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Major Project Proposal

 
Abstract

     This proposal addresses the need for enhanced communication between parents and schools.  Research shows that children learn more when their families and schools work together closely.  The support offered by parents is essential to success in school.  In earlier days, this connection between shool and home was much more natural.  But today, when most parents work away from home and family schedules are hectic, that involvement is becoming scarce.
     The purpose of this proposal is to provide a tool to enhance the communication between home and school.  A website will be established where children and parents can find course information, lesson notes, descriptions of daily assignments, enrichment activities, and current grades, as well as e-mail links to the child's teacher.
      In addition, the proposal includes cooperation between Rock Falls Township High School and the Rock Falls Public Library to provide access to the Internet for families that do not have a home computer.
     There is also a need for collaboration between Rock Falls High School and its five feeder schools.  Rock Falls currently has a consortium which works to coordinate the curriculum in the schools.  The website would be used to enhance this effort. 
     Once developed, this program could easily be used in other depertments at the high school and also at other schools.  Only the classroom specific information would need to be changed.
 

Justification

     The purpose of the Community Technology Centers program is to promote the use of technology in education through the development of model programs that demonstrate the effectiveness of technology in low-income or economically-distressed urban and rural communities.  This program provides support for access to computers and technology and technology-based educational learning activities for adults and children in low-income communities who would otherwise lack that access to computers and informational technology.
     Applicants under this program are encouraged to provide educational services and programming activities around access to and use of computers and information technology for local community residents.  This project proposal focuses on services and activities in the following areas:
 

• Adult Education and Family Literacy - introduction to computers and lifelong learning opportunities through technology and the Internet.
• After-school Activities for high school students to provide homework help and academic enrichment and exploration of the Internet.


In addition, the project will enhance communication between home and school.
     This project proposes to provide these services in the following ways:
 

• Deveopment of the website
• Expanding the community technology center currently at the public library
• Opening the computer center at the high school two nights per week to offer training and assistance to parents and other community members


      Due to the recent closing of the largest employer in the area, Rock Falls is an economically distressed community.  Last month Northwestern Steel and Wire closed its doors, displacing 1400 workers, directly affecting five to ten percent of the families in the Rock Falls area.  The community college has offered tuition waivers to those workers who choose to prepare for a new career.  But many of the courses involve computers.  Although the number of households with Internet access is steadily increasing, many homes in the Rock Falls area do not yet have that access. 
     I have had an interest in developing a program that would provide homework help and/or academic enrichment for students, as well as continued collaboration with the elementary and middle schools that feed into Rock Falls High School.  The Community Technology Centers Program Grant seems to have been specially designed for this area. 
 

Implementation Plan

     The target audience for this pilot project will be students of Rock Falls Township High School  and their parents.  The computer lab at the high school has twenty stations, therefore, attendance will be limited to twenty participants. 
     During the first visit, all participants will receive instruction in basic computer operation, including how to turn on the computer, use the mouse, open and save files, perform an Internet search, and shut down the computer properly.  An interest/needs survey will also be completed, indicating which areas are of most concern.
     In visits that follow, the supervisor/mentor will guide the participants to appropriate Internet resources and will be available for assistance.  The purpose of the high school computer lab is to increase the computer literacy and comfort level of the participants in their use of computers, allowing them to utilize the website that will be developed as the other part of this project.  Many of the participants will already have a home computer.  For those who do not have access at home, the computer lab will remain open two nights each week throughout the school year. 
     When the computer lab at the high school is not available to the community, the Rock Falls Public Library will be used.  Due to the anticipated increase in usage, the library staff has requested two additional computers.
     The second part of the pilot project involves the development of a website that provides on-line homework help, enrichment activities, and home-to-school communication.  The coordinator will be a current CTER student and a member of the math department.  During the first year of the pilot project, the website will only include the math department.  All classes from the department will be represented and all teachers from the deprtment will maintain e-mail accounts through the website.  Each will keep up-to-date class information on the website, requiring approximately one hour each week.
     Both formative and summative evaluations will be used in this project.  The formative evaluation will aide the coordinator as to the needs of the participants, which will then be used to make any necessary additions to the site.  A summative evaluation will be conducted at the end of the 2001-2002 school year to determine if the project should be expanded to include more subject areas at the high school.
 

Timeline

This pilot project will run through the 2001-2002 school year.

Sept - Oct         Introduce participants to the program and the website
Nov - Mar         Website will be maintained and updated as necessary 
Apr - May         Evaluation of website and technology center
 

Budget

Supervisor/mentor for Technology Center                          $ 5400
     $25/hr x 3 hrs/night x 2 nights/wk x 36 weeks
Training and set-up time for website coordinator/trainer         1000
     $25/hr x 40 hrs
6 Math department members for weekly updates of website    5400
     $25/hr x 1 hr/wk x 36 wks x 6
2 Pentium III computers for library                                       2500 
     $1250 x 2
Software                                                                              600 
Miscellaneous supplies                                                           100

Total Expenditures                                                          $15,000 
 

Resources

     George Lucas Educational Foundation (Learn and Live)
     The Secretary's Council on Educational Technology 2000
     Using Technology to Support Education Reform
     Illinois State Board of Education
     Classroom Connect: Professional Learning
     Community Technology Centers Program Grant
 

Conclusion

The goals for this project are:
 

• Enhance communication between parents and school using technology
• Increase technology literacy and access in the community.
• Collaboration with feeder schools, and the local public library.

 
These goals will be met by the development and use of a Math Department Website along with opening the high school computer lab to the community during extended hours and expanding the technology center at the public library.