Running Head: Future City Engineering Competition

SED 464 Signature Assignment

Instructor Bartlett
Grant for Teacher Technology and Software Classes
Richard Williams
Future City Engineering Competition

Future City Engineering Competition

School Environment Narrative:

I am an 8th grade Social Studies teacher at Eliseo C. Felix School within Avondale
Unified School District. Eliseo C. Felix School is a K-8 school with standardized test
scores consistently below the state mean. Last year the 8th graders percentages
that passed the AIMS test were 51% for math, 44% for reading, and 31% for
Science. This school is 81% Hispanic with moderate Level of ESL/ELL programming,
school consistently offers a full program with coordinator for particular ESL/ELL
needs. The school day is broken down into six periods. Chromebooks, Smartboard
and document projectors are used on a daily bases. Students who cannot log in to
Chromebooks have to use books as backups. Students take notes using the
document projector and highlighted information in Chromebooks. The Smartboard
was also used for guided note taking and discussion. Most of the time when
students from each class used the Chromebooks there is an issue of down time for
some students who are more advanced with computer capabilities. Students did
well in small groups showing each other the best way to use the computer. Eliseo C.
Felix School has a total enrollment of 496 students with approximately 21 full-time
teachers. It has a student to teacher ratio of about 23 students per teacher. The
average student-teacher ratio for Maricopa County is 22 to 1. With 391 students
eligible for free and 17 students eligible for reduced lunch this school is designated
under appropriate state and federal regulations all the pupils are participating in
programs authorized by Title I of Public Law 103-382.
The Avondale Unified School District is one of 58 public school districts located in
Maricopa County, Arizona. It provides a program of public education from
kindergarten through grade eight, with an estimated current enrollment of 5,346
students. The Districts projected enrollment for fiscal year 2015 is 5,898. The

Future City Engineering Competition

District is located 17 miles west of downtown Phoenix. A portion of the City of

Goodyear and the City of Avondale are included within the area served by the
District. The District encompasses an area of approximately 30 square miles. The
District consists of 9 school sites, serving grades kindergarten through eighth. The
average age of the school buildings is 22 years.
The economy surrounding the Avondale Unified School district is stable and made
up of Goodyear and Avondale. The District is in a direct path of westward expansion
of Phoenix. Although agriculture has been the economic mainstay of the area for
many years, economic growth and diversity has continued to grow with commerce,
light manufacturing and residential development. Fueled by the $2+ billion per year
tourist industry the service industry is the largest employment sector in the County.
Employing over a quarter million people the wholesale and retail trade is the second
largest employment category. Consisting primarily of high technology companies
manufacturing is the third largest employment sector. Other factors aiding
economic growth include a favorable business climate, the presence of a welldeveloped and expanding transportation infrastructure and major expansions of the
international airport serving the area.
The school has 32 Dell Chromebooks in each class room, an Apple Computer for
each teacher, and 30 Apple computers in the library/media center. The
Chromebooks came with the new curriculum that started July 27, 2015. The Apple
computers are connected to Smartboards. All 40 of the classrooms are equipped
with a document projector and a Smartboard. The 3rd 5th grade classes share a
cart of 32 iPads. The school has wireless Internet access which works fine most of
the time. Occasionally it slows down, but that is to be expected of any network. All

Future City Engineering Competition

teachers and students receive support from one of the technology integration
specialists from the district office.
The best way to increase the students learning ability would be to increase the
teachers technological capabilities and allow them to pass on that knowledge to
their students. As stated before there was wasted time during class when the
students could advance at their own pace. Either students were ahead or behind
depending on their computer understanding. Some students understood control
keys and other short cuts to help speed up the review and highlight process. Some
students could not even log into the computer. The teachers trying to navigate both
curriculum and technology have little ability to troubleshoot issues. The
understanding that there is only one person in the whole district helping with
Information Technology is detrimental to students learning. Every teacher should be
at a competent level with the technological tools that are provided for them. Then
they would not only have the capability but, the confidence to comfortably infuse
the technology into everyday learning. Right now most teachers are doing double
and sometimes triple the work because they worry the students will not get the
information from the technical tools provided.
Getting teachers the proper training on all technological equipment would solve the
problem and expedite learning for the students. Technology in the classroom is in
place to ease the burden of time consumption and choppy transitions in the lessons.
In the classrooms right now technology is just adding to the problems and
frustrating both the teachers and students. Teachers want the opportunity to make
the classrooms better. Teachers embrace change and advancement in technology
because teachers understand it is part of educating. Teachers understand that

Future City Engineering Competition

teachers are lifelong learners and look forward to the challenge of increasing the
technological abilities and passing the information on to the students.