Earning Credit for Boat-Building and Sailing

Recent New York Times article features Rocking the Boat and other non-profits that engage students in meaningful hands-on learning activities after-school that build real-world skills and experience while often earning them course credit at the same time:

Hudson River Community Sailing developed its curriculum with the help of a certified teacher. For math credit in the spring, the students calculate things like the time it takes for a boat to travel a certain distance, given wind and current speed. Over the winter, students built 9-foot sailboats out of marine grade-plywood, an exercise in engineering that can carry science credit.

Different principals award different amounts of credit for the course, and they also determine whether the class is graded or pass/fail. Trevor Naidoo, the principal of Landmark High School in Chelsea, said he offered his students “mostly physical education credit” for the Hudson River Community sailing program, which runs for about six hours a week after school.