GETTING RESPONSES!!!!

My teacher survey was re-sent and I am on my way to getting the feedback needed for my action research plan! I just checked my Survey Monkey account and have received 19 thus far! FAR BETTER than ZERO! I also met with my site supervisor on Thursday just to touch base with her about my project. We talked about how to distribute my parent survey. Some options were to send on color coded paper, so when they came in, I could just log the responses for my sample group. We haven't decided the best way - however; I am hoping to get my parent survey out within the next two weeks. It would be a lot easier for me if I could send a link to the parents of my sample group, but not sure if we could that since it is a race specific population.

WEEKLY UPDATE

Not much to report this week. I sent a link to the teacher survey I created in Survey Monkey to all staff at my site-supervisor's school last week. With it being mid-TAKS, I didn't expect a quick response to the teacher surveys. However; I didn't expect NO response! That is where I am. ZERO responses received as of today. I plan to contact my site supervisor principal tomorrow and ask for suggestions on getting these. Until next week....

Survey Time!

Step one of two has been completed dealing with my surveys. I created a short, ten question survey utilizing Survey Monkey and have sent the link to all staff at my site school. I will be following up with the staff in about two weeks, due to it being TAKS time and my survey is not top priority. However; I very excited and anxious to get their results and feedback. I am in the process of compiling a parent survey that will be sent to the site principal and PRE for approval. I need to touch base with my site principal to get her feed back on whether to sent it to ALL students, or just my sample group. Speaking of sample groups, I will be choosing them within the next two weeks.

Overall, my action research plan is coming along great!

'Visual' update on progress.

I am a visual person, so I am posting updates about my progress using a color coded action plan.
RED will indicate COMPLETED and GREEN will indicate IN PROGRESS.

Action Steps(s)	Person(s) Responsible	Timeline: Start/End	Resources	Evaluation
Meet with site supervisor to obtain approval of action research plan	Amy Clark (self) and Cheryl Alexander (site supervisor)	2/29/11 – 3/21/11	*Internship Plan *TAKS data	*Approval of topic
Collect and disaggregate AEIS and Edugence reports	Amy Clark	3/21/11 – 5/1/11	*Edugence System *AEIS reports for campus	*Collection of data
Develop anonymous teacher survey. Input questions to Survey Monkey. Obtain approval to submit to teachers.	Amy Clark – survey Cheryl Alexander – approval	3/24/11 – 4/15/11	*Survey Monkey	*Feedback and approval from site supervisor
Present action research topic and overview to staff at Steadham Elementary. Distribute anonymous teacher survey view Survey Monkey.	Amy Cark	4/22/11 – faculty meeting	*Power Point presentation *Link to Survey Monkey – anonymous teacher survey	*Response to presentation. *Results collected from survey.
Select sample group	Amy Clark and Cheryl Alexander	5/1/11 – 5/15/11	*TAKS data from past 3 years (AEIS)	*Discussion with classroom teachers
Develop survey for parents.	Amy Clark	3/21/11 – 4/30/22	*Parent Survey	*Feedback from site supervisor
Review literature related to poor student performance in the African American male population	Amy Clark	3/21/11 – 7/1/11	*Peer reviewed literature related to study	*Comparison to current demographic at site campus

Data, More Data, and even More Data!

Over the past week and a half, I have been pulling TAKS results for my specific subgroup. I have pulled years 2007 – 2010. I just need to zero in on the MALE population. This is a little more difficult than I had anticipated, but I keep pressing ahead.  I have also pulled several articles related to the underachievement of the African American male population in our educational system. There is a lot more articles out there, and finding the information I need has been fairly easy. Now, I haven’t fully read the articles, so I can’t say if it contains the RIGHT information needed for my research.

I am presenting my action research topic and plan of research to the staff on April 22. This will be a short 5 minute presentation. At this presentation, I will also be distributing the link they can go to, in order to access the teacher survey. Even though I still have a tremendous amount of work to do with my action research, I am making good progress and keeping on track.

