Cutting Edge Research

At last night's meeting, the Board approved two potentially exciting research proposals.

The first involves a collaboration between an assistant professor of Education at Penn State and the creative writing class in State College's (High School) Delta program. What makes the proposal interesting is that it will study a key component of "21st-century" skills: the ability to communicate in different styles to different audiences, depending on the purpose. As Dr. Whitney noted, there is a big difference between the writing skills required for a Biology class assignment, and what is involved in persuasive writing.

Traditionally, that difference has not been given enough attention, nor is it assessed by typical standardized tests.

"A key component of (writing) competence is the ability to write in different genres, discerning the particular demands of a rhetorical situation ... to produce texts appropriate to that situation and its audience.  However, pedagogy and assessment efforts at the secondary level currently focus almost exclusively on writing .. in the single genre of the expository essay."

The result is that students get little experience deciding which genre to use, a fact that has been substantiated in several casual conversations I've had with university writing instructors.
...

The second proposal will study the impact of a "service-learning" project which will be designed and implemented by the students of Park Forest Elementary School. This study is notable in several respects, beginning with the idea that you can begin to develop citizenship skills in elementary age students. Particularly exciting is the idea that every student has the potential for leadership, and that those skills can be developed and nurtured.

(Traditionally, a few students will demonstrate leadership capacity -  and those students are the ones who are encouraged to take on official leadership roles. It becomes self-fulfilling.)

Several questions the study hopes to answer:

• As a result of the project, do the students feel more empowered to make their surroundings a better place?
• Does the project impact the students' sense of belonging to their school community?
• Do the students learn new skills, (for example: the ability to explain your ideas in public) and gain a greater sense of confidence?

Their school climate assessment tool is very sophisticated; I'm looking forward to the results.