nstructions: 

Please read the attached PDF file and then follow assignment steps 1 – 5 with the correct format explained below. 

Goal: 

apply the reading to a real-world event/issue or creative text of your choosing. 

Format 

The length for the application analysis is roughly 2.5 pages single-spaced followed by a Works Cited. 

Assignment Description:

1. The first paragraph of your application analysis is basically like an intro to an essay. Start by introducing the reading, author, and summarize the reading  (eg. In Homi Bhabha’s Location of Culture, Bhabha proposes/describes/analyzes/argues…). All summary and paraphrasing should be in your own words. Be sure to identify the different and specific elements of the reading that you’ll draw on to analyze your event or text. Next, identify which real-world event or text you’ll apply the reading to. Summarize the event or text in a few sentences and identify/explain any specific elements that are crucial to your analysis (like specific historical context, characters, scenes, interactions etc). Conclude by identifying what you’ll focus on in your analysis. This is loosely like a thesis, but can be more general– it’s explaining how we can use the reading to understand a particular event or a text.
2. Your next paragraph will summarize, in your own words and in greater detail than the intro, the main idea in the reading that you’re making use of. The key here is “in your own words.” These readings have been written on hundreds of times, so it’s easy to find other people’s examples of how to explain and simplify them.  You can reference and read other summaries of these readings to make sure you’re on the right track (that’s totally fine), but be sure to cite them if you draw on them in your analysis. Each sentence should be uniquely summarized and paraphrased by you. Summary can include broad examples to help explain more clearly some of the more complex ideas. Note that if you do reference someone else’s summary, ensure you draw from a scholarly reader or academic website; there are so many terrible and incorrect interpretations of the concepts out there that will really undercut your work. 
3. Your next 3-5 paragraphs will apply the concept to your chosen real-world event/example or a text. Each paragraph should focus on a specific element of the reading. You’ll need to quote directly both from the reading and from summaries of your chosen event, or quote from your chosen text. For instance, if you choose a real-world event, you might quote from an article or someone’s online description of what occurred. If you choose a film as your text, you’d quote directly from that. You can apply the reading to three different instances or scenes, apply three elements of the reading to one scene or character in a text, explore how the event shows different sides of the reading..it’s really up to you how you want to structure these paragraphs. 
4. You’ll end with a really brief conclusion that reiterates why this text and concept work together, and explains how the text helps convey elements of the concept.
5. Self-Analysis and Grading. Please include a self-analysis of your work that identifies areas you’re most proud of/confident in and areas that you’re most unsure about/feel like could use additional work, as well as your grade range based on the below.

Choose five activities for job-embedded professional development according to Figure 3.1 (p. 70) in Ch. 3 of Schools as Professional Learning Communities.

Write a 350- to 700-word essay explaining how each activity supports reflective teaching.

Include at least five sources, including this week’s readings and videos, to justify how each supports reflective practice.

Format your essay according to APA guidelines.

Figure 3.1 Activities for Job-Embedded Professional Development

1. Observe other teachers teach
2. Plan lessons and units with other teachers
3. Give and receive feedback on instructional behaviors from peers
4. Conduct action research projets
5. Mentor new teachers
6. Coach one another 
7. Keep a reflective log.
8. Develop and maintain a professional portfolio
9. Look at student work together
10. Become part of a study group

