How might we provide a platform for elders around Boise to leave a legacy they are proud of?The Mission: Memoir team began in fall 2016 by researching what challenges elders face on a daily basis. Among their findings were statistics about health issues and memory loss, stories about elders being abused by caregivers, becoming victims of financial scams, and even the stigma of moving into a retirement facility.
How might we give high school students the tools to form a plan to get home safely from gatherings involving drugs and alcohol? During the beginning stages of this project, the One Stone student team discovered that each team member had somehow been affected by teenagers driving while impaired. They quickly dove into empathy work and learned from police officers, prosecutors, community members and each other about the severity of impaired driving in the Treasure Valley.
Field + Stone began with a team of students who desired to develop a service project that centered around nature. During their initial research, the team learned about Nature Deficit Disorder and were intrigued by its impact on humans. They also shared personal stories of how nature had positively influenced their own lives and had helped build relationships with family and friends. Other research consisted of talking to a local ESL teacher who has created outdoor programs for refugees, watching documentaries, and interviewing a sixth grade teacher about what role technology plays in his classroom.
The DOUGH Means DOUGH team began their journey in September of 2016 discussing healthy relationships. Through discussions and research, the team identified that teens don’t feel comfortable discussing consent with partners. From there, the team morphed, tackling the idea of how to clarify consent in teen relationships. The team went through the design thinking process, beginning with a survey sent to members of One Stone in order to collect information about consent and sexual education. The team was heavily influenced by Al Vernacchio’s TEDx talk, “Sex Needs A New Metaphor.”
The team spent several meetings discussing the best way to make the topic of consent approachable for teens. Through prototyping and testing the team landed on an event at One Stone headquarters highlighting team pizza-making and facilitating consent-practicing activities. The title of their event, and team, DOUGH Means DOUGH, is a play on the phrase, “no means no,” and an acronym: Discussed Openly to Understand Green-lights and Hesitations. After the first implementation which brought 20 participants from around Boise, the team took a condensed version of their event to the Boise High Street Fair in order to further expand their audience.
Before the event, only about 60% of attendees felt comfortable defining consent. After the DOUGH Means DOUGH event, 85% of participants felt comfortable not only defining, but communicating their conceptions of consent.
Participants came to the conclusions that "consent isn't as difficult to understand as I thought" and "DOUGH Means DOUGH opened my eyes to how easy it can be to talk about consent." They realized that consent involves more than sex – it applies to our handling of all types of different situations and empowered decision making.
In their own words, "Consent is multi-dimensional: it's not just about sex, but about expressing all boundaries."
Participants said they felt "Inspired to spread the discussion about consent and consent culture," which proved that the DOUGH Means DOUGH team had succeeded in making consent an approachable topic for teens.
After months of hard work with the design thinking process, the student team spoke for themselves:
"In today's society there is a stigma against saying ‘no.’ By staying informed and knowing/feeling comfortable with your own boundaries, you can empower yourself and others to create a culture of consent, on a personal or community scale."
"The most valuable take-away from the event was having a clear definition of consent, but furthermore, knowing and feeling empowered that my feelings are legitimate."
Through the course of the project, the DOUGH Means DOUGH team engaged with over 100 high school students to make consent a more approachable topics for teens.
Open Book Adventures is One Stone’s free tutoring and mentoring program for first and second grade students. Once a week for five weeks, the first and second grade “Buddies” are paired with a One Stone “Adventure Guide” for an hour and a half of reading, writing, games and connection. Open Book Adventures provides leadership opportunities for One Stone student members and forges an unparalleled bond between guide and buddy.
A team of students spent the year solving a problem nearly everyone has encountered at some point in their life: bad sportsmanship. During the “understand” and “empathy” phases of the design thinking process, the "Have a Ball" team interviewed local experts on the topic of sportsmanship including Peter Oliver, a lifelong sports coach, and Tim Brady, an executive board member of the Idaho Youth Sports Commission.
The student team gathered at the beginning of summer to explore the topic of female empowerment. As they dove into gaining a better understanding of such a broad topic, they began exploring issues such as street harassment, intimate partner violence, body image, athletic competition, privilege & intersectionality, and the definition of feminism. The team interviewed body positive activist Amy Pence Brown and Girls on the Run Program Director Melissa Bixby.
The One Stone team members decided to create a project surrounding the gender binary or the idea that a girl or boy must only act in ways that are stereotypically that gender. They found that this topic especially affects students who are transitioning into high school, a time already marked by self-exploration and doubt.
The project was implemented twice, once with other One Stone members and once with 9th and 10th graders at Sage International School. One Stone members led activities surrounding three topics regarding gender binary expectations: 1) Awareness, 2) Acknowledgement, and 3) Authenticity. Recipients and the project team answered trivia, discussed their stances on gender issues, and both metaphorically and literally smashed gender stereotypes by creating a mosaic at the first implementation and mosaic photo frames at the second iteration celebrating authenticity.
Recipients reflected on their experiences and shared:
“After today I can be more aware of the effects of sexism on others.”
“Everyone has something they feel they have to live up to. It was comforting seeing everyone does that.”
“It was great to learn about what’s going on around the world and gaining new perspectives.”
Words used by recipients to describe this event:
Eye-Opening
Informative
Aware
Thoughtful
Impactful
Inspiring
Accepting
Surprising
Proud
1151 W. Miller St
Boise, ID 83702
United States
208-451-3825
info@onestone.org
One Stone is a member of the Northwest Association of Independent Schools.
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