Course Relection - Where did this five weeks go?

As I reflect back over the past five weeks, I realize that not only did I grow as a student; I also grew as a professional. I have learned the ‘art’ of reflecting. Reflection is an important leadership skill because it provides the ability to think more deeply about problems and allows the leader to have the ability to take action or make adjustments accordingly. (Martin et al., 2005) After I submitted each week’s assignment, I took some time to make notes of the most important key concepts I learned that week, and kept them in a journal. This will be very beneficial in the future as I transition to the role of administrator.

I have learned a great deal about action research. Like most other students, I was terrified of this course. I had built a pre-conceived idea that a research class meant countless, tiring hours looking up information I cared nothing about. Then the six letter word ‘action’ was inserted before research, and that changed everything.  When I first read the definition from Dana’s text, “Simply stated, administrator inquiry refers to the process of a principal engaging in systematic, intention study of his/her own administrative practice and taking action for change based on what he/she learns as a result of the inquiry” (Dana, 2009, p. 2), I was a little less terrified and more knowledgeable of what we were being asked to do. For the lack of a better word, I was giddy that I was going to be able to pick my own topic and conduct action research on a topic that was relevant to my district and campus. What a concept!

In addition to learning that action research can actually be enjoyable, I learned three strategies that could be used to support and sustain action research. From our Harris text, I learned about three strategies: Force Field Analysis, Delphi Method, and Nominal Group Technique.  Remembering these strategies and being able to implement them as an administrator will be very beneficial to our campus and district.  In our week four assignment, I learned that following the steps outlined in the Harris text to conduct a Force Field Analysis in our new mentoring program would be most beneficial. 

Our weekly discussion board posts have been very insightful. I think the most beneficial part of the discussion board, is that we are able relate to other students and make sure we are on the right track with our plan. I would always second guess myself when answering discussion board prompts and would wait for a few people to post their responses before I did. It was always a relief to see how they responded and know that I was on the right track initially. It was validation that I was actually understanding and doing what was required. I was able to learn how to give suggestions to others without being negative, and receive positive criticism without taking it personally.

BLOG. That is a word that terrified me in the past. I am not a blogger and at first, didn’t see the relevance in creating and maintain a blog for this course and for the life of our action research. I couldn’t have been more wrong. My blog and blogs of my peers have been the most help to me during this course. I appreciated and welcomed all the comments I received on my blog postings, because it helped me adjust and make additional changes to my action research that I would not have thought about. Using a blog to communicate your action research plan and progress is a great accountability tool. It helps the researcher stay on task and meet timelines.

The weekly web conferences were wonderful. It was nice to be able to put a face to the names we see weekly on the discussion boards and to actually see our professor. I participated every week on the web conferences. Some weeks, I really didn’t have any questions or concerns, but I joined in because someone always inevitably asked a question I SHOULD have and that pertained to my situation. I learned that I needed to participate in everything provided to me as a student, so that I could get the most from this class and program.

References

Dana, N.F. (2009). Leading with Passion and Knowledge: The Principals Action Researcher. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Martin, G.E., Wright, W. F., Danzig, A. B., Flanary, R. A., & Brown, F. (2005). School Leader Internship. New York, NY: Eye On Education, Inc.

HOT OFF THE PRESS: Revised and Approved

I have received approval for my action research plan (received 3/21/2011) from my site supervisor. I made a few revisions, not so much with content, but broke it down into a few additional detailed steps.

I also started pulling TAKS data from our EduGence System. EduGence is the data warehouse that our district utilizes to store all testing results district wide, AND flags students who are targeted for intervention. It has taken me a little longer to pull the data I need, since I had to learn how to navigate the system. I am glad that I started as planned and gave myself plenty of time to pull and evaluate this data.

To help myself and other visualize my progress, I will be periodically posting updated pieces of my plan that will be color coded. RED will indicate COMPLETED and GREEN will indicate IN PROGRESS.

