Draft Action Research Project Progress Report

Does GCS Decrease the Number of Students Who Fail on Their Report Cards?

            Several years ago a program titled Grand Central Station or GCS was implemented at my campus. A teacher and an aide worked with select “at risk” students to ensure these students completed their assignments and passed for the year. Last year the program was changed to allow teachers the opportunity to send any student to GCS to make up homework assignments. This was done with the goal of reducing the numbers of students who fail on their report cards by reducing the number zeroes on homework assignments.

            Students with missing homework assignments were called to the GCS room during their elective class times. This was done with the idea that students wouldn’t want to miss their electives so they would do their homework. There were some issues with this plan. One being that students were missing instruction time during their elective classes and getting behind with their elective assignments. Students with special needs and students who are weak in academics often times shine in their electives. There were questions about pulling these students from an area where they were successful to complete work for other classes.Some elective teachers also resented the fact that students were pulled from their classes to do work for other classes. They felt as if they were being told that their class was not important. The GCS teacher also voiced a concern that some students liked coming there to get out of certain classes.

            I decided that a good action research project for myself would be to investigate whether GCS actually decreased the number of students who failed at report card time. Did going to GCS bring up students grades? Did students take advantage of the program to get out of classes? Were students falling behind in their electives? Was there a better time to have GCS than during elective time? Were other schools with a ZAP type program effective and how did they work? These were the questions I set out to answer.

            My data collection consisted of compiling a list of all the students who visited GCS during 3 different six week periods. I listed the student’s name and how many times they went to GCS to finish homework. I then used the failure list to determine if they had passed for the six week’s grading period. I am in the process of analyzing the data I have compiled as well as making comparisons between our program and other similar programs I have found online. I also surveyed the teachers to see if they felt GCS was effective, how often they used it, how they graded the work that came from GCS and what suggestions they had to improve GCS. 

            When I complete compiling and analyzing all my data, I hope to present information that will make our program more effective. Right now it looks as if although many students do pass after going to GCS, there are still a number who go several times a week and fail anyway. I am hoping to present some options to make our program more effective and keep students in their elective classes more of the time.