 Larry Blumsack Founder, President "The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift." - Albert Einstein Zoka Institute Services Arts-based training for business growth Zoka Training® focuses on individuals, work groups or specific business or product challenges through a hands-on, highly interactive and experiential based program through * Training * Coaching * Consulting * Facilitating * Workshops * Keynote Speaker About Zoka Institute For critical thinkers, creative problem solvers and collaborators Zoka Training teaches individuals a skill set that can influence any organization's bottom line - the fine art of developing creative solutions through collaborative, upside/down thinking. By focusing on exploring ideas rather than identifying problems, Zoka Training unlocks hidden creative potential by showing individuals how to think outside their preferred styles and focus their creative energy – thus turning knowledge workers into inspired thinkers and solutions-driven contributors. Volume 3 Issue 1 1/09 |
%%First Name%% The next MBA is an MFA (Master of Fine Arts), and Harvard University is finally on a path to make that happen. "The value of the arts in the education and life of our students and reminds us that we at Harvard are both privileged and obligated to provide a comprehensive educational experience." Harvard President Drew Faust Thirty years ago, I wrote and advocated that once the business community and Harvard University recognize the intellectual and value of integrating the arts throughout all education starting in kindergarten it would finally become a reality. Guess what is high on their agenda now? Innovation through critical thinking, creative problem solving and collaboration. The business community is calling for 21st Century Skills that include the arts integrated in K-12 education and Harvard is on a path to integrate the arts across the University. (Coincidentally, business schools around the U.S. including Harvard are reevaluating their MBA programs in order to meet the challenges of our "conceptual age"). In November 2007, Harvard President Drew Faust "convened a University-wide task force to think comprehensively about the role for the arts in the research university, in the liberal arts, and at Harvard in particular." The result was a 70 page report calling for Harvard to make the arts an "integral part of the cognitive life of the University." The report included a framework of recommendations. As significant as the report is Harvard President Drew Faust's strong support and her empowering statement on the "Report of the Harvard Task Force on the Arts." The following are excerpts from her statement: "In prose both elegant and forceful, the report calls for Harvard to end the "curricular banishment" of the arts and recognize that they belong at the core of the University's educational mission. The arts, practiced well, are "manifestations of carefully acquired skills, conceptual intelligence, and daring." They bring new ideas, forms, and methods into being. Like laboratory science, art-making demonstrates the power of physical, material problem-solving in generating vital and original ideas. In short, the arts belong — every bit as much as the sciences and the humanities — at the heart of Harvard's commitment to leadership and "originality of mind." More concretely, the report calls for changes in the undergraduate curriculum to make arts practice a more important and accessible dimension of both general education and departmental courses in the arts; the creation of an innovative MFA program at the graduate level; the development of initiatives to increase the presence of the arts in the daily life of the University; and the construction of new spaces and facilities to give the arts a greater presence at Harvard. ... When I wrote the charge to the task force over a year ago, I mentioned that it was a time of new beginnings. So, too, a year later we find ourselves in a moment of great change — this time, in the form of radically altered economic conditions that challenge easy assumptions about our ability to contemplate new programs or mount bold initiatives....... Harvard to make a fundamental shift in our perception of the role and function of the arts on campus.... ultimately see the arts assume their rightful place in the life of the University.... The report affirms the value of the arts in the education and life of our students and reminds us that we at Harvard are both privileged and obligated to provide a comprehensive educational experience." There you have it from the president of Harvard. I Thank you, Drew Faust! To learn how to establish a comprehensive and creative work environment in your company that leads to innovation please email me at lblumsack@zokainstitute.com. Click here to go to the website. Regards, Larry 617-489-1933 |
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