May 24, 2023
At a recent event held by the Ontario High School Ethics Bowl (OEB) participants in the training reported feeling 90% prepared following training, compared to just 14% before the event.
Ontario Ethics Bowl
The Ontario High School Ethics Bowl is an activity designed to engage students in democratic dialogue about challenging ethical and political questions. During an Ethics Bowl, teams of high school students discuss ethical dilemmas taking place at the forefront of the world. Students are encouraged to amend their original positions when faced with counter-evidence, which allows them to explore difficult ideas in a collaborative atmosphere.
Ontario Ethics Bowl
Started by the Philosophy Department at the University of Toronto, Mississauga, the OEB has since partnered with eight other Ontario universities to scale up this activity. The first Ontario Bowl took place in March 2020 at the University of Toronto (one week before COVID-19 was declared a pandemic!). For the past two years, the OEB was moved online, during which time they’ve seen extreme growth, with the size of the Bowl doubling, and then tripling, in back-to-back years! Through partnerships with the University of Toronto’s Scarborough and St. George campuses, Toronto Metropolitan University, Carleton, Queens, McMaster, and Guelph, the OEB anticipates even stronger growth in the years ahead.
The Challenge
Ontario Ethics Bowl (OEB) is committed to running the largest Ethics Bowl event in the world. Nearly 1000 participants - including 300 judges and 60 moderators - participated as part of an ambitious growth strategy to double participation each year.
The Enable Education built NHSEBOne platform made this rapid trajectory of growth possible. To achieve their objectives, OEB needed to scale up training of the key knowledge and soft skills needed to use the NHSEBOne platform successfully.
The training for Ethics Bowl moderators and judges was led by a single subject matter expert who is not a formally trained educator. Due to their growth strategy, there were many more people to train this year, and the timeline to do so was short.
How Did Sidekick Help?
Sidekick met with the Ontario Ethics Bowl Director, Jeffrey Senese, and together they assessed the strengths and gaps in OEB’s existing approach to training volunteers. Next, Sidekick made recommendations to enhance it. One component of that support involved adding hands-on activities using the NHSEBOne Platform, enhancing their training deck, and adding feedback mechanisms to improve the training.
The Sidekick platform and support provided meant that OEB could deliver their training with one person aided by a few volunteers. Sidekick was on hand (virtually) to provide them with the support they needed to run the event successfully.
Social Impact
This project is a part of Sidekick’s social impact work. We collaborate with businesses and educational institutions to create and deliver virtual live learning and hybrid learning events that are both engaging and effective. Through our expert instructional design services and cutting-edge virtual platform, we deliver structured and tailored learning experiences that will help your business grow and succeed.
Ready to take your employee engagement to the next level? Let Sidekick be your guide! Our expert team is here to help you revamp your onboarding, training, and professional learning programs to keep your employees motivated and excited to learn. Whether you’re looking to spice up your virtual training sessions or improve your hybrid learning events, we’ve got you covered. Book a call with our team today and discover how Sidekick can help your employees thrive!
