International HS at Prospect Heights teacher Stephanie Edwards strives to inspire curiosity in her social studies students and tap into their creativity.

One way she does that at the Brooklyn school for English language learners is by drawing on her own creativity as a ceramist to create engaging learning projects.

As part of her government and economics class, Edwards taught her seniors how to make ceramic jars, which they filled with wax to make candles. The students sold their candles at the Brooklyn Museum and elsewhere in the community to raise money for senior activities. During the process, they learned about supply and demand, running a small business, and how to price, market and pitch their products.

The candle project is an example of how Edwards, who won an Excellence in Education Award at the union’s Academic High School Awards on April 25, engages her students through project-based learning.

“I like to work with my hands,” said Edwards, a ceramist since 2019 who has received DonorsChoose grants to purchase candle supplies and a small kiln for her classroom. “And I see there are a lot of students who are like me.”

Edwards spends two years with her students, teaching U.S history in their junior year and economics when they are seniors. She appreciates having “the room to be creative” in her classroom, she said. “Especially in the humanities, the principal allows the teachers to really develop their own curriculums and take risks,” she added.

She wants her students to see the real-world applications of their learning and apply the knowledge they acquire in her class to their lives. For instance, she incorporates the Urban Land Institute’s UrbanPlan into the curriculum for juniors. Student teams respond to a “request for proposal” to redevelop a blighted site in a fictional community. Team members have different roles, such as finance director, site planner or neighborhood liaison. They present their proposals to a mock city council.

Besides preparing them for performance-based assessment tests, the activity “also opens them up to different possibilities when it comes to work,” she said.

Through it all, Edwards maintains high standards for herself and her students. She arrives in her classroom at 6:30 a.m., two hours before her first class, to prepare for the day.

She considers herself a “warm demander” who is grateful her students are present but will not coddle them. “I really want you to push yourself,” she said that she tells students. “Because I push myself a lot.”

Edwards said that tapping into their creativity helps prepare students to be leaders who do not simply “follow the status quo.”

“That’s how leaders are born,” she said. “If everybody does the same thing, then you’re creating a society of people who just follow the rules. Sometimes rules are wrong, and you need people who go against the tide.”