Action Research Update 9-29

“Creating a Successful ISS” is the action research project that I have been in the process of working on.  Currently I am in the process of meeting with my assistant principal in reference to the master schedule for the spring semester.  After meeting with my site supervisor along with the leadership team, various options to improve the effectiveness of our ISS were looked at.  By looking at the master schedule we are studying having certain teachers available to teach students in ISS.  This will be a rotation style of teaching.  (Example:  1^st period- Math teacher is designated to ISS.  This teacher will help all students with Math during this period.  2^nd period- Science teacher will help all students with science.  ETC)  One major issue we are still looking at is to have the departments collaborate so that one single subject teacher has what that subject is currently working on.  I have researched and acquired discipline reports from our assistant principals along with attendance records.  The reason for these reports is to see if the majority of the ISS students are repeat offenders.  I have also looked at each assistants principals log as to how many days of ISS each student was given.  I want to evaluate to see if there was a major discrepancy in the amount of assigned days for each principal.  Some of my questions were:  Is different principals assigning different days to ISS for the same discipline?  Is one principal more lenient than another? 

The reason I had to focus on the above assistant principals was to see the effectiveness of the days assigned to ISS and the amount of students currently in ISS.

Action Research Plan- Successful ISS

OUTCOMES	ACTIVITIES	RESOURCES/ RESEARCH TOOLS NEEDED	RESPONSIBILITY TO ADDRESS ACTIVITIES	TIME LINE	Benchmarks/ ASSESSMENT	Revisions to SIP/PIP based on monitoring and assessments
Determine all students who were placed in ISS last year	Review list of students generated by counselors	Counselor lists	Ms. Torres	Completed by September 1, 2012
Determine multiple offenders versus single offenders	Collaborate with the Junior High administration team in determining multiple offenders	Junior High counselors	Ms. Smith	Completed by September 1, 2012
Identify discipline patterns for amount of days for students in ISS	Analyze student data (discipline reports)	Discipline history	Grade Level Principals	Completed by September 1, 2012
Gather students grade report/ attendance for entire year	Gain insight on relevance in relation to time spent in ISS.	Academic grade reports, Attendance reports	Ms. Santos, Ms. Korenk	Completed by September 1, 2012
Communicate with leadership team in ways to effectively improve ISS on campus	Promote a survey with possible solutions along with an open forum	Grades, discipline files, attendance reports, and survey	Leadership Team	Ongoing
Communicate with Administration team on ways to effectively improve ISS on campus	Promote a survey with possible solutions along with an open forum	Grades, discipline files, attendance reports, and survey	Administration Team	Ongoing
Effective communication among all stakeholders	Collaborate and communicate with teachers, and administration in regards to the success of the students.	Relay information during weekly meetings in reference to ISS	Mr. Nava, Mr. Pineda	Ongoing

Action

Reflective Week 2

I am drawn to the educational “teams” that are in our school.  Whether is collaborative teams, mentoring, data teams, or leadership teams the impact and role they play in our education system really sparked and interest in me.   This is a chance for a leader to get input as well as delegate responsibilities out to teachers.  This is also an area that one can get insurmountable leadership experience in a variety of these roles.  After giving much thought about the significance, you can really see the roles these “teams” play in the success of our students.

Blogs

Blogs are a great way to have a virtual conversation among a diverse group.  Using blogs allows everyone access to a conversation/"topic" and give their own personal opinion.  This is very relevant because educators can post assignments online with a blog attached.  Students, parents, and teachers all benefit because of the constant communication that is accessed.  If a user has a question for the teacher/educator, by reading through some of the previous post they may find their own answer.  By creating this dialogue others in the class may be able to help with any questions asked.  This can be a great tool to help learning from others. 

Action Research

Action research is a great tool that will solve many issues that are of specific concern. Solving solutions with people who have an invested interest in the outcome will help with making the correct decision after conducting all research.  Action research is very beneficial because ones own research comes from inside the problem area with all parties involved.  The people that involved in the research will help with the outcome as well.  This is a great way to help get diverse educated knowledge of an issue on ones campus.  One way I can use this is to aide in our district meetings and help bring some conclusion to areas of concern.  Instead of solving issues from the district at each individual campus, we can help by solving issues district wide.  There is no reason why we need each campus solving the same issue at every school when a district wide concern arises.  Using this action research to help solve our district concerns will help bring all parties involved and aide in an overall solution.  All parties will have an impact on the decisions and outcomes that will affect their campus.  With all campuses helping to solve this issue, we will be more unified as a district and be prepared as a whole.