Ms. V. M. Di Vito

John F. Kennedy High School

WEBQUEST:

INTRODUCTION:

Vandalism in schools has become a monumental problem. It is especially serious at the high school level. When vandalism occurs, monies are spent unnecessarily. These are funds that could be used more constructively. It is important to discover ways to cut the amount of vandalism in the Bronx high schools. As a Principal of one of the schools, it is your task to find ways to prevent this vandalism.

Students and teachers are faced with this problem every day. Because there are approximately 180 school days in a school year, it is a matter of necessity to curb this abuse of school property. How can society prevent the ongoing destruction of school property?

TASK:

You have been appointed by Mayor Bloomberg to research the problem of vandalism within the high school system. It will be your task to develop a model plan for all of the New York City high schools located in the Bronx. This model plan is to include preventing, cutting down, or stopping vandalism during the school year. Based on your findings, you will prepare a 4-6-page typewritten report, double-spaced, which you will present to the "Mayor" (your classmates) in a 5-minute oral presentation. The purpose of your report and oral presentation is to convince the Mayor to implement your policy findings. To do this you must use the following six-step public policy approach.

PROCESS:

1. Define and describe the problem (the social conditions, key players, and public policy) using Worksheet #1.

2. Gather the evidence, statistics, case studies, surveys, or articles by experts using Worksheet #2.

3. Identify the causes of the problem using Worksheet #3.

4. Describe and evaluate the existing policy for the New York City school system using Worksheet #4.

5. Develop several policy solutions using Worksheet #5.

6. Select the best policy using Worksheet #6.

resources:

Search Engines:

www.AltaVista.com.

www.MetaCrawler.com

www.Yahoo.com/

www.Google.com

www.AskJeeves.com

www.MSN.com

Web Sites:

1. http://www.hants.gov.uk/scrmxn/c14275.html

2. http://www.glendale-online.com/gov/graffiti.html

3. http://www.communigate.co.uk/london/whig/page9.phtml

4. http://www.sniggle.net/vandalism.php

5. http://www.ed.gov/pubs/AnnSchoolRept98/vandal.html

6. http://www.vista-start-smart.com/Theft___Vandalism_/theft___vandalism_.html

7. http://www.ananova.com/news/?keywords=Vandalism

8. http://www.ci.fremont.ca.us/Recreation/VandalismIssues/default.htm

evaluation:

GRADE:	1	2	3	4
Oral Presentation	No knowledge of the uses of PPA - Presents no data to support the proposed policy	little knowledge of the uses of PPA.-presents several sources of data in a logical format to support the proposed policy	acceptable amount of knowledge Of the uses of PPA –presents several sources of data in a logical and organized format to support the proposed policy	Superior knowledge of the uses of PPA.-presents an exceptional amount of data to support the proposed policy
Research	Links not relevant to support the proposed policy	enough links but few support the proposed policy	many links that support the proposed policy	all links support the proposed policy
Report and Worksheets	Incomplete - does not use the conventions of standard written English	complete weak usage of the conventions of standard written English	complete with and acceptable usage of the conventions of standard written English	-complete with superior use of the conventions of standard written English

ELA Standards:

1. Students will read and write for information and understanding.

2. Students will read and write for literary response and expression.

3. Students will read and write for critical analysis and evaluation.

4. Student will speak and listen for social interaction.

conclusion:

By completing this PPA WebQuest, you now understand the difficulties faced by the Department of Education because vandalism in the schools. As a Public Policy Analyst, you have identified the causes of the problem, provided evidence, researched the current policies, and created an alternative viable policy. As a result of this project, you have learned to identify and improve public policies that affect you as a member of the student population in New York City.