The Effects of Counseling on The Potential
Drop-outThe Effects of Counseling on The Potential
Drop-outSubject: Counseling
Grade Level: 10th Grade
Abstract: Fifteen 10th grade students will be classified based on the following criteria:Failed 3 or more subjects , has an attendance rate less than 75 percent, low self-esteem, no parents or siblings ever graduated from high school , low socioeconomic status, and lacks self motivation. Once these students are classified as potential drop-outs, they will engage in a counseling strategy to affect this status. A survey will be designed and utilized to place these students in a potential drop-out classification. The counseling strategy will include an in class session that will focus primarily on character building traits. Students will make web pages and work on activities for topics . The parents' role is to serve as support and caregivers. The students will communicate with three different schools for students who have left school before graduation but have returned. This communication will be done through e-mail and other online programs.
Learner Description: Students are 10th grade and from the Junior Academy. Fifteen students will be taken from a sample of 100. They will be classified according to the stated criteria and engage in a counseling strategy to affect their potential drop-out status.
Context/Setting: The School setting for Carver High School is in a large Urban School District, the Chicago Public Schools. Carver is surrounded by a Housing Project , the Altgeld Gardens.( A complex for low income families) From 80-90% of Carver's students receive free lunches due to their families incomes being below the poverty level. Carver students are African American teenagers.
Time Frame: This project will last one or two semesters and may be ongoing until graduation. Two 70 minutes guidance and advisory periods for the students will be used to engage students in a counseling strategy , online computer resources and communication with students from the three racially/ethnically different schools to determine what progress the students are making at all four schools.
Rationale: The graduation rate at Carver is 56.3 percent. Failure rate among these classified students is high. The goal is to insure that the that students remain in school until graduation. The goals are to insure that all students will learn, the high school graduation rate is at least 90%, every student will remain in school long enough to acquire skills and knowledge to compete in a global economy , to exercise the rights and responsibility of citizenship, to ensure that students remain in school long enough to find other alternatives to prepare themselves for the next century, and by acquiring social, intellectual, academic and technological skills.
Learner Outcomes: The students will
Alignment with Standards: There are no counseling standards for this project but it will address some of the goals and objectives for integration with Math, Social Studies, English and Science.
Structure of Learning:
Content: The purpose is to ensure that students remain in school to develop their fullest potentials by classifying them as potential drop-outs and using counseling strategies to affect the graduation rate using resources and information gathered from a variety of sources.
Process: The task is to engage students in learning from web sites resources, students from 3 racially different schools and counseling strategies. Information will be gathered from students who have left school before graduation .This information will be compiled, analyzed and utilized by teachers, students and parents at Carver High School to be used in a counseling strategy designed to affect the potential drop-out status at Carver.
Product: The end goal is that students will have at least a 95 percent graduation rate, no failing grades and have chosen a successful career path. The students will produce and design a rubric, create a web page based on their research on various character traits topics, and design a survey that will be used as a tool to identify students at-risk for dropping out before graduation.
Student Assessment: A Rubric was designed by parents , students and teachers to evaluate the effectiveness of the counseling strategies and the extent of student participation.
Project Evaluation: A survey will be submitted along with the Rubric for each new group of students entering the potential drop-out category. The survey and Rubric will be modified accordingly and are ongoing. However the basic structures will remain the same.