By Adam Rohdie
Two weeks ago, I traveled into New York City by train and subway with our Global Economics class. Our destination was Hudson Yards and the corporate headquarters of L’Oréal.
For the last semester this year, the students in this class had been working toward a single goal: How could L’Oréal’s luxury fragrance division connect with the Gen Z market in a more meaningful way?
What happened on the 57th floor in that corporate boardroom was nothing short of transformational.
Working in teams, our students presented four completely original proposals grounded in extensive research, meaningful data analysis, consumer psychology, and untapped opportunities for the company. During the presentations, I found myself watching the division CEO and his chief of staff as much as I watched the students. More than once, I saw executives literally pick their jaws up off the table. More than once, I heard some version of: “We need to be doing this immediately.”
What this experience proved is something educators have long known but too few schools fully embrace: applied learning is deep learning. Sticky learning. Lasting learning.
Some reading this may still wonder whether this type of class truly covers the foundational concepts expected in a Global Economics course. Others may question whether this kind of experience is genuinely “rigorous.”
What made this the greatest final exam imaginable is that both criticisms miss the point entirely.
Every core concept that might have appeared in a traditional economics textbook was not simply memorized — it was wrestled with in a real-world setting. Supply and demand, market segmentation, consumer behavior, branding, globalization, data analysis, economic incentives — all of it became real because the students had to apply their knowledge to solving a real challenge and then present their findings to an authentic audience—not just parrot back concepts on a test. That is true “rigor”—providing students with the opportunity to think critically, to analyze, evaluate, and synthesize knowledge, and to apply that knowledge in new and unpredictable situations.
This approach engages students in deep and meaningful ways. How do we know they are engaged? Well, in addition to the feedback received from the executives and their teachers on the results of their efforts, this group of seniors— after regular classes had already ended for the year, closing in on graduation, and already accepted to college—eagerly and voluntarily returned to campus to perfect their presentation. They worked continuously, staying well into the night to prepare the best possible presentation. Their teachers actually had to tell them to stop working and go home.
That is rigor at its best—students so invested in their work that the adults have to tell them to stop.
This experience and so many others like it, have provided students with a narrative that differentiates them from their peers and which colleges and universities recognize and are excited about. These institutions are moving decisively in this direction as well. Visit almost any university campus today and ask to see its newest building, and chances are it will house some version of the College of Applied Economics, Applied Sciences, Applied Mathematics, or Applied Technology. For our students, this is no longer an emerging trend. It is simply how they learn. Universities recognize that when knowledge and concepts ‘stick’, it provides a critical foundation to which students can apply more increasingly complex ideas.
When our students speak to college admissions officers about their work, they do not describe learning as something done to them. They speak about applying their ideas, solving real problems, collaborating with professionals, and creating work that matters beyond the classroom. And they speak with the unmistakable sparkle in their eyes that comes from genuine Interest and engagement.
As we approach the close of another school year, I invite you to think back to a final exam you once took in high school.
Was it connected to the real world?
Were you passionate about it?
Did your teachers ever have to pull the reins back because you were simply too engaged?
Imagine what school could become if more students experienced learning this way.
Imagine what might happen if more schools had the courage to move in this direction.
That is when learning truly begins to soar.
Adam C. Rohdie has been Greenwich Country Day School’s Head of School for twenty-two years, and is also an Upper School history teacher and coach.
