Youth Voice in School

Schools, Youth Voice and Data

In SCHOOLS you have so much data that you are always looking at

but who is looking at it? 

The Staff 

NOT that the school is HIDING the data form the student BUT that the school doesn't GIVE time to LOOK at their OWN data and really UNDERSTAND what it is SAYING. When you make time and hear what the student have to say about the data, what do you think they might say? Where do you think they are coming from? 

The student could help change the data is we give them the time and space to do this. Students will hear student, over hear what they staff have to say. 

I am going to create a space where I have two co-researcher and have them create a space where students can see and hear data that is in the school. I can asked them questions on what they would think would help change the school community in the way they would like to see it change. Having the student drive the change will help change the community they want to be in. It will also make it theirs, LIKE, it is. 

Good or Bad Data

What can we learn from this data?         Are we helping?

In the article I like how it brought up the questions about good data and bad data.
Is it helpful or hurtful trying to show a point to something.
Are you making someone believe something to show information that they are
ready to know is happening?

Another great question to ask yourself is if the information you get

from the data is going to improve something
for someone. 

When I first thought of the words "bad data" it was when data was wrong or failures. In this article it showed me

that data can be right but painful for a community or group of people. If the point of the data is to show that a

town has a poor school system, then what do you do with the information?
Prove a point and walk away?
How can the school system be helped?
What does the community need to improve it?

Proving that a system is failing could just put more stress on the community and be more devastating.

When getting data we should be mindful and clear about what we are doing in getting information from a group of people or an area.

What I see youth work as

 Not just wearing one hat.

When I look at this picture.... 
I see someone's voice ~ relationships ~ paperwork  ~ time to think ~ problem solving

I found this image and it made me think of how I look and do youth work. It has picture of different actions that are done with in youth work to keep in going. I can stay that every day for me is not the same. I look at how I can plan a day out but something could pop up and then I have to change the plan around. When I am doing the youth work with in the school, I am working where the youth are needed the most not where I THINK the youth should be. Youth work is not something happened 9 to 5 and business hours. 

When the youth show their voice, I hear what they say and see where they would like to move with it. They should be the one that is leading how their educational journal is set up. Not all youth education looks the same because they are not cookie cutters. 

Why Data?

 Let's Talk Data!!

at Veritas Prep School

In my work place we talk data every week. Data is some that the school has to report to donors and the state to keep our building open.

The plat form that we get a lot of our data on is Dean's List. In Dean's List we do attendance, behavior and homework completion. We have weekly team meetings to go over the data for our grade and every week the principle send an all staff email to everyone so they can see how everyone is doing as a whole. 

This is an example of data for the school each week that is sent out to every employee. 

Another time of data we use is doing google services. The service is done for staff, students and families.

Staff services are done weekly by administration to find out where staff are feeling and having difficulties. It is also time for them to have a way to clearly communicate with their coach on areas that they might be having trouble in. The school is based on teamwork and transparency. In our charter we have it written that donors and families can come to the school and see what is going on in the classrooms. Donors are able to see how their money is being used to help educate students and supporting staff. 

Students are given monthly service to see how they are feeling in school and how the school might be able to make it better. If students have an event they would like to do they are able to sign up and a staff member will support them in creating the group. The staff member will support but it is the student lead in an event like this. We try to make the group the voice of all of the student’s. 

Veritas has to report everything to the state of Massachusetts every year. Then they information is made public so that anyone can see how the school is doing. 

When you click on this you can see our report for

Veritas Preparatory Charter School (District)

 2021 DESE Report Card

When you click on this you can see our report for

Veritas Preparatory Charter School (District)

2021-22 DESE Annual Report 

Veritas Preparatory Charter S

Evaluation of Organization Conducts

We have different type Evaluation for my Workplace

The evaluations are for students, families and staff so that everyone is on the same page.

Types of student educational growth are: Map Testing, Standard-Based Grading, Attendance, use a program called Jump Rope so that parents can see grades at any time. 

