second design challenege eval.

My team Chlamaica Frazim struggled with stating our ten key finding when time was set aside in class.  It was mostly our eagerness to solve the challenge at hand and quick jump to constructing a new detention policy that limited our key findings and narrowed our thought process.  Despite that we successfully came up with both good key findings and a unique solution.

My teams weak area seemed to be research, but I would say same for all.  When I heard the amount of time Mr. Sutphin put into this project my outside research sounded like child-play.  I think this is due to other classes and soccer, but looking back I do know I could have put in more outside effort.  We did commit to asking how effective thirty random people found detention.  Our strongest part of this challenge was our solution because I personally think we came up with an effective yet compromised form of todays detention policy.

Chlamaica Frazim did not come up with a never before heard type of policy, but it did seem to be a possible successful policy.  It allows for a more relaxed policy towards non chronic offenders with an escalating policy for those chronically offended to successful deter.I would compare the possible successfulness to both tori cazo's policy and Mr Sutphin's.  Like Mr. Sutphins it might be excessive, but they are likely to be successful.

Detention Self-Evaluation

1. I believe that overall our team worked pretty well together. I think our biggest challenge was our lack of communication. I feel that we could have been a bit more organized throughout the project. The first weekend of the project we did not really research or collect much data, which put us at a disadvantage from the start. I think if we started out more organized then we could have had a better presentation.

2. I think the weakest part of our design process was analyzing our evidence and bending it to support our argument. Although we were able to find diverse and varying data, we struggled to compile a list of our key findings. I think the strongest part of our design process was our collection of data. We were able to ask people who had many detentions, people who hadn't, teachers and faculty, etc...

3. I think our solution was pretty good compared to others. We were the only group to take an approach of adding to the current detention policy rather than remove from it. Several groups wished to lighten the punishments or remove the rules entirely; whereas, we wanted to make the rules as strict as possible so that students would not want to get detention. I believe that all the groups were fairly similar in terms of completeness of proposal and clear connection to problem, but I feel that our group differed in thoroughness and creativity. I think that our group was weaker in these categories because we did not have answers to some of the things Imperial proposed and we didn't take a very different approach and simply added things to the current policy rather than change things completely.

Detention Policy

Questions:

1. Why do you get detention?
2. Is detention effective in deterring you from breaking rules?
3. What do you think of while sitting in detention?

New Questions:

1. What is a solution for a new detention policy?
2. What are the characteristics of an effective detention?

Current Behavioral Punishment at Saint Mary's

• Detention (30 minutes up to 6 hours)

Is it effective?

Based on the student survey, detention is seen more as a chore than a punishment.  Most [female] students that are not deterred by the detention policy have become more sneaky in two ways:
1) avoid Shum at all costs (avoid St. Joe's Hall)
2) wear a scarf when outside of class
The students who saw detention as a deterrent for breaking school rules had some things in common:
1) most had never actually had a detention
2) most were afraid of Shum
both of these tie into fear of the unknown.
Solutions/Ways to Improve:
1) have all teachers enforce dress code inside of classrooms
2) increase the severity of the punishment for repeat offenders (ex. 5 detentions in a month leads to a 1 hour before school morning detention)

10 Most Important Pieces of Information

1. Most students who found it effective had not had detention before
2. Most who do not find it effective have had a detention
3. Students have learned ways to avoid detention
4. Most students didn't have detention until they came to high school
5. Teachers found it effective but in need of improvement
6. Reasons for detention varied between gender and grade
7. Girls found dress code sexist
8. People who haven't had detention are the ones who fear it the most
9. Students believe that detention only addresses the immediate problem, not the deeper issue
10. More girls received detention than boys

KNOW

Fix the detention policy at Saint Mary's

1.1

• 20 minute, 30 minute, 1 hour, 2 hour, 4 hours, 6 hours
• Being late to class after lunch
• Late to 1st period 
• Out of dress code (30 minutes)
• People don't show up to detention
• Some supervisors let out early
• 2 hour not able to do homework
• Campus cleaning as an alternative
• Help out teachers as an alternatives
• 2 hours are built like a game
• Put students against each other (rewarded for the punishment of others)
• Teacher can give detentions
• Abuse of powers by teachers
• Chewing gum
• Previous years mobile phone use
• 2 hour detention for parking w/out permit
• Not having ID for dances

AT OTHER SCHOOLS
Oakland Tech

• 3 Unexcused absences
• 3 excused tardies
• Trauncy (skipping class)
• given by teachers
• time varies: 30 minute+ (up to Saturday school)
• cannot graduate if you have an unserved detention
• not allowed to talk (people do)
• allowed to do homework
• library or the basement
• get out early for good behavior

Head Royce

• 3 tardies earn a detention
• skipping morning meeting (given by teacher)
• too many detentions can lead to suspension
• can do anything but make noise
• 40 minutes served at lunch
• detention is taken as a joke
• violating traffic laws (jay walking)
• parent's bad driving

Carondelet

• given 5 school days to complete detention
• mainly given for being out of uniform
• work on homework quietly for 45 minutes
• can be worked off with a teacher
• assigned for unexcused absences and tardies

Bentley

Why is detention at A-Block?

