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About

2025-26 Informational Slides by GABRIEL MEDINA
Our Vision


Our VisionEmboldening the next generation of creatives.

Our Design and Research, Engineering, Arts, Math, and Science (DREAMS) magnet center focuses on design thinking as a program-wide theme for developing socially-conscious and entrepreneurial students.  Students work on collaborative, cross-curricular projects that employ design thinking, a powerful learning tool that teaches students to use empathy and critical thinking to tackle problems of any kind from a human-centered point of view.
 
 

Who is a DREAMS Student?

At Southeast DREAMS Magnet, students are social entrepreneurs. They must learn to take on multiple lenses of expertise to tackle any given problem.

 Within this vertically articulated learning model, students are given developmentally tailored opportunities throughout their middle school experience to engage in systematic, thoughtful work that means something to them and to others. Teachers at Southeast DREAMS Magnet coach students through project work, team building, thoughtful dialogue, and the testing of hypotheses and concepts, with the ultimate goal of promoting systemic, positive impact in the community.
 
 
 
Our Students Are:
EMPOWERED LEARNERS
We engage in the learning process by seeking out new ideas and sharing our own.
 
Estudiantes Empoderados 
Nos involucramos en el proceso de aprendizaje buscando nuevas ideas y compartiendo las nuestras. 
 
KNOWLEDGE CONSTRUCTORS
We form links between all sorts of things we know about and add more links as we learn new things.
 
Constructores de Conocimiento 
Formamos enlaces entre todo tipo de cosas que conocemos y agregamos más enlaces a medida que aprendemos cosas nuevas. 
 
COMMUNITY COLLABORATORS
We collaborate compassionately and responsibly to participate in our communities in diverse and meaningful ways.
 
Colaboradores de Comunidad 
Colaboramos con compasión y responsabilidad para participar en nuestras comunidades de maneras diversas y significativas. 
INNOVATIVE DESIGNERS
We look at multiple angles and consider the needs of all to find creative and effective solutions.
 
Diseñadores Innovadores 
Miramos múltiples ángulos y consideramos las necesidades de todos para encontrar soluciones creativas y efectivas. 
 
COMPUTATIONAL THINKERS
We analyze and deconstruct data to better understand a problem.
 
Pensadores Computacionales 
Analizamos y de construimos datos para comprender mejor un problema. 
 
CREATIVE COMMUNICATORS
We communicate clearly and express ourselves creatively to get others excited about our ideas.
 
Comunicadores Creativos 
Nos comunicamos con claridad y nos expresamos de forma creativa para entusiasmar a los demás con nuestras ideas. 
 
 

6th Grade

Focus on Self Discovery to Build Empathy

The sixth grade year will lay the groundwork for the design thinking process. Students will engage in empathy-building and self-discovery through projects that focus on understanding themselves.
 
PROJECT IDEAS IN THE MAKING:
  • Create a digital redesign of your family living space to meet the needs of all members, a cross section of architectural mapping and empathy.
  • Tackle issues and challenges of making safe and responsible decisions online through EverFi Ignition’s “Organize a Concert for your School” project. Create a blog, manage a social networking site, and work to resolve cyber bullying issues through the project process.
 6th Grade
 
 
7th Grade

7th Grade
Focus on the School Community

The seventh grade year will continue to foster empathetic entrepreneurship of students with an emphasis on creating innovative change within the school community
 
PROJECT IDEAS IN THE MAKING:
  • Generate advocacy-driven campaigns that uplift diversity and a sense of belonging through Student Snapshots, modeled after the “Humans of New York” campaign on social media
  • Redesign the audience experience for Forum Theatre plays based on bullying and bystander issues at school. Showcase real-life situations that would allow “spect-actors” to role-play positive inter
  • ventions to become “upstanders” in future conflicts on campus.
 
 
 

8th Grade
Focus on Community at Large

Capitalizing on their prior knowledge of design thinking, the 8th Grade curriculum would challenge students to create their own capstone project based on observation, interviews, and research of the South Gate community.
 
PROJECT IDEAS IN THE MAKING:
  • Develop an online application that allows the community to improve in an area of need
  • Design a personalized hearing aid for a child that won’t fall out while he plays with his friends at recess
  • Develop a project that utilizes technology and mimics nature as seen in Vijay Kumar’s robots that can fly and cooperate
 8th Grade
Be a part of the DREAMS community.

Be a part of the DREAMS community.

Want to attend Southeast DREAMS Magnet?
 
The 2026-27 On Time Application window opens on October 1, 2025.