Artifact 1: Longitudinal data
The researcher collected the longitudinal data from the percentage scores, counts, and grades of the Michael R Null Middle school recorded in 2018 to 2019 academic year. The researcher collected the total number of economically disadvantaged students within the Michael R Null Middle school population, whereby they were 981 students representing 86.9 percent of the campus’ total student population (Texas Education Agency, 2019). Such a statistic shows that most students were from humble family backgrounds and struggled to meet their academic and welfare needs. In this case, it implies that only 13.1 percent of the total campus student population were the only ones who were not economically affected, as per the Texas Academic Performance report of 2018-19. The above-collected data about the economic standards of the student were appropriate because, in mathematics and science, it was evident that economically disadvantaged students’ performance was terrible, as many students were unable to raise their level grades. Such students were presumed to have experienced learning challenges, incredibly when fulfilling the school requirements (Kathryn, 2019). Some students must have struggled to clear tuition or have suitable scholastic materials to progress in their academic endeavors. In this case, it shows that the longitudinal data collected from the report was appropriate to identify and confirm that economic disadvantages experienced by students have a significant impact on their instructional practices and learning abilities (Texas Education Agency, 2019). In support of the chosen problem, the data collected about the performance of economically disadvantaged students guide the strategic plan of addressing the problem through that there exists a problem to be addressed. The student’s struggles provide evidence to guide the formulation and implementation of appropriate interventions to improve students’ welfare and academics (Marshall et al., 2022).
Artifact 2: Research materials and resources used to inform the development of the plan
The researcher utilized the Columbia district consolidated state plan, which indicated that 87 percent of its total student population comes from an economically disadvantaged background. The above district material and resources indicated that the socio-economic statuses of families where students come from significantly impact their learning ability while at school. The charts used by the district resource indicated that the school’s overall performance of students is below average. In this case, the school did not achieve the required grades from the performance, whereby the students significantly failed subjects like Algebra, social studies, and writing with socioeconomic challenges. In reflection, all the above subjects need consistent practice and involvement of students so that the concepts can be mastered to lead to success (Texas Education Agency, 2019).
Additionally, the Texas Academic Performance Report of 2018 to 2019 indicating the performance of the students for Michael R Null Middle was the research material from the school that was utilized to understand the statistics of how the socio-economic status of the families of the students affects their abilities to instructional practices and learning. In this regard, the school material showed the cumulative performance of students with socioeconomic challenges families’ performance from 2018 to 2019. Most significantly, cumulative performance was important in understanding the history of the problem (Texas Education Agency, 2019). More so, the school and district resources significantly affected the plan’s development in a way that broadened knowledge about the problem. This made it possible for the researcher to understand the problem’s background and how it can be tackled through the plan. In such a manner, errors in the plan’s development were limited because the problem was clearly understood based on the stated statistics from the school and district resources or materials (Texas Education Agency, 2019).
Artifact 3: The Plan
The investigator developed the plan to support students in gaining equitable and broader access to learning and curriculum through acquiring academic financial assistance opportunities and pathways. The plan’s objective was to support economically disadvantaged students to improve their abilities in instructional practices and learning. In due course, economically disadvantaged students would have an opportunity to favorably compete against their colleagues as far as academic performance and progress are concerned (NSW Government, 2018). Historical evidence showed that economically disadvantaged students were underperforming because of struggling to meet the school requirements. Moreover, the emotional distress caused by missing classes due to failure to meet school requirements adversely impacted their academic performance.
