COURSE:

Leaders of the Past & Present

ABOUT:

Leaders of the Past and Present is a history Exploration course where student advance his/her knowledge of highly influential leaders as well as develop themselves further into a highly effective person and leader. Our journey takes us through history to look at great leaders of the past, including Mahatma Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa, Florence Nightingale, and Malcolm X. We also hear from local leaders who are shaping our city, state, and world. By learning from leaders of the past, we better understand what it takes to be a leader in the present.

 

QUESTIONS WE SEEK:

  • What is the difference between leadership and management?

  • Do leaders make history or does history make leaders?

  • What are the daily habits that mold healthy leaders?

  • What is a servant leader?

 

READINGS:

I Am Malala by MaIala Yousafzai

Strength to Love by Martin Luther King, Jr.

Malala exhibit at Celebrations of Learning created by the 2018 Leaders of the Past and Present class.

Gandhi exhibit at Celebrations of Learning 2018.

“Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.

 Seek first to understand, then be understood.”
— Stephen R. Covey, author of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
 
 
 
 

course:

Oklahoma History

ABOUT:

Oklahoma history explores the many diverse aspects of Oklahoma from Statehood to present day events. Students discover the roots of Oklahoma City and Bricktown as well as historical events and places around the state.

 
Sophomore at Odyssey Leadership Academy created an animated short film as her final piece for her Oklahoma History course that was shown at our Celebrations of Learning event, December 2018. All art is the student's original work.

TOPICS WE DISCUSS:

  • Oklahoma’s Rich Native American Culture

  • Western Heritage 

  • Military and Aviation History 

  • Historical Landmarks

  • Our Thriving Oil Industry

  • The Bombing on the Murray Building 

  • The Great Depression

  • Tulsa Race Riots 

  • Art, Music, and Sports Culture of OKC

PLACES WE VISIT: 

  • OKC History Museum 

  • OKC Museum of Art 

  • Cowboy Museum 

  • Oklahoma Gymnastics Hall of Fame 

  • Pop’s

  • Oklahoma Memorial Museum

 
 

course:

Celebrating Differences

ABOUT:

Celebrating Differences is a course where students investigate marginalized people groups throughout specific time periods around the world. We focus mainly on African American and Native American stories, as well as world religions, to study the effects of prejudice and discrimination towards skin color, ethnicity, culture, and belief systems. Students wrestle with such things as the value of personhood, stereotypes, implicit bias, white privilege, genetics of race, in-group and out-group bias, and tolerance. By grappling with historical and current events, students learn how to seek first to understand and then to be understood.

A World of Difference

"On the globe there are many symbols that represent differences among people, such as religious, political, gender, and economic differences. These are not location specific. They represent that we all live in the same world, and even though we all have differences, everyone's voice matters."

- OLA Junior

External Constraints

"Beneath the skin, human beings are the same. We each have muscles, bones, and nerves that form our physiological structure, as well as a beating heart and a pulsing brain. For centuries, people thought of race as yet another biological component of the human species, something that was more than just skin-deep. But this is false. Race is merely a social construct. It is an institution created by white Europeans that disenfranchised other groups who were labeled as "inferior" to the dominant white culture. These" inferior" groups are trapped in racial cages, solely defined by the color of their skin. It is extremely difficult for these minority groups to break free from these cages, but we must remember that a thin layer of skin cannot define one's humanity."

- OLA Junior

 
 

COURSE:

Problem of Evil

ABOUT:

The problem of evil is one of the oldest and most fundamental questions of the human experience. Since ancient times, this problem has preoccupied every major philosophy and religion, has perplexed psychologists and sociologists, and inspired scientific researchers to explore the depths of the human brain to ask, "What is evil, and can it be avoided?" No matter how it is viewed, the problem of evil remains a crucially relevant issue, particularly in the modern world. In this course, students study the problem of evil from the perspectives of psychology, philosophy, religion, science, and literature in order to wrestle with questions of theodicy, human behavior, structural violence, the banality of evil, the role of authority, group think, ethnocentricity and xenophobia through the lens of an in-depth historical analysis of the rise of Nazi Germany leading to and including the Final Solution.

Roasted Egg: represents springtime and renewal.

OLA Junior drew the hand with the tattoo Jews were tagged with during WWII. She shows how out of our thorns and prisons we can become victorious and beautiful. Even from death there can be new life, like many of persecuted Jews demonstrated when they were freed from Nazi power.

"One thing that stood out in the Problem of Evil class was the fact that six million Jews were killed in the holocaust due to one man's actions and beliefs. These are six million people whose stories will never be told. Each grain of sand in this project represents one person's life and story. Six million cannot be seen as just a number. These people need to be remembered so that a holocaust will not happen again. The ash in this project also represents life lost in the holocaust, but in a more surreal way - the Nazis killed the Jews by burning them in one of their many crematoriums. The holocaust cannot be forgotten because it truly shows the kind of evil of which mankind is capable"

-OLA Junior

“No matter how many V2s or submarines they manufactured, propaganda was the most powerful weapon of evil for Nazi Germany.”
— OLA Senior