Now Future is

The future is here at Saint Francis.

Actually, it’s been that way since the Brothers of Holy Cross first opened the doors to Saint Francis High School in 1955. Inspired by the teachings and philosophy of the Blessed Basil Moreau, a Saint Francis education was forward-focused from the start.

Implicit in “preparing useful citizens for society” is inculcating the skills and values needed to address the world’s current and future challenges. Blessed Basil Moreau or our founding Brothers may not have written our school’s 21st-century vision statement to shape the future to create leaders of impact, but they certainly would have embraced it.

A Holy Cross education has its eye on innovation to create a just, hope-filled and humanity-focused society. At Saint Francis, our educators, students and alumni know that technology is not the end goal. It is a tool to lead to change.

The people and programs featured in this issue of Progress understand that technology is a means to get at what it means to be a human. To understand each other’s stories. To connect more deeply offline.

To create together the kind of future we want and need.

Our Future Is How We Find Creativity

Brandon J. Rolle ’05

Composer, conductor, teacher and mentor to early-career musicians. Creates music informed by psychoacoustics and computer programming.

How does technology fuel musical creativity?

Technology has always fueled musical creativity, from the development of the modern piano, to the electric guitar, to digital effects like autotune. With modern computers, though, we can now see, hear and manipulate the details of a sound in unprecedented ways. My music is interested in using that technology to explore sound worlds hidden to the naked ear. In a piece like für Klarenz, this meant creating software to help transform the subtle sounds and inflections of his name into notes for the piano. Technology plays another role during the performance of the piece, too, emphasizing hidden details of the piano’s sound by making them appear to move, swirl and ultimately envelop the audience.

How are musicians changing how we experience music today?

I think there is an instinct to use current technological developments to explore new frontiers, to replace the physical with the virtual — virtual instruments, performers, reality — which certainly can be exciting. But as artists, we also need to be conscious of what technology can teach us about what it means to be human. Sound and music connect us to our bodies and to our environment in a fundamental way: the shape of our ears, the size of the room, the air-pressure level are all inextricably linked to how and what we hear. So for me, the most interesting music today is using technology to explore how sound can connect us as humans, or how it can make each of our experiences completely unique. In other words, technology can help us understand this reality, or it can help us to create an imaginary, virtual one. I think in the best art, today as in the past, these two impulses are inseparable.

We shall always place education side by side with instruction; the mind will not be cultivated at the expense of the heart. While we prepare useful citizens for society, we shall likewise do our utmost to prepare citizens for heaven.

- Blessed Basil Moreau, Circular Letter, 36

The curriculum and programs at Saint Francis are created with an eye on the future. By infusing the latest in pedagogical best practices and technology, we offer boundless opportunity for students to focus on solving future challenges while remaining grounded and inspired by centuries of Holy Cross traditions.

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE MATCH PASSION WITH RESEARCH Independent Inquiry

Through Independent Inquiry, students pursue a creative project of their own design and present their results at the end of the year. By placing the ownership of the learning on students and combining ideas and skills from many disciplines, Independent Inquiry increases engagement and depth of understanding.

“Laughter is a huge part of my life. With Shakespeare’s Dropouts, laughter is integral to our mission of on-the-spot comedy. To connect my passions for improv and laughter and turn them into an academic research project is something I could have only hoped to do through Independent Inquiry. This spring, I gave a TEDx talk on my research findings, and I plan on presenting a research paper and a case study on the effects of laughter therapy on the senior population. Independent Inquiry has given me the ability to question things and to stay curious. I hope to carry these values through the rest of my life!”

Niva Shirsekar ’24

Topic: Laughter and How and Why Humans Do It TEDxSaintFrancisHS presenter, March 2023 Member, Shakespeare’s Dropouts, Saint Francis Improv Comedy Team

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE TAKE CARE OF EACH OTHER Social Emotional Learning and Saint Francis Family Club

As a Holy Cross school, we are committed to the physical, social and emotional safety of all students, and we support the needs of students beyond the classroom. The Social Emotional Learning (SEL) program at Saint Francis uses data-driven, research-based practices to inform the intentional inclusion of SEL skills in all of our classes and programs. During advisory periods, juniors and seniors who are in the Saint Francis Family Club serve as mentors to assigned freshmen. Guided by educator advisors, they lead SEL-centered activities and offer support in small-group settings, covering essential topics like communicating honestly, developing empathy and cultivating humility.

“I’ve grown in my communication and organization skills, and the way that I lead is by example and how I conduct myself in and out of the classroom. Family Club is different from other leadership groups because of your role as a mentor. It’s your job to be an example to freshmen. I think about the values we talk about, like humility and kindness, and I make sure that I’m not just teaching those, but I’m also implementing them myself.”

Ava Malae ’24 , Family Club mentor

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE ARE AGENTS OF CHANGE Ethnic Studies Requirement and Department

Inspired by the core beliefs of the Brothers of Holy Cross and Catholic social teaching, we are called to take action to disrupt systems that perpetuate the marginalization of individuals and groups. The 2020 implementation of the Ethnic Studies requirement and the formation of the Ethnic Studies Department creates opportunities to deepen our students’ understanding of themselves and their community.