Weeks Reading

The Professional Learning Community: An OverviewPreview of the ChapterToday, a great deal is known about what leads to school improvement and about the change process in schools. In the current literature, there is extensive discussion of the learning community as an effective model for fostering school improvement and general consensus about high-quality learning activities as essential factors in the improvement of teaching and learning. This chapter provides the theoretical basis for an understanding of the learning community as a metaphor for schools and the rationale for the strategies that lead to schools characterized by collaboration, shared leadership, and ongoing learning. The evolution of the learning community in the research literature is explored and an in-depth discussion of the characteristics and impact of the learning community on students, teachers, and staff is provided. The chapter specifically addresses the following questions:What is a learning community?What are the characteristics of a learning community?What is the role of the learning community in an age of accountability?What are the key elements of the school improvement framework for learning community schools?How is student achievement affected by the learning community model?How are teachers affected by the learning community?How do reflection and reflective practice contribute to the building of learning communities?What is a Learning Community?Dr. Karla Brownstone is just beginning her tenure as the superintendent of the Merlo School District, an urban/suburban-type district where achievement scores and teacher morale have been on the decline for several years. The former superintendent had a highly directive leadership style that limited his ability to improve the schools and resulted in a high turnover in the administrative staff. In her initial meetings with the board of education, teachers, and other staff and community members, Dr. Brownstone had shared her vision of providing the kind of leadership that would facilitate the transformation of each of the district’s schools into learning communities. Her ideas had generated some interest among the district’s building principals and supervisors.When she initially toured the schools in the district, the superintendent observed that the teachers in the elementary and middle schools all taught in self-contained classrooms in which the children were homogeneously grouped. In a survey conducted by the district staff, the teachers had overwhelmingly indicated their approval of the manner in which students were assigned to their classes.Superintendent Brownstone found that most curriculum and instruction decisions were made by a curriculum-planning committee composed of central office staff and chaired by Jack Carson, the director of curriculum and instruction. The declining achievement scores in mathematics had recently led the planning committee to implement a new mathematics program in the district. The central office personnel were ready for a change that would lead to an improvement in school climate, more effective teaching, and higher academic achievement in their schools. The achievement data had led them to realize that the strategy they were using had not improved teaching and learning in Merlo’s schools. Dr. Brownstone is now planning a series of meetings with the teachers and staff in each school to share with them the meaning of a school as a community of learners. What information should she include in her presentation?Over the past several decades, the research literature on school improvement and school reform has focused on the characteristics of effective schools and the importance of the principal’s leadership role and behavior (Leithwood, Seashore-Louis, Anderson, & Wahlstrom, 2004; Purkey & Smith, 1983; Sergiovanni, 1992). The metaphor for schools that dominated the literature during this period was the notion of schools as formal organizations. The 1990 publication of Peter Senge’s work The Fifth Discipline led members of the education community to explore new ways of improving how schools operated and the professionalism of teachers and administrators.Senge’s Learning OrganizationSenge (1990), whose focus was on corporations rather than schools, argued that if corporations are to survive, they must change themselves into learning organizations that recognize the threats to their survival and the opportunities for their continued growth. Senge described five learning disciplines that must effectively be employed to build a learning organization: (1) personal mastery, (2) mental models, (3) team learning, (4) building shared vision, and (5) systems thinking. In implementing these principles, people learn from each other and develop more effective ways of doing things. Practical ideas and tools that can be used to help educators apply the five learning disciplines in schools can be found in Schools That Learn (Senge, Cambron-McCabe, Lucas, Smith, Dutton, & Kleiner, 2000).In recent years the school reform literature reflected a view of schools as communities of learners (Blankstein, Alan, Houston, & Cole, 2008; Hord & Sommers, 2008). Transforming a school into a learning community, however, can pose some significant challenges for educators. Building a learning organization requires organizational members to have access to such resources as time to collaborate, ongoing leadership support, information, and ready access to colleagues (Senge, 1994). A lack of meaningful opportunities to engage in learning activities can limit the capacity of schools to become learning organizations (Ingram, Louis, & Schroeder, 2004; Lashway, 1997). In our experience schools typically do not encourage shared thinking; rather, teachers are generally free to make their own instructional decisions.The views stated earlier on schools as learning communities beg the question, what does a learning community school look like? A snapshot of such a school, in which one of the authors served as the college supervisor of administrative interns, follows.Online Resources 1.1Do you want to know more about Senge’s ideas on the learning organization? Read the article Peter Senge and the Learning Organization at http://www.omahaodn.org/Articles/July%202005.pdf. Information is provided on the five disciplines (systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, building shared vision, and team learning) that Senge identifies as the core disciplines in shaping a learning organization.A Snapshot of a Learning Community SchoolWalking about the halls of a New York City high school, I noticed that in many ways this school was different from others. The four-year-old school, which was housed in an older school building, lacked many of the facilities of other newly founded schools in the city. However, I was struck by the fact that the doors to the classrooms were always open and the students and teachers were all deeply involved in learning activities. During my twice-a-month visits to the school, as I freely moved from classroom to classroom, it struck me that an unusual amount of student talk took place in the classrooms. Students felt comfortable in probing for understanding. They freely entered into dialogue with their teachers; students and teachers alike challenged one another’s thinking with their questions. The environment was exciting, and I came to the realization that the students in this school were continually searching for meaning and accepting responsibility for their own learning. I rarely saw this level of student engagement in the other high schools I visited. More often, students were treated as receptacles for information, and instruction was more likely to be teacher-centered and narrowly planned around the state testing program.When this school first opened, the