDes, Harvard University
Amro Arida, Art Director
Selem Delul, MS Software Engineer, Bogazici University, Turkey
Emily Glass, NuVu Coach + All Saints Academy Project Coordinator, MArch, Rice University
Robin Hsieh, NuVu Coach, MRSD, Carnegie Mellon University
Jenny Kinard, NuVu Coach, BID, North Carolina State University
Andrew Todd Marcus, Chief Academic Officer, MArch, MIT
Ryan Nixon, NuVu Technology Fellow (All Saints), PhD Mechanical Engineering, UF
Anjali Patel, NuVu Design Fellow (All Saints), MArch University of Cincinnati
Karen Sutton, Operations Manager, BA Liberal Arts, University of Kansas
Jon Turnquist, Facility Manager,
Rosa Weinberg, Idea Engineer, MArch, Yale

OUTCOMES

NuVu students experience an intense interdisciplinary environment characterized by ambiguous, complex, ill-defined and unstructured problems to be addressed by rigorous brainstorming, collaborating, iterating, design, and experimental methodologies.

Students will also develop and enhance critically important 21st-century academic and life skills, including:
-Collaboration and collaborative problem-solving
-Working in an entirely project-based environment
-Learning cutting-edge technical skills using technologies and tools currently under development at the MIT Media Laband elsewhere
-Working in a multi-age environment with peers and adults
-Working with ill-structured problems in a multidisciplinary, results-focused environment

Students also increase their familiarity with and ability to apply traditional intellectual and academic skills, including:
-Research
-Oral communication and presentation
-Quantitative reasoning and analysis
-Visual and digital art-making
-Scientific reasoning and analysis

The iterative process in the design studio is intended to provide students with continual feedback on performance as well as product, with the experience of working in an intense, feedback-rich environment providing students with information and support for continuous self-evaluation, reflection, and improvement.

The primary means of evaluation is an end-of-trimester exhibition and review. At the conclusion of the program students will receive a comprehensive skill transcript, a studio by studio narrative progress report, and a narrative evaluation addressing design skills and learning experience. Successful completion of the NuVu program is the equivalent of 2.3 Carnegie Units of high school study.

Example term, each term is unique as Coaches rarely reteach a topic:

Session 0: Nov 28-Dec 2, 2016
Genius Camp Winter 2016:During the Genius Camp, students are introduced to core design concepts and technologies they will use in subsequent studios through a series of focussed design problems and associated technical instruction.

CNC Milling & Parametric Design: In this studio, students learned to use Grasshopper, a programmatic 3D modeling software, and a CNC router to create novel lamps and lighting designs.

Session 1: Nov 5-16, 2016
Physical Encoding: In this studio, students explored the meaning of the word "information", by creating science-museum style pieces that physically animate the concept of information exchange. In order to create their pieces, the students learned basic electronics and programming, and also refined their skills at CAD and woodworking.

Augmented Objects: This studio explores new ways to deploy technology to enhance interaction between everyday physical objects, devices, and humans, towards new augmented living experiences.

Patient Emotion Therapy - P.E.T.: In this studio students learn how to express and build emotions and feeling into objects in order to create functional devices that serve as positive companions for an acute visit or long term hospital bound patients.

Periodicity: In this studio, students researched naturally occurring periodical events and abstracted the ideas to develop devices to re-imagine how people experience time.

Session 2: Jan 3-14, 2017
Alive Enough: "Alive Enough" is an exploration of what makes something conscious and why us thinking that something is conscious has an effect on us when we interact with it. Students will then design and fabricate a robot that in some way makes "us" think that it is conscious.

Safe Cities: In this studio, students learned to observe the hazards of living in an urban environment and created a personal safety device to address one of those issues. Experts from the City of Cambridge will join the studio to give feedback on projects.

Telepathy Objects: In this studio, students designed and built responsive objects which communicate over long distances to enable users to connect and share thoughts, moods, and emotions to their families and their loved ones in an abstract or tangible form.

360 Virtual Reality Storytelling: In this studio students crafted interactive narratives using 360-degree video and computer-generated scenes from conception to final edit, in order to create dynamic user experiences for virtual and augmented reality.

Session 3: Jan 16-Feb 3, 2017
Reenvisioning Traditional Games: In this studio students worked with UNESCO and gamemaker and technology company Tencent to re-envision traditional Brazilian games to better understand their place in the modern world.

Personal Protection Wearables: In this studio students developed custom made wearables that used for protection and safety purposes. Using precision computer modeling and 3d printing, students developed prototypes produce prototypes and to envision novel workflows for manufacturing.

Independent Projects: Continuing NuVu students advanced their skills through independent projects.

Transferring Narratives: In Transferring Narratives, students spoke with a number of primary sources, Kilian Kleinschmidt, the former manager of Za'atari refugee camp in Jordan, Christina Zarogianni, an asylum lawyer on the Island of Lesbos, and Alhamza Al Kinany, a young Iraqi man, a refugee in Vienna. Students took ideas that resonated with them, often counter-intuitive critiques on current policy, and created interactive public art installations.

Session 4: Feb 6-Mar 1, 2017
Juxtapose2: In collaboration with renowned choreographer Heidi Latsky, students designed wearables for an installation for performers with a disability and which express aspects of the performer's passion or character trait, or an experience they have had. This installation uses fashion as a tool of social justice aiming to celebrate the beauty of difference.

Open Innovation Winter 2016: In this extended studio, students formulated concepts for projects of their own choosing and pitched them to the NuVu community. Groups developed project schedules and requirements for their designs and actively sought resources, skills, and expertise required to bring their ideas fruition.

Etc

Student Work: https://cambridge.nuvustudio.com/discover
Videos: https://www.youtube.com/user/nuvustudio
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nuvustudio/