Growth Mindset

12/18/2024

By Laura Hamlin Weiler ’00, Head of Community Engagement

For Trinity’s innovation and technology teacher, exploratory learning, trial and error are the keys to success

For Cynthia Chinworth it’s the journey, not the destination. Chinworth, technology and innovation teacher and robotics coach at Trinity, there is joy in the organic moments throughout life’s paths. If this sounds a bit naturalist for someone who lives in the technology world, it illustrates that Chinworth is anything but typical in her approach.

Growing up in Alexandria, Virginia, Chinworth was an athlete, playing field hockey and rowing on the crew team. After earning a history degree from Virginia Commonwealth University, she began working in sales, but soon decided that education was where heart lay, becoming a social studies teacher at Prince George High School.

“I loved the historical component, however I was more interested in helping students manage the world we are in in the present,” she recalls. “I then moved into the technology field from there, earned my certification in business and information technology, and then a technology education certificate.”

All of those different experiences made Chinworth the educator she is today.

“Having a varied background and not being a long-time tech person is helpful because I can understand challenges,” she says. “I am not inherently good at it, so I love learning and the emotions involved, too.”

Chinworth came to Trinity in the fall of 2022. In a little more than two years, she has raised the profile of Trinity’s innovation, technology and robotics programs in more ways than one.

Together with the Trinity’s Technology, Research, and Innovation (TRI) team — including Laurie Pierce, technology director, and Spring Lavalee, librarian — Chinworth has worked to integrate innovation education into the curriculum as a foundational skill, just as research and technology have more recently been.

An example of this school-wide initiative — from a subject that is not readily associated with technology and innovation, English — was met with great success. Ninth grade English classes spent a week studying the derivation of language and words and then creating their own “slang” word. Their peers voted to narrow them down and then the finalists were presented to the entire school with their definition and the opportunity to vote for their favorite. It was fun for the entire community and was very effective in conveying the ever-changing nature of language.

“People use language and words to denote different things all of the time; slang is a form of innovation,” says Chinworth. “Words evolve and change meanings in subtle ways.”

In recognition of her work to explore these ideas and synthesize them for broad consumption by others, Chinworth was recently a featured speaker at the Women in Technology Conference at the Science Museum of Virginia. Hosted by rvatech/Women in Technology, the conference brought together technology professionals for education and collaboration about this ever-changing field.

Chinworth found the process and the presentation rewarding. “I learned a lot and it was really fun to represent Trinity to the outside world,” she says. “It was really interesting talking as an educator to non-educators — very refreshing and pushed my boundaries.”

And all of this comes on the heels of a historic spring of 2024, where she helped guide Trinity Robotics Team 539 to its first-ever trip to the FIRST Robotics World Championships in Houston. As plans begin to consolidate for the 2025 season, Chinworth says she can’t wait to team with students again to see what they will produce. “I love the all-encompassing nature of how mechanics, electrical, coding, and teamwork are all unified in robotics,” she says. “For me, the most rewarding part is building a completely functional robot and seeing the pride in the team’s faces.”

While it may be tough to replicate the unprecedented success of last year’s season, Chinworth is eager to see what this season brings as the fully-committed group continues their unique form of innovation. “We are focused on longevity and continuity and are very excited about the potential for the new space in the lower level of Morgan Hall and being worthy of that space.”

Chinworth welcomes the continued pace of innovation and cherishes the opportunity to experience it with students at Trinity. For her, the “X” factor she brings is being accessible to students. “I am learning as I go, too,” she confesses. “I help them to see that anything you put effort into, you will be successful with. Success looks like different things to different people however fully committing to something and seeing it through will lead to success. Trying and learning is success.”

Happily, that love for exploration and trial and error is at the heart of innovation. “Innovation is anything new and used in a novel way,” she says. At its heart innovation is “tools that expand human capacity.”

Fortunately for the Trinity community and for the broader RVA Women in Technology community, Chinworth has a lifetime of experience in adaptation and innovation and the power of intellectual curiosity as it leads to a life of meaning and purpose.

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About “Connections”

Connections is a regular online column, written from the first-person perspective of Laura Hamlin Weiler ’00, Head of Community Engagement:

In this space, I have the privilege of sharing stories of Trinity students, alumni, and faculty and staff who are carrying our mission beyond the boundaries of campus. Many of these stories might not make the headlines, but they will illustrate how every member of the Trinity community has a unique path to discover, and the ability to make an impact on both the Trinity community and the world beyond.

I am fortunate to have been a part of this community since my own adolescence. I have been a student, a teacher, a coach, and an administrator, and in these roles I have witnessed the school’s growth and evolution through the years. We have grown in size as well as spirit.

Stories here will capture how seeds planted at Trinity have taken root and flourished into full-grown passions. You’ll also read stories of those in our community who bring their gifts from outside to help us learn. At Trinity, we seek to develop lifelong learners, and stories here will illustrate real-life examples of that beautiful symbiosis.