KEN TURNERL4L5SUMMER 2013

Cycle of Inquiry:4H-Challenge Course at Camp Long:

Attack the Gap

The ‘trust fall’ during facilitatortraining, March 2013(Photo K.Turner)

Audience

Teachers, principals, and other Seattle Public School leaders trying to close the achievement gap in middle/ high school.

Interagency HS 9th graderson Tension Traverse(Photo: K.Turner)

Challenge Course: LOW

The 4H Challenge Course at Camp Long seeks to promote

DECISION MAKINGCOMMUNICATIONTEAMWORK/

COLLABORATIONthrough 13 low elementactivities and initiatives.

Greenworks students working on spotting sequence (photo G. Benedict)

Challenge Course: HIGH

And the high course encourages

SELF-ESTEEM/ SELF-EFFICACY

through 2 unique elevated structures.

Facilitator Melissa practicingacross split rail traverse(photo K.Turner)

Locus of Control and Challenge Courses

Newberry and Lindsay found that just after an 8-hour low course experience , participants were ‘significantly more internally oriented’ than those not participated.

The WALL often represents a challenge or obstacle in a participant’s life.(photo K.Turner)

Problem of Practice

Since the opening of the Challenge Course in August 2011, only 3 different public school groups have used the course; about 60 students total. This is less than 5% of the total number of participants we have served.

Interagency HS teen on Nitro Crossings (K.Andrews )

Problem of Practice continued

Most groups have been private schools and universities.

Problem: Challenge Course was put at Camp Long to specifically work with underrepresented students who typically have an internal Loci of Control.

We need to be working with more youth at risk!!!The park has close proximity to Rainier

valley and West Seattle and is on a major bus route.

3 Grants with 1 Purpose

WSU Extension 4H granted Seattle Parks $40,000 to work with youth development in 2011

Department of Neighborhoods awarded

$70, 000 in 2012 to work with local schools and youth programs and was matched by King County Parks with $50,000

Achievement Gap in Seattle

For 70+ years, an obvious achievement gap has continued between the North and South schools in Seattle.

*

Camp Long is marked red(Beadie 2013)

Theory of Action

If leadership promotes Challenge Course usage and purpose, schools will bring students to the challenge course.

If schools (teachers) bring students to the challenge course, students will strengthen their life skill development.

If students develop strengthen their life skills development, the achievement gap can be decreased.

Claim

Challenge coursesparticipation canimprove life skilldevelopment, thusdecreasing theachievement gap

Facilitator Anuja gettingthrough the net at 40 feet!(Photo: K.Turner)

Evidence

Evidence 1: historic Challenge Course data

Evidence 2: CSHS has some lower life skill data scores on Healthy Youth data than other SPS and the state average.

Evidence 3: CSHS Life Skill Evaluation from their visit on April 5th, 2013

More Evidence 3: Interagency High School data from their April visits.

Evidence 1:Historic Challenge Course data

“Challenge courses are an effective tool for impacting a variety of educational and psychological constructs with a variety of participants” (Gillis/ Speelman 2008)

Increased self-efficacy in middle school students (Conley, Calarella, and Young 2007)

And Loci of Control study (Lindsay and Newberry 2000)

Evidence 2: Healthy Youth data 2010

Cleveland High School students have the ‘worst’ personal rating of their quality of life.

(Healthy Youth Data 2010, 10th grade HS)

Balla

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Wes

t Sea

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Stat

e Avg

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

My Quality of Life is %LOW

My Qual-ity of Life is LOW

Question 136: Youth Quality of Life

Evidence 3

CSHS (14) students spent ½ day on the Camp Long Challenge Course on Friday, April 5th and filled out this evaluation right afterwards.

Evidence 3: Chief Sealth High School, mixed grade classFriday, April 5th (mean score changes)

14 participants (8 males, 6 females)

Question 2Question 3

Question 7

Before Challenge After Challenge

Interagency High School (mean score changes)three different April visits

Question 2Question 3

Question 7

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

4

Before Challenge After Challenge

21 evaluations over 3 different visits (9th graders based on credits, but various ages)

Results

Participants at CSHS and IHS

showed improved life skill

development

Participants showing improved life skills should help decrease

achievement gap

We only have data from 14 CSHS students, as well as 21 Interagency High School students for 3+ hours, imagine working with ALL of them on both the Low and High elements for 12-16 hours.

Next steps?

Replace current Life Skills Evaluation to Pre and Post survey for better data collection

Collect data on entire grades inside a school or the entire school over several visits

Fantasy: 4 visits by same student cohort

ElementsOrca watch,

Galloping Gertie, Nitro (Low elements)

Deception Pass, Support Sequence, The Wall (Low)

Mt Challenger: Vertical Play Pen, Power Pole

The Enchantments: Hub and Spoke course with dual zip lines

OutcomesStart breaking down barriers,

promote support of each other, teamwork utilizing low-risk elements

Continue breaking down barriers, promoting problem solving utilizing medium-risk elements

Support peers’ challenges, more support and trust development, personal reflection on high course

Promote self-esteem with success of team and self on hub and spoke high course, self-reflection and self-assessment

Final Thoughts

As Paul Tough argues in his new book How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character , “skills like perseverance, conscientiousness, and optimism” are often more important in a child’s success than scores on achievement test. (Tough, 2012)A student testing her

tenacity on the high course (Photo K.Turner)

Citation

Camp Long/ WSU 4H data compiled from CSHS students (April 5-2013) and Interagency High School (April 4, 11, 25-2013)

Conley, L: Caldarella, P; and Young, E. Evaluation of a ropes course experience for at-risk secondary school students. Journal of Experiential Education, 30 (1), 21-35

Gillis, H.L. and Speelman, E. (2008) Are Challenge (Ropes) Courses an Effective Tool? Journal of Experiential Education, 31 (2), 111-135

Lindsay, J.F. and Newberry, E.H. (2000) The impact of social skills training and challenge course training on locus of control of youth from residential care. Journal of Experiential Education, 23 (1), 29-42

Tough, P. (2012). Paul tough: writer and speaker. Retrieved from http://www.paultough.com/

Washington State Healthy Youth Survey 2010. (2011) Various Seattle area public schools. RMC Research Corporation.