We The Students: More Than Just A Number 8.7.14

• 1. We the Students: More than Just a Number

2. Introduction We the Students: More than Just a Number speaks to the complexity of students lives and the vast potential youth possess, as evident in the data presented here. As suggested by the title, this complexity and potential is not measured well in a single number, which is frequently how students come to see themselves and how they perceive themselves as seen by others in the current emphasis on school accountability through testing. This source be cited as follows: Galletta, A., Bisesi, A., Evans, C., Giraldo-Garcia, R., Gullatt, L., Sterritt, M., Thomas, J., & Watson, T. (2014). We the Students: More than Just a Number. Presentation at City Club of Cleveland on August 7, 2014. Contact: Anne Galletta, Ph.D. [email protected] 3. Collaborative Who are we? Youth & young adults Educators & community members University faculty & students 4. What is Participatory Action Research (PAR)? Inquiry takes place within a collective which shares relationship to research focus Members may share a particular standpoint, situated within a context or bring multiple angles of vision to study Those who participate in the research are often insiders in some way and who bring lived experience to research Experiential knowledge is given weight (Cammarota & Fine, 2008) Analysis of data situates individual within context of history, policy, and local conditions 5. What did we do? CSU students & faculty and 25 youth in the Cleveland Metropolitan School District (CMSD) gathered in November 2012 and planned our action research Engaged 9th grade students in 7 schools - using film & poetry Cleveland State University (CSU) students collected data through Survey Monkey December 2012 Youth & CSU students/faculty analyze survey data, identify themes January 2013 Reported back to 9th grade students using creative products spring 2013 6. 9th Grade Survey Report Demographics Transportation Student Mobility and School Closure Student Safety and Getting Along Student and Teacher Relationships 7. Demographics 8. Study methods The student sample consisted of 9th grade students in 7 district schools. The sample size (N=259) is fairly reflective of the demographics of the district and allows us to make inferences about the districts 9th grade student population* Our collective of 25 youth from the 7 schools, a community member, and CSU students and faculty have analyzed the data and found there are compelling themes to spark a discussion on the challenges and opportunities youth experience in their early years of high school * further details on study methods available on request 9. Transportation 10. 9th grade students on transportation issues Even though I might only live 2 miles away, it is still a long walk because my parent does not have the time to drop me off, and our car breaks down I actually like having to catch the bus, but sometimes it takes long I was slightly scared to ride the RTA because I have never done it beforeit was a new transition 11. Recent transportation changes The district announced in January 2014 that students living mile or more from their high school would get RTA transportation This decision was a positive step in addressing transportation problems! Issues remain nonetheless in terms of safety, getting to school on time, and crowded busses taking students to school, or passing them by when the bus is full. We creatively explored these issues through poetry and film. We now share a video, When are You Safe? It was prepared as a creative product to engage the 9th grade students in this issue. This video was used in 9th grade classrooms in the spring of 2013 when the youth researchers returned to report back to the 9th grade the data and key themes 12. Video & Poem: When are you Safe? 13. Students Changing Schools & School Closure 14. Frequently changing schools As noted in the previous slide, 40% of 9th grade students taking the survey reported changing schools somewhere between 5 and more than 9 times Frequently changing schools can negatively impact students grades and social relationships. We found in the survey data that students who reported changing schools a lot also reported high levels of verbal bullying in their school 15. Locating issue of school closure in local history In 2010, 14 K-8 schools closed and several more were closed in 2011. This occurred mostly on the districts east side. Given this, we looked at mobility due to school closure on the east side high schools to understand better the experience of 9th grade students who may have had their elementary school closed As you can see on the displayed chart in the next slide, in one east side high school 35% of the 9th graders said their school closed, which is reported almost the same as moving from a K-8 to high school OR changing schools due to a family move 16. 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 37% 35% 7% 26% 7% 37% 2% Mobility in One East Side High School 17. Transition from closed school into new school Across all the schools, among those who attended a school that had closed, 43% reported the transition was hard or very hard Some students saw the transition due to school closure as a loss, others as an adjustment, and still others as a new beginning These numbers are important to our analysis, but they dont tell the whole story. 