My Action Research Topic

After tonight's web conference I wanted to blog about the topic my principal and I discussed this week. We have struggled to understand why our student’s attendance has begun to suffer. This school year started out with satisfactory attendance percentages, but lately they have plummeted.  As I met with my campus mentor we discussed campus issues and possible action research topics. Needless to say the conversation evolved into an action research project that will involve staff and students. My principal, who is my mentor, has allowed me to begin creating a form that will track student tardies, absences, and leaving campus early. The registrar’s office will mark students accordingly on a daily log and provide the information to the principal and myself. I am also creating a questionnaire that will inquire about the reasons behind the lack of attendance.  This questionnaire along with the log will allow staff to reflect on recurring themes that students use as justification for missing school. My job is to formulate rebuttals that can be used to redirect students and help encourage better attendance. For example a student that chronically misses due to appointments could be asked to schedule new appointments after school hours.  The information collected will be used to further develop a plan that can be used to benefit all the members of our campus. Our ultimate goal beyond improving attendance is to implement a form students will need to complete in order to leave early, arrive tardy, or miss school. When the form is turned in, an administrator can use our formulated methodology to redirect students and increase their seat time. This is a work in progress and reflection on results may take me in a whole new direction, but this is a start.