Behavioral growth for students is measured in a PBIS system and Dean's list program to keep track of all data and reports pulled every week and the parents get the same report for how students are doing. In the report it showed how much homework was completed and points earned for each class. The points are a play check and student's can spend the points. There is a positive referral system. Any school staff member can give a positive referral to any student and at the end of the month they win a prize. When the school has any type of suspicion this does have to be reported to the school. We only use suspicion when there are weapons and physical fights that happen. At any time there is a suspicion there is a project the student has to complete and community service because of our restorative practice we use. We will have a meeting with the student, teacher and families to talk about what has happened and make sure everyone has a voice.

Parents Growth: We want to make sure parents have a voice in the student education so having parents come into the school and the teacher has to document that they have had communities with parents 2 times in two weeks. The teacher documents they have communicate home through Dean's List and Dean's List will create a list of students that have not had communication in the past two weeks. We do parent surveys every two months to see how parents are doing with the school year.

As a staff we have time every week to look at our data as a team and administration looks at data as a team once a week. How we will look at data is that we don't say one person is doing a bad job but look at it as how we can improve and do it as a team.

Understanding Evaluation

 

Most of the time programs are out to do the right thing but not all. It is hard to think that people would take advantage of being a nonprofit and not doing what their mission statement reflects.

I think it's important that programs do have a way to evaluate themselves and make sure they are living up to their mission. Sometimes when evaluations are created to look over a program they're not diverse enough or look at all aspects of a program. It is important that an evaluation is transparent and is created by a wide range of people to make sure the evaluation is not biased in any way. Evaluations are very hard not to be biased but is it important to reflect on how the evaluation was created. An evaluation should be a helpful tool to help a program grow and make sure they are living by the mission in which they have stated why they have the program. The mission of the non-profit is the most important thing. The nonprofit created a mission statement in which they are creating their whole program around. 

 

An evaluation should only be one tool that is used to help a program and their funding. I feel other resources and reflections of their actual work in the community. 

How a non-profit is using their funds should be very transparent for anyone to see where the money is going. 

Money can be a very powerful tool if it's use the wrong way.

Post Positivist, Constructivist, and Critical

Who?  What?  When?  Where?  WHY? 

Post Positivist: This is something that is after the fact has been said. It makes me think of when people will say that ALL youth act them the same or look at a youth feeling that they Must be up to know "good". These statements try to put everyone in one group and youth can't be put in one group.

Every youth is different in their ways of life and can bring different views to a table. There are youth that help in their community and people don't see that behavior. Youths prove different theories of "what youth are" wrong to make it a null hypothesis. People just need to be able to see and hear that youth are not one cookie cutter. People that work in the youth field help prove that youth do so much more than people have seen. Youth need to be given the time to show people that their reality is there. People might have not seen it yet because they have not been given the chance to shine in a different way, and it is "out there."

Someone this work makes me think of Rick, Resilience and Prevention because they have programs out there that youth do use and need. This does not mean that they are "bad" or "uneducated" for using different tools that help them. Programs that are created are not just to show youth do things wrong but to help protect them in the way they would like. Programs are created to help youth not label them. If the youth are voicing they want these programs let's give them it.

Constructivist: This area of theory is the nature of reality of why something might be happening. This is an area that I relate to because I am always asking why. I feel when someone asks why, it helps show if there is anything behind what someone might be saying. This helps someone's statement become more transparent why they have the answer to why they believe and/or do something. In constructivist it is built around human rationality and contextual area. The ideology of youth work it reminds me of is Positive Youth Development.

Critical Theory: This theory points to change society as a whole and critique. This area makes me think of groups that help support groups that youth have a social voice in the community. These groups stand by youth to push back and let them use their voice on what they believe in.  I feel the youth's voice should be heard by all. Youth are a voice that can ask "WHY" and they should. 

In all of there areas the different ideologies can overlap with each other because youth development is seen in so many different ways.