Week 5 Reflection - Community Relations

My progress towards the implementation of my action research project is on schedule. I have contacted Dr. Hall and have submitted the request for the school district data on the number of cell phone violations. I have also started some one-to-one interviews with my assistant principals over discipline to get their overall view of the cell phone as a classroom disruption. Those interviews are being recorded as well. My next step is to formally document the time spent on cell phone violations compared with other administrative time. I will use these interviews to correlate with the district data I am receiving from Dr. Hall’s office. After that, I will be interviewing the Para-professionals whose job it is to collect cell phones, take payments for cell phone pick up and determine the amount of time they spend on this issue on a weekly basis. If I look at my action research project, it is daunting. I have to remind myself that the best way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time. At the present time, I don’t foresee any problems finishing the project. I recently was elected to serve on the campus CIDC committee which looks at the campus plan and ways that the campus can implement this plan. The committee also looks at student discipline and different ways that students, staff, and parents can help manage the various discipline problems that arise. I felt this was a great way to not only document hours for my action research project and my field experience, but also gain insight on some of the ways the problems of cell phones in the classroom have become a problem at our school. The first meeting lasted 2 ½ hours and dealt mainly with the campus plan/vision. I did bring up my topic and was met with mixed reviews. The biggest hurdle to accomplishing the end goal (allowing smart phones in the classroom) is that our campus is a 1-to-1 campus with each student being issued a laptop. This policy somewhat defeats the BYOT (Bring Your Own Technology) initiative since students have access to the internet and the other digital learning arenas. Overall, I am pleased with my progress, although slow. According to my original plan, I am right on schedule.