teachers had been permitted to make their own decisions collaboratively about the kind of programs they wanted to implement. The faculty had decided to utilize a thematic interdisciplinary curriculum incorporating a team-teaching approach. Each team of teachers decided on the norms that specified how the teams would work together.The program had been implemented after a year of training. The teachers had selected key staff from another well-regarded school that used a collaborative approach to providing professional development. During the period of training, as they interacted with teachers from the other school, made interschool visits, and learned more about team teaching and thematic curriculum development and implementation, faculty members had come to realize that they had mutual responsibility for their own learning as well as the learning of the all the students on their teams. Over time this approach to teaching and learning resulted in a level of interdependence among the faculty that fostered collaboration within and among the teaching teams. Additionally, faculty members discovered that reflecting on their ideas and activities and making and carrying out decisions were intellectually stimulating and motivating. The decisions they made affected the breadth and depth of their students’ learning as well as how they felt about themselves as educators.A visit to the teachers’ room revealed the same level of interest in learning as I found when visiting classrooms. The conversations of the teachers were invariably concerned with the plans being made for their classes. A bulletin board in the teachers’ room announced various activities planned around teaching and learning issues. Reminders were posted about regularly scheduled school leadership team meetings, study groups meetings, activities for new teachers, meetings of the peer coaching team, and purely social events. With the support of the principal, all of these activities were collaboratively planned and led by teachers.One of the building principal’s priorities is to provide the instructional support that the teachers felt they needed. At the recommendation of the faculty, positions for half-time coordinators of technology, science, and audiovisual and instructional materials have been carved out of the available teaching positions. The coordinators are available to support teachers in all content areas and to provide for or arrange learning resources as requested by the teaching team.The entire faculty keeps its focus on student learning by taking advantage of the available opportunities to talk about and learn about teaching strategies and students’ needs. The principal provides the teachers with available achievement data, which the teams use to plan for instruction. On a regular basis, teachers collaboratively analyze the data from tests developed by the teams to make plans for instruction. The teachers have become socialized to the extent that they maintain open classrooms, which other teachers can enter and observe on an informal basis.All activities are built around the school’s core mission, which is focused on advancing student achievement. Plans have been made for a small group of teachers to meet to reexamine and update the existing mission statement. They will share it with the teachers at a faculty meeting. The faculty will discuss and modify it, if necessary, before moving to adopt the statement. The principal plans to carry this process out every two years, as she believes the mission as stated helps some of the faculty focus.Clearly, the school described in this snapshot has learning as its focus. How, though, do we define a learning community? And what learning community characteristics have become embedded in the culture of this school?Defining Learning CommunityThe term learning community has taken on a variety of meanings in the literature. In Improving Schools From Within, Roland Barth (1990) described a community of learners as “a place where students and adults alike are engaged as active learners in matters of special importance to them and where everyone is thereby encouraging everyone else’s learning” (p. 9). He also explored the role of teachers and principals as learners and the importance of cooperative and collegial relationships as important aspects of community.In Recreating Schools, Myers and Simpson (1998) described learning communities as “cultural settings in which everyone learns, in which every individual is an integral part, and in which every participant is responsible for both the learning and the overall well-being of everyone else” (p. 2). Collay and her associates (Collay, Dunlap, Enloe, & Gagnon, 1998) noted that not only are individual and collective growth cherished in a learning community but also the processes for attaining that growth are valued.Speck (1999), who asserted that shaping a learning community is the most pressing task of the building principal, defined a learning community as follows:A school learning community is one that promotes and values learning as an ongoing, active collaborative process with dynamic dialogue by teachers, students, staff, principal, parents, and the school community to improve the quality of learning and life within the school. Developing schools where every aspect of the community nourishes learning and helping everyone who comes into contact with the school to contribute to that learning community are important concepts. (p. 8)As defined earlier by Speck, members of a learning community are mutually responsible for building the community. Thus building a school learning community becomes the collective pursuit of the principal, teachers, students, parents, and all other community members. To accomplish their goals, community members must carry on conversations about the fundamental issues that influence the quality of the available learning opportunities offered to all members of the school community.In a more recent study, Seashore (2003) and colleagues stated:By using the term professional learning community we signify our interest not only in discrete acts of teacher sharing, but in the establishment of a school-wide culture that makes collaboration expected, inclusive, genuine, ongoing, and focused on critically examining practice to improve student outcomes. (p. 3)They further noted that, with respect to advancing student outcomes and teacher professional learning, how teachers connect with one another outside the walls of their classrooms may possibly be as important as their classroom practices and behavior. The model offers an environment in which all teachers come to assume responsibility for the learning of all students (McLaughlin & Talbert, 2006).What are the Characteristics of a Learning Community?The literature identifies characteristics that are associated with the development and maintenance of communities of learners. Our discussion in this section is based on the work of Kruse, Louis, and Bryk (1995) in Professionalism and Community: Perspectives on Reforming Urban Schools. The characteristics that they identified (Figure 1.1) serve as the theoretical basis for the ideas and activities described throughout this book.A professional community, as identified by Kruse, Louis, and Bryk (1995), has as its focus the cultivation of learning and interaction among teachers and administrators so as to improve teaching and learning outcomes for students and for the school community at large. As a result of extensive research, they cited five elements of a professional community: (1) reflective dialogue, (2) focus on student learning, (3) interaction among teacher colleagues, (4) collaboration, and (5) shared values and norms. Each element is briefly defined here.Figure 1.1 Kruse, Louis, and Bryk (1995) Formulation of the Professional Community

