Educational Improvement Proposal

This is a fun group project that is great at the beginning or end of a school year! It covers so many writing, research, and speaking & listening standards, without the students having to write a traditional essay! It can be completed individually or in groups and creates the best results when a week or more is spent on this, assigning small deadlines to promote deeper research and give the teacher time to conference with the groups to help them delve deeper.

The premise of this project is that the students were assigned to an "Educational Improvement" team in your school. Together, they need to address an issue in the district, conduct research on what has been done or what should be done, propose a solution, and present this proposal to the board of education. The board will be the rest of the class and the classroom should be staged to simulate a board room on the day of presentations.

This project provides opportunities to go over the research process, use more primary sources with your own district, teach speech and argument skills, and allow for a healthy and constructive peer evaluation!

The material provides a project description, requirement list, and rubric.

Assessment: Students will complete a formal, written proposal that they present during the mock board meeting. The rubric evaluates them on both the presentation and the written proposal.

**Tip: Have fun with this! Make the students dress up as if they were presenting to the board! Invite your supervisor or an administrator to observe! If there is time, allow the students to really plan and perhaps high-scoring groups can actually pitch their proposal to the real board of education!