9th grade student voices are reflected in the following slide 18. 9th grade students on school closure All my friends were gone. I was expecting to graduate from my school. It also hurt me when I went to another school because we were all packed in the classroom...there was not enough books to go aroundIt was not easy switching schools. I felt sort of sad that I had to leave all of my friends, but it introduced me to new things. "It didnt change my life that much, but I did feel like I lost a part of me... 19. Student Safety & GettingAlong 20. Students getting along with each other 76% of 9th grade students who took the survey reported that they get along with other students in their school BUT: 52% said they experienced verbal bullying sometimes or many times 21. Students report getting along but also note bullying Some possibilities in terms of interpreting the data these were shared with 9th grade students: Students feel safe and get along with those who are their friends, often people who share a common background. However, when students are in a situation with someone different from them, they may bully or be bullied Conditions in the school can increase the likelihood of bullying, such as crowded hallways, students who are strangers to each other and to their teachers, and pressures outside the school in the home and neighborhood 22. Teacher and Student Relationships 23. How students and teachers get along 59% of 9th grade students report that students and teachers do not get along very well At the same time, 68% reported that teachers make me think deeply about ideas 70% reported teachers challenge me to work hard The data appear to reflect negative as well as positive dimensions in student-teacher relationships In our analysis, we considered ways teachers and students come to know each other better: through advisories, through meaningful and challenging curriculum, through classroom resources and reasonable class sizes 24. Question on classroom practices impacted by state policy More than half of the students (60%) indicated that their teachers focus only on the Ohio Graduation Test (OGT) Those who reported getting along with their teachers were more likely to also report their teacher focused only on the OGT Have students begun to equate good teaching with OGT prep? 25. Engagement in Inquiry and Action 26. Why did we conduct a survey? Survey plays the role of a social mirror (Martn- Bar, 1994) through which youth can see their experience reflected Our use of critical theory guides us in embedding the experience analytically within broader systems of relationships More on the meaning we give to this work as a collective of university faculty and students, youth, educators, and community members in the next slide 27. CSU student engagement Moving beyond university classroom walls Utilizing participatory action research in the study of policy and of educational change Teacher candidates play a role in PAR collectives Youth bring knowledge of the problems they experience on a daily basis in schools and their neighborhoods Youth knowledge coupled with university resources in terms of faculty and students Youth and community members critically analyze alongside members of the university 28. Policy Implications 29. Locating themes in broader national and local context Historically, legislative action intended to address school improvement and educational equity: No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top competitive grants, Ohio House Bill 525 Survey themes of transportation issues, changing schools, and school closure have implications for the implementation of the districts Portfolio System, consisting of seven principles, including school choice Within this arrangement, waiting lists have emerged, seen by some as a sign of successful reform Waiting lists suggest that some students will gain access to resources, and others will not 30. Attending to Equity The quality of student-student relationships and teacher-student relationships is influenced by what happens inside and outside the classroom in the policy decisions put in place in the name of school reform Careful attention must be given to ways in which legislative action in education may lead to inequitable policies and practices 31. Summing up Transportation challenges, concern about students getting along, frequent changing of schools, and the need for students and teachers to get to know and respect each other make transitions a challenge for 9th grade students These themes reflect the data from the 9th grade survey. What do you think? What do you think should be done? Discussion! 32. References Butler, A., Mitchell, A., & Pitmon, N. (2013). When are you Safe? Poem and video produced at Participatory Action Research session at Cleveland State University. Cammarota, J., & Fine, M. (Eds.). (2008). Revolutionizing Education: Youth Participatory Action Research in Motion. New York, NY: Routledge. Martn-Bar, I. (1994). Writings for a liberation psychology. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 33. Acknowledgments A special thanks to the parents of the youth researchers, who have supported their sons and daughters through this project. To the educators embarking on a new academic year, hold close to your passion, curiosity, and fearlessness. 34. We the Students: More than Just a Number