The Academy is housed at Cocoa High School, a public urban school located in Cocoa, Florida, and integrates academic education and aerospace technology. Approximately 1,250 students are enrolled in the school with the following ethnic representation: 63% Caucasian, 34% African-American, 2% Hispanic, and 1% Asian-American. The academy enrolls 150 students per year and is open to any student in the county. A total of 11 mathematics teachers teach full-time in the school, with one full-time teacher and one part-time teacher assigned to the academy.
Early in the 1990s, instruction across the board at Cocoa High School was based on lecturing and reliant on paper and pencil drills and rote memorization of information. Cocoa High was typical of other schools in Florida, which were tracking heavily and featuring low-level and basic skills classes. Minority students were overrepresented in these classes, even though school demographics indicated only about 10% minority enrollment. The result was low academic performance and lack of motivation to learn. According to the academy coordinator, students kept asking, "Why do I need to learn this? What sense does it make to me?" At that time, she began a research project to see how the curriculum could become more relevant to students. Based on this work, the school began broad integration efforts, including language arts and all vocational-technical courses. The results were so promising that the school decided to consider integrating all of the core academic areas and vocational education.
In 1992, an RFP came from the State proposing a change to a career academy system focusing on technology. Through the leadership of the current school's academy coordinator, Cocoa High School submitted an application based on the concept of Virtual Learning Activities (VLA), using aerospace technology as a hub. The virtual learning concept is based on problem solving. Students are given a real-world problem and they must solve it by researching and integrating multidisciplinary concepts and technical skills. Virtual learning is expected to occur as students solve problems resembling situations they may encounter in aerospace technology. In 1993, funds were awarded to Cocoa High School to create Cocoa High Academy for Aerospace Technology (CHAAT). The strong points of the academy's proposal included the VLA concept, focus on student preparation for school-to-career transitions, emphasis on SCANS competencies and applied technology, and cooperative learning and authentic instructional practices (e.g., emphasis on critical thinking, reasoning, and communication skills). With this framework, integration efforts began immediately. Under these circumstances, mathematics was to be fully integrated with science, technology, applied communications, and business. Teachers at this site participated initially as volunteers. The group included five teachers who were already implementing integration activities. After receiving the initial grant, a steering committee was formed including district-level administrators, business people, post-secondary instructors, and staff from the academy. Subcommittees included working teams (e.g., curriculum committee), who worked with staff to develop curriculum focusing on integrated VLAs and SCANS competencies. An instructor provided an account of this process:
Faculty got together with the academy coordinator. We had math, science, English, business, and technology instructors. The five of us sat down with the academy coordinator to start brainstorming for ideas on [virtual learning activities]. We also looked at SCANS competencies and decided what to do in the first nine weeks of school and what we wanted to accomplish. We picked appropriate SCANS competencies relevant to communications, transportation, manufacturing, whatever topic [involved in aerospace technology].
Once VLAs were identified, situational and solution statements along with criteria for evaluating student performance and outcomes were developed as well as program logistics. During the first two years, the academy received funding to support curriculum development and faculty worked full-time during the summer to develop curriculum.
The academy's first years were not easy. Stereotyped perceptions of vocational-technical programs are prevalent in the Cocoa area, and the academy's appeal was not high among students at the beginning. Since admission requirements are not based on grades and enrollment is open for any student in the county, the academy was seen as an alternative program for low achievers and problematic students. However, the academy has a goal of serving all students interested in aerospace technology and was open to all students regardless of grades. An instructor explained this philosophy:
To say that we're going to take the top-end students and make the best of them is not fair. That's not the real world. We want everyone who wants an opportunity to come in here and make a change in their life. We want to do something for those students. And that's the way the grant is written and we've stuck to that.
To date, the program's philosophy, underlying working principles, and the climate among faculty and students all appear to be paying off. Students and instructors seem to have formed a unified front and have refined a team concept supported by various integration strategies.
The academy uses numerous strategies to integrate academic/vocational education. To reinforce a holistic approach, the school offers professional development activities tailored to specific needs around cooperative learning and a creative scheduling format. Further, consensus building and open discussions of issues and day-to-day problems remain an important foundation for collaborative, integrated work.
Integration Formats
The academy coordinator described CHAAT's integration efforts as seamless. "There are no discrete disciplines," she remarked. The entire curriculum was restructured based on an academy model spanning the 10th to 12th grade, where academic and vocational courses are aligned in a thematic structure featuring aerospace technology. The technology context involves relevant, transferable skills, including engineering, computer applications, technical maintenance, graphic design, computer aided manufacturing, and telecommunications. Traditional mathematics tracks were replaced by an Applied Math series, based on a series of sequenced and coherent courses for appropriate grade levels. VLAs, the focus of the integration approach, provide the vehicle for linking academic and vocational content. The unit "Working in Space" exemplifies these VLAs. The unit is introduced with the following situation statement:
NASA has asked Congress for funding to design, build, and launch a large space station into earth's orbit, and you have been selected to serve as members of the Space Station Task Force. You have committed the next ten years to the preparation of the space station, and you will be among the station's first inhabitants. Launch is tentatively scheduled for the year 2000.