Videos

https://www.educationalimpact.com/programs/programs/activity/llc_05a_05/

theme throughout this course has been that human and social services professionals constantly apply theories and processes to address issues and challenges. As a social change agent, leader, and advocate, you should be able to apply relevant theories and processes to implement and support change on a local and global scale. As always, codes of ethics should provide guidance as you attempt to bring about change. As the final step in the development of your strategic plan, you will develop an action plan for each year of the strategic plan. For example, your plan might start off with strategic goals at the local level with plans to take these goals national or international in following years of the strategic plan.

To prepare:

• Review the feedback from your Instructor regarding the components of your strategic plan in Weeks 3, 4, and 6–8.
• You should make any changes based on the feedback you received. You will include these elements as a whole this week for your final strategic plan.
• Finally this week, consider what actions you will take each year of the strategic plan.  

The Assignment (15–22 pages):

Guidelines for each section of the Assignment are provided below.

Part I. The Fundamentals (3–4 pages): The fundamentals of a strategic plan include identifying the core values, mission, and vision, which represent the organizational identification (ID). The Assignment requires you to develop the organizational ID for the agency, organization, or community for which you will develop a strategic plan.

1. Identify and describe the core values of the agency.
   1. Discuss the degree to which those core values are aligned with advocacy, leadership, or social change.
   2. Explain how those core values contribute to the well-being of individuals, groups, societies, or international communities.
2. Identify and describe the mission of the agency, organization, or community.
   1. Evaluate whether the mission statement is aligned with the core values of the agency, organization, etc.
   2. Describe whether the mission statement promotes advocacy, leadership, or social change.
   3. Discuss whether the mission statement provides evidence of how the agency/organization contributes to the well-being of individuals, groups, societies, or international communities.
3. Identify and describe the vision of the agency.
   1. Evaluate whether the vision is aligned with the core values of the agency, organization, etc.
   2. Describe whether the vision promotes advocacy, leadership, or social change.
   3. Discuss whether the vision provides evidence of how the agency/organization contributes to the well-being of individuals, groups, societies, or international communities.
4. Identify and describe key stakeholders involved with the agency.
   1. Discuss whether each stakeholder is internal or external to the agency/organization.
   2. Describe the role each stakeholder has in the organization (i.e. leadership, management, staff, recipient of services, etc.).
   3. Discuss how each stakeholder can be an essential element for gathering information to develop the strategic plan.

Part II. Needs Assessment (2–3 pages): A needs assessment is a systematic way of determining the gap between what an agency, organization, or community has and what is desired to meet the needs of individuals, groups, communities, or societies. The needs assessment will reveal whether there may be unmet services. It can then provide information about those needs and help inform your planning to meet them. The needs assessment also consists of planning who you need to target, how you will effectively gather new data, and/or how you will use existing data to inform your planning decisions.
The Assignment:

1. Outline and describe steps you would take to conduct a needs assessment.
2. State which stakeholders you would contact and why you would contact the stakeholder.
3. Develop a stakeholder survey related to your professional or societal issue.
   1. The survey must contain at least 10 questions.
   2. Provide a justification for each question on the survey.
   3. Provide rationale for the type/format of questions on the survey.
   4. State how you would vary items on the survey based on the role of the stakeholders who would complete it (administration, leadership, staff, recipient of surveys).

Part III. Strategic Issues (4–6 pages):
After the needs assessment has been completed, the next element of the strategic plan involves developing the strategic issues. Key tasks associated with the strategic issues include conducting a gap analysis, performing an environmental scan, and developing stakeholder surveys. The actions are performed so that you can conduct a SWOT analysis. SWOT stands for STRENGTHS, WEAKNESSES, OPPORUNITIES and THREATS. A SWOT analysis is used to help an agency, organization, or community better understand the business and environment in which it operates. The goal of developing strategic issues is to list or map out all of the strengths and weaknesses and then to do the same for all of the opportunities and threats. This helps the organization identify a strategy for planning. Opportunities that match the strengths are things that should be pursued. Threats that particularly align with weaknesses should be especially avoided when developing a strategic plan.

