It’s a Podcast Away

A middle schooler in his eighth-grade year, worried about the world of high school, has many questions, and is anxious for a response. But in his case, he has a mentor, an older sibling, that just happened to be in his senior year. The wisdom of a senior is that of no other student. The experiences and mistakes from his time in high school would teach him how to survive and adapt to the high school community. That wisdom helped his younger brother through this stressful transition. Through his brother's guidance, he understood the importance of picking a magnet high school and tips for succeeding academically. This middle schooler now attends William T. Mcfatter Technical High School, is a part of their Medical Assisting Program, is academically achieving, and is excited to implement a project to help guide young minds through addressing the same issues he had four years ago. Although I had a mentor, that is only the case for some. The transition from middle school to high school is difficult for many reasons, yet there need to be more programs that help guide these students in the county of Broward. The transition to high school is difficult, but with enough support, there are no limits. Therefore, due to the lack of support and resources for students in Broward, placing a podcast to support students through the transition to high school by addressing their questions and guiding them through a creative outlet is imperative.

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Firstly, what aspects could make the transition from Middle to High School hard? As eighth graders transition to High school, academic preparation is a crucial topic of discussion. Unlike middle school, high school "has an increased class workload and homework" ( Mizelle, Bravo 10). For example, the introduction to different class levels from Advance Placement, Honors, and regular classes can make it very stressful for students to keep up with these classes due to their different levels of rigor. Additionally, to graduate high school, students must pass certain credits to meet graduation requirements. Due to these new expectations of academics put forth on students, succeeding is becoming increasingly more work if there is a lack of guidance. When in High school, if you fail a class, you are now responsible for making up any classes that you might potentially fail due to "Many school districts [having] limited options for students to catch up once they fall behind" (Bravo 16). When we compare students who are "off track" to those who are "On track," we see that they become very unmotivated. When students start seeing research talking about how "on-track are three and one-half times more likely to graduate from high school in four years than off-track students" (Allensworth & Easton, Bravo 18). When the lack of school leadership comes into play, and if schools aren't supporting their students and considering that all students are different and trying to help them succeed, we see the topic of dropping out coming into play and the loss of motivation. Furthermore, the idea of communication is a massive contributor to the success of students. When students develop relationships with the school and staff, it makes it easier for them to ask questions and be recognized by their schools. Students must be open-minded and understand that schools "shape [students] social world, contributing to overall development." (Suhrheinrich, Bravo 32) Students need to realize that limiting themselves due to their naiveness and deciding not to talk or participate in school activities could also lead to feelings of isolation.

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If the transition from middle school to high school is so Important for students' success, why hasn't Broward County tried to develop a program to help solve the issue, and if they have, why is it not seen today? To answer this question, we have to go back to an article Published in 2013, "Implementing Ninth Grade Academics In Broward County, Florida." By Nettie Legters Et al. To better support students, the Broward County school district would try to implement Ninth Grade Academics (NGAs) in every public high school. This program would offer first-year high school students the opportunity to have a more personalized learning environment that high school "administrative leaders, faculty, space, and team organization" (Nettie Legters Et al. xi) would operate. Being funded by the Institute for Educational Science (IES) program, which "[promoted] evaluation of state and local programs and policies." (Nettie Legters Et al. xi) Broward County's approach to having all its high schools implement the NGA program was of great interest to the MDRC and John Hopkins Researchers. This project would help institutions like John Hopkins to have a better understanding of how well a "large, urban school district [will] succeed at getting such a complicated reform into place." (Nettie Legters Et al. ix) The program was deemed unsuccessful; out of the 18 high schools that implemented the NGA program, only 3 out of the 18 high schools would implement the project "well." If Broward County tried to Implement a project and was unsuccessful, why try implementing a podcast? The critical issue with the NGA programs was that due to the lack of committed leadership and budget cuts, the NGA implementation ended in the spring of 2010 with the SLC grant. (Nettie Legters Et al. 61) Due to no on-site support from the district Broward County Leadership, schools increasingly needed to establish a stable leader who knew how to maneuver such an intricate program. Additionally, if the principal and the NGA administrators weren't interested in supporting the project, it made it impossible to become successful. Therefore, due to the lack of resources provided by Broward County and the continuing emphasis on the transition from middle school to high school, I would like to propose creating a podcast that can be accessible to everyone from students to parents to learn about the different types of programs Broward County has to offer to students through its magnet programs and give tips to students to better assist them in the assimilation of high school academics and culture.

 

As we are now in the age of technology, it's imperative to use technology as a resource for students; by using a podcast to transmit information, I can grasp a broad range of students and faculty. Of course, there's the argument that what's the point of doing a podcast if the Broward County Public School websites already have everything written down about the programs they offer? That may be true, but "The results revealed that the participants who had podcasts supplemented in their instruction scored signifigicantly higher on the knowledge and application assessments and claimed to feel more motivated than those who received text-only training." (Kennedy et al. s Goldman 11). To elaborate, the use of podcasts allowed students to have a greater understanding of the topic compared to those who just used text only training. It's also important to note that a podcast is not a substitute for a learning method. Still, teachers should use them to expand knowledge about certain topics. Finally, what I want to emphasize is that I will be setting up a curriculum; the podcast is a resource that students for students create, so I will need to conduct surveys/research to see what topics/questions they are most concerned about, this means that for the beginning stages of my project, I will be evaluating the need of students and working around those needs to figure out the topic of discussion and which guest speakers to invite. I will use resources created by the" How to Create a Podcast - From the Writing and Communication Center" to create the podcast.