Both of us struggled to find our place in high school (Tinsley dropped out of traditional school and earned her degree online and Josh got kicked out of boarding school). We’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what a good education could look like, and we want to help students find their spark.
Two years ago we started working on the Edify Symposium, an education conference and design workshop where we invited high school students and undergraduates to reflect on their education and design forward-looking schools. We did a lot of work in Berkshire County, where Josh grew up, working with students and school stakeholders on proposals for architectural renovations. At the heart of this project was an emphasis on student voice and our desire to help students prepare for the problems they’ll face as a result of rapid technological progress.
COVID prevented us from hosting this event last spring, so we started thinking of other ways we could continue this work. We decided to offer a remote course to public school students in Berkshire County based on a seminar Josh teaches at NYU. Shortly after finishing our summer pilot, we won first place in a COVID-focused innovation challenge and started our fall program with over 100 students.
Since making this pivot to remote learning, Tinsley graduated summa cum laude from NYU and began a director role at eChalk, where she worked with many schools and districts (mainly in the NYC public school system) to design accessible websites for their communities. We’re both excited to on edgi full time now and can’t wait to get more students engaged with the issues most relevant to our future.