Take what you know and think about global health and boil it down into a single representative word. Then translate that idea into a piece of artwork in a meaningful, evocative way.
That was the assignment that faced the students in the integrated studies course taught last year by Cambridge School of Weston teachers Marilyn DelDonno (science), Agnes Voligny (mathematics), and Tom Evans (art). The class, entitled “Issues in Global Health,” incorporated global health concepts, ideas, resources, and tools with biological science, mathematics, art, and literature. DelDonno and Incubator Faculty Director Sue J. Goldie introduced students to an interdisciplinary global health framework—articulating the interconnections between health conditions, conditions for health (or social determinants of health), and societal responses from within and outside the health sector—and then used that framework to explore topic of infectious diseases. Voligny taught about the mathematical skills and analyses essential to understanding epidemiology and global health.
Finally, Evans charged students with task of translating what they had learned into works of art: no small task for these high-schoolers, many of whom had limited art training. “It was clear to me that the impact of this assignment was the culmination of what they thought about throughout the class,” said Evans. “It’s impossible to learn about global health and not have a strong emotional experience. It’s heartbreaking, it’s motivating, it’s empowering, it’s disturbing. To just learn about it and talk about it and report back… is not the same as saying, ‘now you have permission to think emotionally about it.’”
This project inspired the development of “Global Health – In One Word,” a multimedia art exhibit now on display at the Incubator, which features seven of the students’ pieces along with videos of Evans’ interpretations as discussed in a studio interview following the conclusion of the course.
The Incubator also translated Evans’ reflections and feedback into a written lesson plan about exploring global health through art; that lesson plan and corresponding educational materials will soon be publicly available as a teaching pack in the Incubator’s online resource repository.