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Impact Challenge

Every Hillbrook student understands they are a unique and powerful person with the agency to determine what difference they will make in the world.

The Impact Challenge is a semester-long, hands-on learning experience where students apply social entrepreneurship and design thinking to tackle real-world problems presented by local organizations. Students meet weekly for extended sessions, working in small teams to explore issues, develop innovative solutions, and refine their ideas. The experience culminates in a community pitch event where students present their proposals to partners and local leaders, with the goal of fostering sustained partnerships and long-term community impact. Centered on youth voice and agency, the Impact Challenge empowers students to imagine what the world might be and take action to shape it.

Students are empowered to see themselves—and their school—as agents of meaningful change. By engaging with real community partners and grappling with complex, unscripted problems, students gain firsthand insight into the challenges others face and learn how to contribute authentically. The experience helps students build critical life and professional skills—such as project management, creativity, communication, and adaptability—that can’t be fully taught in a traditional classroom. They learn to collaborate across differences, navigate uncertainty, and iterate through failure. Above all, the Impact Challenge instills a deep sense of confidence and hope: that their ideas matter, their actions can make a difference, and they are capable of doing hard, important work in the world.

Tools and frameworks for impact

Throughout the Impact Challenge, students are equipped with a powerful set of tools and frameworks that prepare them to turn ideas into action:

  • User-centered design thinking

  • Landscape and competitive analysis

  • Problem identification

  • AI as a tool for social change

  • Public speaking and presentation skills

  • Visual thinking

  • Effective storytelling

  • Providing and integrating feedback

  • Professional communication

  • Dialogue and deliberation

  • Independent problem solving

Looking ahead, the Impact Challenge has the potential to become a defining element of a student’s educational journey—not just at Hillbrook, but across the broader educational landscape. We envision it as an open-source model that schools and organizations can adapt to empower youth as changemakers in their own communities. By providing students with opportunities to turn ideas into tangible impact, the Challenge could evolve into a city-wide forum where young people across San José collaborate, innovate, and drive solutions to real-world issues. As the most rigorous expression of intellectual curiosity and purpose-driven learning, it offers a compelling vision for the future of education—one that aligns student skill-building with meaningful work for people and the planet.