10/26 What's the point of it all?

 BLOG  POST #9:  At the end of this semester, you are going to have a broad idea of what your YDEV Master’s Capstone Project will be.   Look back at the post you wrote after looking at projects from other cohorts, and think about all we have done in the past two months.  What are you still curious about? Where do you want your influence to be in the world?  It can be personal.  It can be work related.  It can be creatively conceived but should be somehow tied to youth and the anchors of this program: Play, Care, identity, Social Justice/Advocacy, Leading With.  

Write a blog post about your ideas.  They can be loosely formed and broad, but start to write about possible topics and how you migh

The role of extra ciricular activities and" success" an exploration to community sovereignty.

I am thinking of collaborating with programs who run a 12+ week program of extraciriculars such as dance, basketball, football, soccer, baseball, and track the "success" of those middle school students. I specifically want to focus on middle school because that is the age in which identity and peer groups begin to infect children. Yes, infect and affect. The long term study shall be conducted in 4 month increments where the participant shares their experiences, their grades, and also their parent/guardian speaks on behavior. the success metrics we decide will be "state based" grades, detentions, phone calls home etc. while our metrics will be their inner philosophy, or outlook on life. How they are using the lessons learned through play to help them maintain in a system of oppression. 

I must share a story, I somehow was tasked to coach the cross country team. 15 students wanting to run cross country. Week 1 little did they know the run they signed up for was 1.5 miles. How many middle schoolers or even adults run a mile straight regularly? I know i dont i would struggle to dinish the mile wihouth walking. These middle schoolers share an inishgt that has guided my research and has also been a redirection to reinforce positive behavior. "Mr. Beasley this was the hardest thing I have ever done in my life." With a big smile on their face. 

 There it is. The joy in toiling @ Ibrahim 

This is a moment when the student is in the classroom they can look back and say I ran a race i didn't even think i could finish, I can definitely finish this assignemnt my teacher gave me. Is the theory true? that toiling in difficult things like sports, learning new hobbies, and habits make you a more resilient person and more likely to "suceed". If so, how do we routinely allow access to EVERYONE not just those who are the best. 

Just a thought, in our first year having an athletics program, we were able to send 2 players to the state meet. What's the longtterm impact of a young black girl being amoung the top runners in a cross country middle school race at 6th grade all becasue she happened to join a club. What does that do to her positive self image? can you measure that on a standardized test to determine her probability at "success" 

Ranting... 

There will be some quantitative data to be polled at schools and programs to know how many students actively participate in after school programs. WHat schools even offer after school prgrams, is there some data digging and dissecting that could happen to make further inferences about the afterschool theory.  

I think also about using my current school as a gunea pig with the types of programs and hwo to measure their effects becasue we do see a decrease in dean referrals an increase in student buy in for academics and generally our more influencial kids become a positive peer pressure instead of the negative. So maybe starting small with obsrvations and intervews at my school is a great first step.