In contrast, the students from wealthy families did not experience these challenging situations because their school dues were always paid on time. In due course, inequality is drawn from economic disparities manifested in the school and directly influences the student’s academic performance and progress. This plan intends to bridge this gap by significantly reducing the influence of economic disparities on students’ academic performance and progress (Athuraliya, 2022). More so, the financial pathways covered the subject-specific costs, funding of school activities, curricular activities, empowerment programs for the parents, and scholarships. In this regard, the developed plan addressed the problem at the primary and secondary levels. The primarily developed plan aimed at engaging economically disadvantaged students in instructional practices and learning through gaining access to financial assistance pathways for subject-specific costs (Kathryn, 2019). More so, the developed plan aimed at addressing the problem at the secondary level by offering empowerment programs to the parents to improve their socio-economic status to support the students financially while at school. Encouraging parents to seek job opportunities and actively participate in income-generating activities were the financial literacy programs conducted for parents to improve their socio-economic statuses. In this regard, the parents would be empowered to generate income adequate to support their student’s educational needs (NSW Government, 2018). More importantly, the developed plan was also targeted to address the long-term problem by gaining access to partners to fund the school’s extra-curricular activities like debates and drama so that economically disadvantaged students can access new opportunities. In such a manner, the developed plan significantly addressed the problem in various dimensions. Improving the performance of economically disadvantaged students through enhancing their engagement and involvement in instructional and learning practices is the immediate resolution to the problem. The plan aims at achieving the above problem resolution by partnering with various organizations to support their school programs which encourage the students’ engagement equally in the instructional and learning practices regardless of their financial background (Athuraliya, 2022). The plan aims to connect the school to various charity organizations and individuals who may offer scholarships to academically performing students suffering from socio-economic challenges to finance their school fees and other academic materials. For example, the plan aims to connect to various non-government organizations that can empower the parents of economically disadvantaged students through sensitization and support in various programs like farming and business. The above action of the developed plan aims to enhance the socio-economic status of parents of economically disadvantaged students so they can support their children while at school. When the plan is implemented, the formerly economically disadvantaged students will now be referred to as students from wealthy families. The focus is on ensuring parents have enough financial resources to support and sustain students’ educational needs (Kathryn, 2019).
Artifact 4: Timeline and steps
Pre-planning, planning, plan design, and post-planning were the four main steps of the developed plan to address the problem in question. The pre-planning stage was the first stage of the plan, involving two main steps: school diagnosis and planning process design. During school diagnosis, determining the readiness and capacity of the school towards the plan, identifying various stakeholders and participants, assessing existing plans, and constructing a capacity plan were the activities that were conducted. It took seven days to complete all the activities of the school diagnosis (Kathryn, 2019). Planning was the second stage of the development of the proposed plan to address the problem of low engagement of students in instructional and learning practices due to their socio-economic challenges (Shannon, 2022). Collection of data and analysis, identification of the problem, formulation of objectives and goals, selection of tools and policies, and adoption of the plan were the five steps performed during the planning stage of the plan development process, and they took 20 days to be completed. Plan design and development was the third stage of the plan design process, and it took 40 days (Kathryn, 2019). During this stage of the plan design process, every policy and action of the plan was definitely put in place based on the objectives and goals of the proposed plan to address the problem (Kuhn & Grungi, 2018). Post-planning was the fourth stage of the plan design process, taking 15 days. At this stage of the plan design process, the plan was implemented to function. Plan implementation, assessment, and monitoring were the main activities conducted at this post-planning stage of the plan design process. Monitoring helped to determine whether the plan had achieved the desired objectives and goals (Athuraliya, 2022).
Artifact 5: Communication with stakeholders
Like any other plan, there is always a need to establish an adequate information flow to ensure that all stakeholders are informed about what is happening. Adequate information flow minimizes resistance to change from the stakeholders, thus supporting the plan implementation. In this regard, the communication of the plan to various audiences was direct and goal-oriented to ensure that they understood precisely what the plan was about. Meetings, online platforms, writing emails and letters, and phone calls were some of the communications strategies utilized to communicate the plan to different audiences. All these stated choices were effective because they bridged the information gap about the plan among the different stakeholders (Kuhn & Grungi, 2018). Meetings were significant when communicating with the communities where students with socio-economic challenges come from because they built confidence with the audience, thus encouraging them to participate in the plan’s development. Online platforms particularly social media platforms such as Instagram, Twitter, Whatsapp, LinkedIn, and Facebook helped in the coordination of the plan activities with participants during the development process. These platforms provided a high degree of convenience when disseminating information about the plan because they were easily accessible anytime and anywhere. As such, valuable time was saved while using social media platforms for communicating the plan to the stakeholders, which supported the timely completion of the plan. Online emails and letters were significant in communicating the plan to various non-government organizations and funders like the ministry of education of Texas State because they are the formal communication strategies. Phone calls were significant in coordinating the various participants involved in the development of the plan. Phone calls were instant and allowed instant communication among involved stakeholders, further boosting coordination.
