FreeMindsAustin

After months of recruitment and interviews, we are thrilled to welcome the class of 2011! This year Free Minds enrolled eighteen women and two men whose ages span four decades. The class includes city and state employees, a former ski instructor, students from Sweden, Belize, and Mexico, writers and artists, mothers and great-grandmothers. We are excited to discover where the year will take us!

The students and their children all met for the first time on Monday, August 16, for the Free Minds orientation at the Austin Can! Academy. We discussed the books and the syllabus, introduced key staff, and started the process of getting students registered at Austin Community College with the help of the Mobile Go van parked outside the school.

All the faculty were present to kick off the semester on Monday, August 23. Students and faculty squeezed together around the seminar table and shared stories about something very near to the hearts of everyone involved in the Free Minds Project: education. Responding to a reading from educator and author Mike Rose and a prompt put forward by Project Director Vivé Griffith – “What did you used to believe about education and what do you believe now?” – students and faculty introduced themselves to the class as thinkers and learners, and everyone left excited about the months to come.