A solution statement encourages students, as members of the task force, to solve problems associated with designing and building a space station. Students must submit various reports describing solutions and are expected to research, critically evaluate available information, draw and build architectural models, and justify their space station proposals. Each contributing teacher is provided with a teacher page outlining specific outcomes for each subject, teacher methodology and related activities, suggested resources and references, and evaluation strategies. In this unit, mathematics integration involves using scale drawings and maps in two- or three-dimensional shapes; using mathematical formulas to solve problems; and using flowcharts, area/volume concepts, and spreadsheets to manage and analyze data (see example of the teacher's page for Applied Mathematics II below).
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Course: Applied Mathematics II Date: Title: Working in space Outcomes Perform operations with powers and roots and solve relevant problems
Teacher Methodology and Activities
References and Resources
Evaluation Students will receive full credit for this activity by:
(From CHAAT, 1996) |
Each instructor is also provided with a criteria checklist for assessment and evaluation purposes. Other formal and informal integration strategies support academy work ranging from individual efforts to work in teams to integrate specific aspects of VLAs drawn from various fields related to aerospace technology. Internships represent another form of integration, strengthening the connections between school and real-world applications. Students learn relevant on-the-job mathematical applications involved in VLAs. Students who have internships are also responsible for developing VLAs with the help of their mentors. Integrating work-based learning activities into the academy becomes another source of potential VLAs happening in the real world identified from the students' standpoint.
Professional Development
Preparation in cooperative learning, authentic assessment, and applied curriculum are prerequisites for new staff members. The district also provides professional development opportunities addressing these topics for staff who need further training. This includes various local and state staff development workshops with focus on cooperative learning, authentic assessment, and applied curriculum. These professional development activities assure broad-based and uniform familiarity with these topics. In addition to the workshops provided off-site, training in virtual learning is provided at the school for all teachers. A math instructor reported that faculty may spend a summer attending a 60-hour inservice workshop on cooperative learning and applied technology involving mathematics and examining its relevancy to various fields in aerospace technology.
Scheduling
The academy model and the implementation of VLAs require a flexible and creative scheduling system, allow instructors various forms of collaboration, and provide students with time to work in groups and participate in internships. Work is organized in academic rotations or individual learning activities. First, students get together in teams and learn about the objectives for specific components of the day's VLA. Five predetermined groups work simultaneously, each focusing on a different academic/technical aspect of the VLA (e.g., English, technology, and mathematics). They brainstorm ways to address the problems assigned to them and divide the work. They can work as a group or individually until regrouping to debrief and assess progress. Then each team rotates to another component of the VLA to focus on a different academic or technical aspect. At the end of the fifth period, the students participate in a debriefing session to assess overall progress and to plan for the next day. The rest of the day is spent on elective course work available at Cocoa High School, or students may leave campus to work on their internships or participate in on-the-job training programs. To keep all instructors abreast of common progress, the sixth and seventh periods are devoted to planning meetings. All staff are debriefed about what's going on in mathematics, students' progress, problems they are facing, and whether more time is needed to complete certain tasks.
Institutional Climate and Support
Camaraderie and a sense of family and teamwork seem to be important in maintaining integration efforts at CHAAT, especially if difficulties arise. The thematic context helps establish a climate conducive for collaboration among students and instructors. As one instructor put it: "When you think about it, not only are we an aerospace team, we're also a family. We spend five hours a day with these kids and seven hours with each other as teachers, so we are one big family and we really work that way. We have our problems, but we work through them together." Because of the VLAs' integrated nature, accountability and interdependence among teachers are vital components of the cooperative efforts between different areas and for conducting learning activities. "There might be some occasions that you see somebody putting up boundaries," explained another teacher, "but they fall because we talk about it and it is resolved." During typical meetings, all faculty meet with the academy coordinator and support staff to discuss ongoing work and issues and about how the day went. They identify collaboration on common tasks related to the rotations and talk about disciplinary issues. Decisions are made by consensus, and the academy coordinator's vote has the same weight as everybody else's. This participatory climate is further enhanced by cultural values inherent in teamwork and by student-centered instruction. Thus, instructors refer to each other as facilitators because they do not rely on lecturing. Their goal is to "promote a lot of interactions with the students." This climate among faculty spreads to students, who in turn are encouraged to work in teams with peers of different academic abilities.
The academy coordinator reported that the NCTM Standards have been addressed as long as math has been integrated at this site. She noted that county performance standards are also very closely linked to the NCTM Standards. In developing curriculum for the academy, facilitators guided their efforts based on the NCTM Standards, county performance standards, and the SCANS competencies, with a particular emphasis on problem solving activities. Indeed, each VLAs includes a problem statement along with relevant questions requiring researching, data collecting, analyzing data, exploring possible alternatives for solutions, implementing a plan of action, and reporting findings in both writing and verbally. For instance, mathematics concepts can come to life throughout the VLA as students may be required to estimate the exact orbit of a space station, budget for maintaining the station in operation, and draw flow charts of plans of action and blueprints of space station models. Teamwork is emphasized in each VLA through a balanced, heterogeneous grouping of students with different academic abilities and backgrounds. Thus, a great deal of student interactions occur whereby advanced students learn by explaining to peers who may be in lower grade level. Finally, assessment methods range from traditional paper-and-pencil tests to non-traditional strategies. Students are assessed via criteria checklists, teacher communication, rubrics, and portfolios of students' work. "The assessment criteria is not just a checklist that is passed around for signatures," reported one teacher. "It is used to let the students know where they are and what they have to do to complete the activity as they go along. It is like a road map and we're always checking them off and letting them know how they're doing, if they're going in the right direction."