1. Conduct a SWOT analysis. This analysis focuses on the present state or condition of the organization and determining where the organization would like to be. The difference between the two represents the gap or the difference between where the organization is currently and where the organization would like to be. This gap could provide information on what might be the major focus of the strategic plan.
2. Describe plans for conducting an environmental scan. The environmental scan is a process that that gathers and interprets relevant data on an agency, organization, or community to identify external opportunities and threats.
   1. Identify and describe internal conditions that might impact the implementation of the strategic plan.
   2. Address on how you would minimize the impact of those conditions.
   3. Identify and describe external conditions or competitors that might impact the implementation of the strategic plan.
      1. Address how you would minimize the impact of those conditions.
      2. Consider how you might plan to work with competitors to meet the needs of your targeted agency, organization, or community.
3. Identify and describe at least three strengths of the agency, organization, or community.
   1. State why each item on the list is a strength.
   2. State how you plan to utilize each strength to positively the impact the development or implementation of the strategic plan.
4. Identify and describe at least three weaknesses of the agency, organization, or community.
   1. State what causes each item on the list to be a weakness.
   2. State how you plan to minimize the impact of the weakness.
5. Identify and describe at least three threats to the agency, organization, or community.
   1. State what causes each item on the list to be a threat.
   2. State how you plan to minimize the impact of the threat.
6. Identify and describe at least three opportunities for improvement for the agency, organization, or community.
   1. State what causes each item on the list to be an opportunity for improvement.
   2. State how you plan to incorporate the opportunity to the implementation of the strategic plan.

Part IV. The Technicals (4–6 pages): The technicals element includes items such as developing strategic goals, strategies, leading indicators of success, and performance targets for the strategic plan. The technical elements represent the executable part of the strategic plan. As you begin to develop the technical elements, the executable part of your strategic plan, consider the goals in relationship to internationalization and alliances.
Develop your strategic goals (Weeks 6 and 7). You must include at least three goals on the list. The goals must address the following:

1. Address issues such as globalization and how those issues might impact the strategic goals of the agency, organization, or community.
2. Identify potential alliances:
   1. Identify opportunities for alliances with other agencies or organizations.
   2. State why the alliances are important.
3. Develop strategies for implementing goals. You must have at identify at least two strategies for each identified goal. These goals must be specific, measurable, attainable, and realistic.
4. Address issues of accountability.
5. Describe how you will address accountability for each of the following: 
   1. Describe how your leadership will be held accountable for execution of the strategic plan.
   2. Discuss the following aspects of accountability for employee:
      1. Identify who will be responsible for executing specific aspects of the strategic plan.
6. Explain how employee accountability will be tracked.
7. Describe leading indicators of success. To determine whether the agency, organization, or community will benefit from the strategic plan, you must identify those things which would serve as indicators of success. These indicators must be observable, measurable, and quantifiable in some way.
   1. Identify four indicators that would signify success with regard to the strategic plan.
   2. Discuss specifically how you would measure each indicator.
8. Identify performance targets. Performance targets represent the level at which you would like to observe performance on each indicator. They represent the desired level of performance. For each performance indicator that you have identified, specify the targeted level of performance.

Part V. Action Plans (2–3 pages): Develop action plans for each year of the strategic plan. Your strategic plan should cover 3–5 years.

This unit has discussed the mechanical processes for solid waste (e.g., conveyance, shredding). For this assignment, compose an essay that addresses the prompts below. 

• Describe best practices for the mechanical processing of solid waste.
• Explain best practices for shredding.
• Elaborate on the environmental benefits of mechanical processing.
• Using a search engine of your choice, conduct a search using the following terms: high-horsepower hammermill solid waste shredder. Find a manufacturer of a shredder. Select one shredder from the manufacturer’s inventory, and provide the model number and operating specifications, such as the horsepower (i.e., kW), the capacity (i.e., units of tons per hour), and the size of materials that it can process. Discuss why you selected the shredder, and describe the shredder’s pros and cons.

In your paper, limit the number of direct quotations that are taken from outside sources. The majority of your paper should be composed of your own thoughts and paraphrased information. Make certain that your essay meets the criteria listed below. 

• Include a title page. 
• Provide an introduction. 
• Your paper must be at least three full pages in length, not counting the title page and references page. 
• Your references page should include at least three sources, one of which should be the course textbook, one of which should be a peer-reviewed source from the CSU Online Library, and one of which should be the hammermill shredder webpage. 

Please adhere to APA Style when creating citations and references for this assignment.