Doesn't A-Block lose it's purpose if you can't get help during it?

If there's is going to be a detention then there a consistent policy for detention?

What is the purpose of detention?

Why is there a discriminatory policy for dress code?

Why can't we do homework during detention?

Design Team Vows

1. A desire to succeed: We vow to come into all design projects with a positive mind, and attitude, so that we can continue to strive for excellence. 
2. Have fun: We vow to avoid frustration in every project we go into, and try to get a positive experiences from everything, no matter now badly we fail.
3. Collaboration: We vow to work together and focus our efforts to one idea, rather than work individually and divide the labor.
4. Planning: We vow to be prepared and plan for all future design challenges, and to not be caught flatfooted. 

julian's 1st self evaluation

Material wise I didn't contribute much at all I broke a couple pieces testing how sturdy the spaghetti was, but all together I didnt contribte much to my teams succes.

My team worked together in brainstorming and desiding the structure of our tower. We were all taking turns in being leaders.

I think the most important thing to take from this is to have fun because personally I didnt have fun after failure and gave up.  I should have also not allowed my failure to be the end.  my group also lacked courage

My curiosity was lacking since the get go but dropped down to a full time give up when I failed at even making a triangle out of the materials.  This tells me that I didn't learn failure is the key to later success, but also that I don't have a will to complete a challenge.

The most beneficial thing for me to help my team in the later challenges and better myself would be to not give up and continue on after failure

I bring a general pessimistic mindset to anything, but I love learning new things and once slightly picked I quickly excel.  The purpose of education is to make myself better, but that doesn't mean I take all my courses seriously and try to better my skills.  which affects my effort here and there if i dont have a will.

Marshmallow Challenge Evaluation

On the Wednesday that we practiced making the model for the second time, I got a lot better at taping the spaghetti pieces together.  I found a system of placing the spaghetti on the sticky part that was facing up, and then fold the tape over the pieces.  I am sure that I was not the first person to think to apply tape this way, but I did share my this idea with my teammates.

  

I think that I was acted as a motivator.  I was trying to keep the mood light. I like to think that working in a negative environment makes. It is more difficult to accomplish anything in a negative environment, so being a positive motivator is something that I tried to do. I would not say that I offered any leadership.  I prefer to work, not independently, but to my own instruction. I work better when I can focus on what I am doing, as oppose to leading others.

I asked my dad what his thoughts on the project were, and how he would approach it if he had the same guidelines as our team did.  We had a brief conversation about how he would have done the model, but it seemed far too complicated considering the fact that we were having trouble assembling the most structures, due to our lack of patience as well as a soft touch, so I decided not to share my dads idea with the group.

I definitely learned that proper planning is vital to have a successful project.  Our group worked mostly on the fly, and in some instances that would be acceptable, but for this project it was not.  We also had a procrastination problem.  We did most of our online research in the 5 minutes that we were allotted before the final construction of the marshmallow project.  I am sure that most teenagers know that procrastination is not a technique that is preferred, yet we still continue to do so.  Having patience is also very important vital to the success of the project.  We were getting impatient with the how long it took to administer the tape.  This caused us to rush, and in turn we were breaking some spaghetti noodles.  Even though there was a time restraint, patience could of helped us tremendously in making more progress towards our goal.  Hopefully in the next project we can procrastinate less, and be a little more patient.

When I noticed that we were running out of time, and were no where near completion is when my interest and curiosity began to wane.  At the 3 minutes remaining mark, I knew that there was no way that, realistically our group would be able to win, but I wanted to see how much more progress we could make in those last 3 minutes.  My interest in winning shifted towards eagerness to see how much we could accomplish, in the time period we had left, as oppose to trying to win a competition with our classmates.  I try to be as realistic with myself as possible, so that I do not set myself up for disappointment.  I purposely set my standards on life lower, so that when I do not succeed, or a goal is not met, I spare myself from disappointment. 

For the next design challenge, giving yourself more context will be an advantage for our team.  We did not do a lot of prior preparations, but if we had, I think that we could be more successful.  Asking others, like our parents, about their ideas could be a simple step in succeeding.

Entering the design challenge my mindset was extremely lackadaisical.  I did not initially understand the seriousness of the challenge, nor its importance.  I carried this mindset for all of the first week of school.  I did not understand that there were valid lessons.  Most of the time, I try to bring a positive attitude to school, as well as remind myself of my goals for the future and that school is a necessity to reach those goals.  Education is the pathway that allow me to provide for my family.  Without education I will not be able to have a successful career, and in turn not be able to give back to my family.  I try to do the best work I can in the classroom, and with my classmates, so that I will be able to receive a quality education, that will assist me later in life.