Four Pillars
Mar 07, 2023
At my school, we have four pillars that represent our values and philosophy: Character, Community, DEIJ, and Academic Excellence.
We also have four actual pillars in our gym/multi-purpose room/theater.
A few years ago, I was teaching our 7th grade Design + Code + Make class, running a project where the students identified an issue somewhere in the school, wrote a design proposal/made a prototype, and then actually constructed whatever they had proposed.
One group proposed making wooden boxes to wrap the columns with cut out letters and back lighting to 'illuminate' our four pillars. Two weeks later, the global pandemic hit.
Three years after that, we finally got back around to this project. The 8th graders (who were 5th graders when the idea was originally proposed) made the boxes. They used our Shaper Origin to route out the letters, built an internal structure for the boxes, attached the plywood to the outside, and glued plexiglass on the inside to diffuse the light. Before mounting the boxes, we wrapped the columns in LED strip lights that can be controlled remotely.
It's good to have these up (finally!).