Beginning with the Class of 2025, all students will take two semesters of coursework in Ethnic Studies: a foundational, onesemester course and an interdisciplinary semester selective in English, Religious Studies or Visual & Performing Arts.

“By looking at the role played by identity, race and justice in American society, Ethnic Studies provides our students with a critical lens to examine and contextualize what is happening right now and why it is happening. In an increasingly diverse and global community, these skills are critical. The coursework enables our students to engage in these discussions and become active agents of change for a more just community. Additionally, this class exposes students to the stories, perspective and lived experiences of different communities and provides our students opportunities to become more culturally literate, empathetic community members on our campus and beyond.”

Heather Washington, Ethnic Studies teacher

Our Future Is How We Advance In Medicine

Meghan Flanagan ’99

Surgical oncologist and breast cancer specialist, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center Assistant professor of surgery, University of Washington

What role does innovation play in cancer care?

Innovation is taking a problem and approaching it from a different angle. For breast cancer treatment, we are thinking about ways where we can change the order of what we do, like doing radiation before surgery. In this new area of precision medicine, there’s a ton of innovation by taking what we know on the macro level and applying it to each patient. Each tumor is fundamentally different and specific to that person. So we can consider what is very specific about your tumor and treat you differently.

What is the future of cancer research?

In the last five or 10 years we’ve had the capability to do whole genome sequencing. We’re at an exciting future and crossroads where our technology is to the point where we can do individualized medicine. There’s a lot of work going on currently to address unknown problems. For example, statistics show certain demographics have worse outcomes. There are lots of studies looking at why. It doesn’t appear to be only socioeconomic, demographic or cultural. Even if patients access care at the same time, something about the tumors might be different. There’s so much room in medicine for understanding where the patient is psychologically, socioeconomically or culturally and figuring out how to combine that with a tailored treatment so patients get the best possible outcome.

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE LEARN ANYWHERE Innovation Program Experiential Learning

Just as we seek to establish partnerships with outside organizations to provide educational opportunities for students, we also are committed to collaborating with students and placing them in internship positions within the school to offer meaningful pathways to learn outside the classroom. An internship program was created this year within the President’s Office to give students a direct look at how an organization is run, and it will expand to allow students to learn about work in additional departments, such as Marketing and Communications. We also created a hospitality internship program; read about it on page 20.

“What I’ve always wanted was real-world experience with a business. This opportunity in the President’s Office gave me a baseline of experience. Now I can start building on that baseline. This is a free-flowing learning environment that I can model to what I’m interested in. I’ve had conversations with people about what they do, how they’re doing it and why they’re passionate about it. I’ve learned how their backgrounds have brought them to where they are today. It’s helping me understand what I want to do, why I want to do it and how I can do it.”

Our Future Is How We Create A More Just Society

Justin Lai ’10

Transformation Officer, U.S. Department of Labor

Leads a design and research team to advise state agencies on updating their systems to improve the user experience for customers from vulnerable communities.

How does technology impact today’s challenges in public health?

Reducing barriers to access is a big issue. My focus in graduate school was how technology could increase access to mental health services. For the federal government, I advise all U.S. states and territories in modernizing their unemployment insurance systems. So many people applied for benefits during the pandemic and didn’t receive them in time. My team thinks about how we can use technology to increase access to previously inaccessible services, especially during moments of crisis.

What is the potential of how we interact with computers and how we think about how we live?

The big question is how do we better understand how we communicate with each other, and how might technology magnify those capabilities and meaningful ways? What kind of tools can we develop that enrich the human experience? For example, if we focus on people with disabilities and build tools that work well for them, there’s a trickle-down effect where the mainstream society can benefit as well. Text messaging was invented for those who are deaf. It was first seen as a niche technology but is now one of our main sources of communication.

What has allowed you to be successful in seeing the possibilities of innovation?

What has guided my approach to my work is a sense of humility. The heart of innovation is first focusing on understanding the problems as opposed to jumping to solutions. In Silicon Valley, there’s a technocratic philosophy that technology can solve problems, but it’s so much more than that. You have to understand the lived experience of the people whose problems you’re trying to solve.

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE INNOVATE IN EDUCATION Partnership with Santa Clara University

Our partnership with Santa Clara provides opportunities for students to engage in meaningful ways outside a classroom or club activity. While courses like computer science and clubs like Machine Learning help develop technical skills, the partnership with the university opens new avenues in applying knowledge to real-world challenges. Projects with the Healthcare Innovation and Design Program at Saint Clara have included creating a prototype to alleviate the suffering of dementia and using virtual reality to create an immersive environment.

“This is experiential learning. Our students are being taken seriously and going through the steps of creating something as if they were in a company. Even if they never do anything in medicine, this experience of being on a team and working toward a goal of creating something is a skill they’ll need in any profession. This is where education is going. Gone are the days where the teacher is the one in the room who knows the most. I’m excited to see what’s next because we’re just getting started.”

