ase Study Fatima Roman Catholic School is a Secondary school in the community of Palo, Seco, Trinidad. There are currently 800 students, ages 11-17 years old, who come from the school’s surrounding areas and other low-income neighborhoods. Many of the students live in households adversely affected by unemployment, violence, and family disintegration. In 2015, a group of teachers, social workers, guidance counselors, and administrators identified several indicators of school failure: inadequate level of learning, boredom, high dropout rates, students’ lack of interest and commitment to continuing their education, irrelevant curriculum content, and a devalued role for teachers. They found this situation was causing frustration and a sense of powerlessness in both faculty and students. External conditions imposed on the educational system and the system itself made it impossible for the teachers to produce significant changes, and they also knew that small changes were worthless. The group attempted a number of projects, including a school radio station, sex education workshops, support groups to overcome learning difficulties in the first year, camping trips, and tolerance and diversity workshops to reinvigorate the curriculum and engage students’ interest. They found that these experiences offered both students and teachers valuable lessons. However, the inflexible structure of the Secondary school system often overpowered them, and they found it difficult to sustain these initiatives. They soon realized that they had to take advantage of the system’s own weaknesses and loopholes to change the situation and incorporate experiential learning into the curriculum. They based this decision on the belief that as teachers, they know students can fail, but they are also aware that the school itself can contribute to that failure. That is why they aimed at changing some of those unsuccessful institutional practices to include service-learning projects in the regular curriculum. The goals of the projects were to: promote students’ active role in the school and community through participation develop experiences that have a significant impact on the participants’ personal growth and self-esteem encourage caring attitudes among students develop service experiences within or outside the institution, as part of the learning process link school lessons to real-life experiences teach students to plan and implement a project To meet these objectives, they set up a Solidarity Internships System. Solidarity Internships are actions, activities, and learning experiences that older students carry out with younger students in the school or with groups from other institutions, coordinated by teachers. They realized students can learn as much outside the school as inside it. Therefore, the internships were implemented to utilize the potential of the community as a larger classroom. Read the case provided with a critical eye. Describe the needs identified in the case. What methods/strategies were used to identify the needs reported, and what were the strategies that were used to address the needs?
Case Study
Fatima Roman Catholic School is a Secondary school in the community of Palo, Seco, Trinidad. There are currently 800 students, ages 11-17 years old, who come from the school’s surrounding areas and other low-income neighborhoods. Many of the students live in households adversely affected by
In 2015, a group of teachers, social workers, guidance counselors, and administrators identified several indicators of school failure: inadequate level of learning, boredom, high dropout rates, students’ lack of interest and commitment to continuing their education, irrelevant curriculum content, and a devalued role for teachers. They found this situation was causing frustration and a sense of powerlessness in both faculty and students. External conditions imposed on the educational system and the system itself made it impossible for the teachers to produce significant changes, and they also knew that small changes were worthless.
The group attempted a number of projects, including a school radio station, sex education workshops, support groups to overcome learning difficulties in the first year, camping trips, and tolerance and diversity workshops to reinvigorate the curriculum and engage students’ interest. They found that these experiences offered both students and teachers valuable lessons. However, the inflexible structure of the Secondary school system often overpowered them, and they found it difficult to sustain these initiatives. They soon realized that they had to take advantage of the system’s own weaknesses and loopholes to change the situation and incorporate experiential learning into the curriculum. They based this decision on the belief that as teachers, they know students can fail, but they are also aware that the school itself can contribute to that failure. That is why they aimed at changing some of those unsuccessful institutional practices to include service-learning projects in the regular curriculum.
The goals of the projects were to:
- promote students’ active role in the school and community through participation
- develop experiences that have a significant impact on the participants’ personal growth and self-esteem
- encourage caring attitudes among students
- develop service experiences within or outside the institution, as part of the learning process
- link school lessons to real-life experiences
- teach students to plan and implement a project
To meet these objectives, they set up a Solidarity Internships System. Solidarity Internships are actions, activities, and learning experiences that older students carry out with younger students in the school or with groups from other institutions, coordinated by teachers. They realized students can learn as much outside the school as inside it. Therefore, the internships were implemented to utilize the potential of the community as a larger classroom. Read the case provided with a critical eye.
- Describe the needs identified in the case.
- What methods/strategies were used to identify the needs reported, and what were the strategies that were used to address the needs?
Step by step
Solved in 2 steps
