Who We Are
futurePREP'd focuses on bringing relevance and design thinking to students. By providing experiences with community and business partners, students are able to explore careers, work on leadership skills, and get ready for their next steps.
Within futurePREP’d, students will have the opportunity to solve a real challenge with a local business and/or community partner. Using the Creative Sequence, a Design Thinking process, students will progress from investigating a real challenge to coming up with ideas to pitching a solution to a business partner. Along with this, students will practice and perfect the Skills4Success, a set of softskills that every student needs in order to be successful and productive.
Summer Programs
Registration opens April 15, 2024, 9:00 AM
IChallengeU
IChallengeU is a two-week internship program that provides real-world work experience at local businesses and college scholarship opportunities for 9th-12th grade students. Teams will work together to develop new and innovative solutions to real-world problems faced by local companies.
IChallengeU June 17 - 27
Open to current 9th-12th grade students
Mon - Thurs 8:30 AM - 3:00 PM | Friday June 21 & Thursday June 27 8:30 AM - Noon
IChallengeUth
IChallengeUth is a one-week program that provides real-world work experience at local businesses for 6th-8th grade students. Teams work together to develop new and innovative solutions to real-world problems faced by local organizations.
IChallengeUth July 8th-12th
Open to current 6th-8th grade students
July 8 -11 9:00 AM - 3:00 PM | July 12 9:00 AM - Noon
IChallengeUjr
IChallengeUjr. is a four day program that provides real-world experiences in design thinking for K-5th grade students. Teams will work together to solve challenges their community is facing.
IChallengeUjr June 24th - 27th
Open to current K-5th grade students
June 24 - 27 9:00 AM - Noon
futurePREP'd Educators
Our futurePREP'd team works to train and partner with educators within the Ottawa Area ISD to bring design thinking, relevance, and project-based ng into the classrooms of thousands of students. We continue to support 400+ futurePREP'd educators with professional development, networking opportunities, innovative programming, and local community connections. We partner with our educators and 100+ l community and business partners to help students become equipped with 21st Century Skills and start to decide what is next for them.
Click here to view this work, find resources, and connect with other educators