Diving Deep Into Systems Thinking
While 9th and 10th graders were away on their beginning-of-the-year camping trip with our Field Studies team, our 11th and 12th graders were on campus diving deep into College Counseling, Human Development, and of course, SIP!
We’re excited this year to equip students with the skills to untangle and map out a complex social or environmental problem using diagramming tools from the world of systems thinking. Every morning this week, we did an intro to three different tools: Iceberg Models, Connection Circles, and Behavior Over Time Graphs. After speaking with a guest in the afternoon about intractable issues such as homelessness, mobility justice, and global recycling flows, students mapped out the issue using tools they had learned about in the morning.
We define systems as a set of parts whose relationships to one another form a unique pattern of outcomes. Understanding the parts of how homelessness affects people (housing stock, wages, mental health support, etc.) helps students design articulate and effective interventions.
After this quick deep dive into these systems thinking tools, we’re excited to see how our 11th grade Impact Project students will be able to tell the story of their self-selected issues after a semester of ethnographic research!
TUESDAY
We learned how to use Iceberg Models as a way to identify the invisible mental models that undergird complex issues.
Thank you to Brenda Lynch (Union Station Homeless Services) and Amiyoko Shabazz (CSH Speak Up! Advocate) for sharing stories and expertise with us.
WEDNESDAY
In the morning, we jumped into Connection Circles. Connection Circles help us understand cause and effect relationships between the stocks of an issue (the things we can measure, count, see).
Thank you to Brenda Yancor (Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition) and Daisy Villafuerte and Yanel Saenz (Los Angeles Walks) for talking with students about advocating for bikers and pedestrians at the local and state levels.
THURSDAY
On Thursday morning, we practiced creating Behavior Over Time Graphs (BOTGs). BOTGs help us look at the history and future of a particular issue and identify what causes things to change for the better or for the worse.
Thank you to Professor Joshua Goldstein (USC) for talking with students about the economic, political, and social history of recycling between China and the United States.