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE SUPPORT YOUNG EDUCATORS Holy Cross Intern and Teaching Fellow Program

This program, which was created in 2017, brings back recent alumni college graduates who wish to explore careers in education to Saint Francis. Interns work as mentors, shadow teachers and counselors and explore additional departments on campus as career interests arise. Interns may continue as fellows, teaching classes and working with a co-teacher and a mentor teacher. Interns and fellows receive a stipend and fellows receive aid from Saint Francis to cover a portion of the cost of pursuing a credential.

“I’m in the American Sign Language [ASL] classroom each day and help interpret when discussing more complex topics. I would like to teach ASL next year. This program has helped me become a teacher because I have the opportunity to be in the classroom each day to observe, teach my own lessons and create tests and projects.”

Sean Smith ’17, teaching assistant to the ASL teacher

Our Future Is How We Consider Ethics And Technology

Olivia Gambelin ’13

Artificial Intelligence ethicist specializing in the practical application of ethics to technological innovation

Founder, Ethical Intelligence

What are the consequences when ethics are not built into AI and technology?

There are issues around data privacy, so there’s a violation of personal information and the feeling of lost agency over your own ability to make decisions on your life. But the perspective I take as the main risk is you’re cutting yourself short if you’re not using ethics in your development and design processes. If you do ethics by design, it naturally leads to a better business and stronger technology.

What considerations do programmers need to take into account when implementing ethics into technology?

My biggest advice is to question yourself. When you’re making decisions, do not assume that everyone thinks the same as you. It sounds simple, but it’s the easiest way to catch a lot of ethical problems. Programming is a very set way of problem solving, but you can’t solve ethical problems with an engineering patch. It’s something that involves conversation, deliberation and a lot of critical thinking.

How do you view the interaction of ethics and technology?

There are two sides of ethics. One is the risk mitigation side where you’re making sure nothing goes wrong, where regulation and compliance play a hand. The other half lies in what I find to be an exciting space of innovation and hope because you can design for specific values. We can pretty much problem solve in any direction that we want. We can help shape problem solving and innovation in a way that benefits us as people. We all have an active role to play in how we interact with technology and develop it. There’s a lot of potential and opportunity that comes along with this space.

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE CARRY ON THE BROTHERS’ LEGACY Hospitality Internship Program

The paid hospitality internship program was created to give students work experience in a professional learning environment. Under the direction of our hospitality team that prepares and serves food for lunch and school and community events, interns learn all aspects of hospitality management, including food preparation, certification for food handling safety, customer service, cash reconciliation and menu planning. For additional real-world experience, interns took part in a branding workshop led by Allison+Partners, a marketing and communications agency working with us, to rebrand an on-campus food kiosk.

“I work with customers every day, even if those customers are my peers. I’ve also worked at events like the basketball tournament and the alumni reunion, so this internship gave me the experience of dealing with people of all ages, and I’ve become more extroverted because of it. Our job is to be constant and make sure that students are well fed, and if they’re having a bad day, we’ll always be there. You see hospitality workers daily because everyone gets lunch every day, but you might not see your teacher every day. It’s cool because you have regulars who always go to the same concession, and I think ‘I know what you’re going to get.’”

Toni Oliva ’23, hospitality intern

OUR FUTURE IS HOW WE WORK AND LEARN Virtual and Flex Days

We value innovation in how we work and study. One component of remote learning that continues at Saint Francis are virtual days before Thanksgiving break. To provide families with more flexibility during the week, two school days during the Thanksgiving week are conducted over Zoom, which received overwhelmingly positive feedback from families when first implemented in 2021.

Additionally on Flex Days held at certain times during the school year, students work from home to finish and submit work or meet with teachers for online collaboration sessions. This flexibility allows students to receive additional help and educators to collaborate with colleagues and attend workshops led by fellow educators.

Be Part of Our Future

Join our future-forward focus and get involved with helping to shape our students’ experiences, which, in turn, will shape the world.

Attend

Design Showcase

May 15, 6:30 p.m. Eggers Innovation Center

Be inspired by presentations from Design Department classes and tour our student project trade show, featuring exhibits from our Computer Science, Design Thinking, Engineering, Entrepreneurship and Independent Inquiry classes and more.

Joanna Vollucci, Design Department chair and computer science teacher, joannavollucci@sfhs.com

Participate with Students

Offer to be an advisor for an Innovation@Saint Francis project (duration and time varies; no specific expertise required). This role involves meeting with students and leading discussions. New projects are slated for the 2023-24 school year.

Shraddha Chaplot, Head of Innovation, shraddhachaplot@sfhs.com

Share your Gifts

Propose a project of any topic or duration for students in the Innovation@Saint Francis program. Be available as students are selected and the project is implemented to its conclusion. We’re looking for new projects to start next school year.

Shraddha Chaplot, Head of Innovation, shraddhachaplot@sfhs.com