Artifact 6: Reflections on adjustments and/or results related to the implementation of the plan
Getting all students engaged in the learning instructional practices and improving the performance of students are some of the anticipated results when the problem of economically disadvantaged students is addressed at Michael R Null Middle school (Kathryn, 2019). Regarding students’ engagement in the instructional practices, the students shall be able to acquire various requirements needed to receive teaching and reading materials from teachers timely. In such a manner, the students shall be enabled to practice and have self-reading to meet learning standards. Such aspects will empower students to seek and utilize the knowledge acquired from educators, discussions, and personal research to improve their academic performance. The above claim is because the formerly disadvantaged students will have access to learning resources and adhere to educators’ instructions (Texas Education Agency, 2019). More so, when students get engaged in instructional practices, they will improve their learning capacities, leading to better academic performances. In the long run, when this particular problem is addressed, the school will be able to develop a better and more effective culture due to the performances that could be set in place. A culture comprising of committed and ambitious students may be established at Michael R Null Middle school, which further improve students” academic progress and performance. The above argument is because when students can improve their performance regardless of their economic background, it will motivate the teachers to deliver learning materials to students timely. In such a manner, teacher-students relationships may be enhanced to support knowledge transfer and acquisition, thus creating a better learning culture for the school. In the end, all students’ academic progress and success, regardless of their economic background, may be realized at Michael R Null Middle school (Marshall et al., 2022).
Artifact 7: Student work
The overall performance of students with socio-economic challenges after one academic year is the strategy to be used to assess the results of the plan and determine its impact on the instructional and learning practices. The above strategy was chosen because the economically disadvantaged students could have performed better in subjects like algebra, social studies, and writing, based on the report by Texas Academic Performance 2018-19. These subjects mostly require much focus and attention, whereby the students who pass with high grades should have a stable mental mind. This is why students who passed the above subjects were mostly from economically advantaged families. Students from economically disadvantaged families most experience emotional distress attributed to struggles relating to access to educational materials and meeting school requirements. In due course, they may struggle to concentrate and achieve higher grades in these complicated and technical subjects such as algebra and social studies. In such a manner, assessing the performance of these economically disadvantaged students one year after the implementation of the developed plan will be significant in determining the difference the plan would have created. The above approach will allow comparative performance assessments for economically disadvantaged students before and after implementing the plan. Algebra, social studies, and writing are the student works I could select to determine the results of the implemented plan. The student works will be selected because they were the ones in which the economically disadvantaged students had failed to raise the required pass marks or grades. As such, any changes in the student’s performance in these subjects, especially after the plan has been implemented, will be significant for conducting and understanding the assessment. In the end, the impact of the implemented plan on the students’ performances will be determined after a comparative assessment has been conducted.
References
Athuraliya, A. (2022). The Easy Guide to Developing an Effective Action Plan. Creately.com. Retrieved from: https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/how-to-write-an-action-plan/
Kathryn, C. (2019). The 5 R’s to Educating Economically Disadvantaged Students. Retrieved from: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/five-rs-educating-economically-disadvantaged-students-craig-m-ed-
Kuhn, R. & Grungi, R. (2018). Process-based Strategic Planning: Final assessment of strategies and strategy implementation measures. p.273-287. doi: 10.1007/978-3-662-09451-8_19
Marshall, D.T., Pressley, T., & Shannon, D.M. (2022). Why teachers are leaving and what we can do about it. 104(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/00317217221123642
NSW Government. (2018). Effective strategies for supporting students from low socio-economic backgrounds. School Excellence in Action. Available at: https://education.nsw.gov.au/
Shannon, O. (2022). Teaching Economically Disadvantaged Students. Study.com. Retrieved from: https://study.com/academy/lesson/teaching-economically-disadvantaged-students.html
Texas Education Agency. (2019). Texas Academic Performance Report 2018-19.
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