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Educational Design & Technology

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Learning Technology Grant Program Overview: Community School District 7

Award Years: 2021-2024

Full Steam Ahead (FSA): Destination Beyond…

CSD 7 is a designated New York State (NYS) Target District that serves an ethnically diverse population of 17,049  pre-kindergarten through grade twelve students, 70% of whom are from Latin American countries and 26% are of African American origin. The district is well qualified for the preference priority points of this funding with 93% of the students considered economically disadvantaged. Sixteen  percent of that population are Limited English Proficient (LEP) and twenty-seven percent are students with disabilities (SWD).  The three public schools in this project are among those with the greatest need in the district based on the NYS assessment performance and participation rates for ELA,  mathematics and science for the Limited English Proficient (LEP), SWD and economically disadvantaged subgroups.

Full Steam Ahead (FSA): Destination Beyond… is an innovative digital literacy initiative that will expand, curate and publicize the existing Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts  and Math (STEAM)- based programming currently underway at three New York City District 7 schools. FSA: Destination Beyond… will impact 36 teachers, 2 teacher specialists and at least 900 students, grades 3 through 8, over a 3-year period.

FSA: Destination Beyond… will focus on three phases of planning, implementation and dissemination through the building of digital media, effectively expanding on the A for arts in STEAM-based learning with an emphasis on visual arts and student voice. PS 1, a Comprehensive Support and Improvement school, CVES 359 and IS 584x will incorporate  a focus on literacy with visual arts integrated learning into their existing game  design work  through the creation of digital media projects to include digital murals, video and 3D augmented reality (AR) experiences. A team of students from each grade will broadcast and record  bi-weekly news casts  on real world topics in mathematics, science and social studies that will be made public through a project YouTube channel. School administrators, classroom teachers, teacher specialists and students from CVES 359 and IS 584x will lead the project as mentors to the PS 1 teachers and students to create a scaffolded approach to learning across the curriculum for grades 3 through 8 students.

FSA: Destination Beyond… will develop a pathway from elementary to middle school through the effective use of a blended learning model to improve literacy through content-based learning particularly for targeted English Language Learners, as well as, develop the 4C’s of 21st Century Learning: critical thinking, creativity, collaboration and communication as a pathway to college and career readiness.

FSA: Destination Beyond… will promote working in a team-building approach where students participate as designers, engineers, documenters, and strategists creating arts integrated projects, aligned with core curriculum standards. The Digital Age Learning (DAL) team, a NYS M/WBE  provider, will partner with school administration to build a cadre of 18 teacher ‘experts’ during phase 1 and 2 to support additional teachers and specialists in their schools, during phase 3 of the program. DAL will provide ongoing professional development and mentoring of teachers through each phase to ensure the opportunity to build capacity for turn-key training and bring the project to scope and scale for implementation in additional schools throughout the district, beyond the grant period. DAL will also provide training and support to all schools for publishing program artifacts including program documents, student exemplary portfolio work that is handicap accessible and meets the Creative Commons License requirements, using a district Google Site, promoting dissemination of all project work to be shared to a broader community.

The goals for (FSA): Destination Beyond… are:

  • To develop and disseminate instructional materials as regional and state-wide public resources supporting the documentation and public sharing of a STEAM based model that integrates literacy and arts-based learning.
  • To provide ongoing, sustained professional learning opportunities to targeted administrators, teachers, and specialists that build capacity to offer a standards-based blended learning approach that integrates arts and literacy with the core curriculum
  • To build student voice and 21st century learning skills using digital media to address students’ academic needs and develop evidence- based projects that integrate arts and literacy learning in science, social studies and mathematics.

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