Action Steps(s)	Person(s) Responsible	Timeline: Start/End	Resources	Evaluation
Meet with site supervisor to obtain approval of action research plan	Amy Clark (self) and Cheryl Alexander (site supervisor)	2/29/11 – 3/21/11	*Internship Plan *TAKS data	*Approval of topic
Collect and disaggregate AEIS and Edugence reports	Amy Clark	3/21/11 – 5/1/11	*Edugence System *AEIS reports for campus	*Collection of data
Develop anonymous teacher survey. Input questions to Survey Monkey. Obtain approval to submit to teachers.	Amy Clark – survey Cheryl Alexander – approval	3/24/11 – 4/15/11	*Survey Monkey	*Feedback and approval from site supervisor

REVISED AND APPROVED:

ACTION RESEARCH PLAN 7.1 Tool

GOAL: To increase student performance on state assessments in the African American male population on campus by implementing an after school ‘mentoring’ program for this subgroup in response to research.

Action Steps(s)	Person(s) Responsible	Timeline: Start/End	Resources	Evaluation
Meet with site supervisor to obtain approval of action research plan	Amy Clark (self) and Cheryl Alexander (site supervisor)	2/29/11 – 3/21/11	*Internship Plan *TAKS data	*Approval of topic
Collect and disaggregate AEIS and Edugence reports	Amy Clark	3/21/11 – 5/1/11	*Edugence System *AEIS reports for campus	*Collection of data
Develop anonymous teacher survey. Input questions to Survey Monkey. Obtain approval to submit to teachers.	Amy Clark – survey Cheryl Alexander – approval	3/24/11 – 4/15/11	*Survey Monkey	*Feedback and approval from site supervisor
Present action research topic and overview to staff at Steadham Elementary. Distribute anonymous teacher survey view Survey Monkey.	Amy Cark	4/22/11 – faculty meeting	*Power Point presentation *Link to Survey Monkey – anonymous teacher survey	*Response to presentation. *Results collected from survey.
Select sample group	Amy Clark and Cheryl Alexander	5/1/11 – 5/15/11	*TAKS data from past 3 years (AEIS)	*Discussion with classroom teachers
Develop survey for parents.	Amy Clark	3/21/11 – 4/30/22	*Parent Survey	*Feedback from site supervisor
Meet with site supervisor to obtain approval to distribute survey	Amy Clark and Cheryl Alexander	5/1/11 – 5/15/2011	*Copy of  survey	*Approval of survey
Distribute survey to parents and teachers	Amy Clark	5/16/11 – 5/18/11	*Survey *Survey Monkey link	*Survey results
Review literature related to poor student performance in the African American male population	Amy Clark	3/21/11 – 7/1/11	*Peer reviewed literature related to study	*Comparison to current demographic at site campus
Disaggregate survey results	Amy Clark	6/1/11 – 8/1/11	*surveys *Information from Survey Monkey	*Survey results
Compile data and present to campus	Amy Clark, Cheryl Alexander	8/1/11 – 9/1/11	*Literature review data *Survey data *TAKS data	*Feedback from campus staff and site supervisor
Write conclusion paper and proposal for mentoring/tutoring program	Amy Clark	8/1/11 – 9/1/11	*Literature review data *Survey data *TAKS data	*Feedback from campus staff and site supervisor
Present research results to campus faculty	Amy Clark	9/2011	*Handouts with research data (results) *Power Point *Plan of Action for mentoring program	*Feedback from campus staff and site supervisor
AFTER RESEARCH: Implement after school mentoring/tutoring program	Amy Clark, Cheryl Alexander, staff at Steadham Elementary	9/1/11  -	*Action Research results	*Student performance on STAAR for 2011 – 2012 school year
Monitor benchmark and curriculum assessments (CA’s) scores	Amy Clark	9/2011 – 6/2012	*EduGence	*Student performance on benchmarks and CA’s

Template was received from the following source on page 85:

Harris, S., Edmonson, S., Combs, J. (2010). Examining What We Do to Improve Our Schools. Larchmont, NY: Eye on Education.