July 17, 2009

Scholarly Training in Urban Development for Youth (STUDY)

2008 – 2009 Interns Research Presentation Summaries

July 17, 2009

RAISING THE QUALITY OF EDUCATION IN NORTH MIAMI AND NORTH MIAMI BEACH: A TEACHER’S PERSPECTIVE

Group Members:

Jennifer Therazin

Octania Therazin

Viotha Louis

Daphney Raphael

Ania Pompilus

Elizabeth Bellevue July 17, 2009

OBJECTIVE Finding out the base of a quality education from perspectives of teachers and administrators

from North Miami Senior high as well as North Miami Beach Senior high.

We feel that educational

budget should be split more towards construction and

curriculum.

Basically the purpose of the project was to

inform others of the quality of

education in our high school and discuss why it

should improve.

The better the system the higher

the graduation rates and stronger

the school.

We feel that the major and oldest

high school in North Miami is

lacking the proper resources and well

experienced teachers.

INTRODUCTION The quality of education in North Miami is an

important issue and the budget allocated from the school board plays a major role.

These important factors are taken into consideration.

The Significance of Education

The City of North Miami

North Miami Senior High

school

CITY OF NORTH MIAMI

North Miami is a city located in northeast Miami Dade County in the state of Florida and about ten miles north of Miami. The city lies on Biscayne Bay.

In 1953 the town originally called “Arch Creek” then it was renamed and called the “City of North Miami.”

The city contains five elementary schools, three middle schools, and two high schools.

They are all part of the public school system which is administered by the Miami-Dade County School Board.

DADE COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS BUDGET CUTS

The budget distributed towards education is very important, and the way in which it is divided is also a major issue.

Over the past year Miami-Dade County public schools has reduced its budget to close to $300 million.

The reductions included a rollback of administration with a 27 percent cut of central office expenses and administrative salaries.

The school district is currently dealing with approximately $56 million in budget cuts.

METHOD

Type

•We created a questionnaire.

Schools

•North Miami Senior high school

•North Miami Beach Senior high school

Sample

•Twenty surveys, ten for each high school.

•Seven teachers and three administrators per school.

THE DETAILS OF THE QUESTIONNAIRE

Who was surveyed?•Teachers and administrators.•This was because we felt that they would

provide a more accurate and reliable response.

The Questionnaire•Consisted of basic questions regarding the

availability of school materials and resources.

•Focused on teaching skills and necessity of FCAT.

Data Collection•Went to the high schools and received

principals permission to survey staff. •Met with seven teachers and three

administrators and explained the survey and asked them to fill it out.

PURPOSE OF THE QUESTIONNAIRE

Compare the quality of education in the high school in the City of North Miami vs. the high school in the City of North Miami Beach.

To receive accurate answers from staff. Their answers would provide the discrepancies needed to support or reject our hypothesis.

RESULTS

There was a bias in the survey because we questioned only teachers and administrators that were working during the summer. Therefore their answers may be unreliable.

At least 80 percent of those surveyed agreed with questions that related to having sufficient materials and resources available to students.

At least fifty percent of the teachers and administrators from both schools agreed that they had enough supplies to teach their lessons and that the FCAT was necessary as well as beneficial to the students.

TESTING AND ANALYSIS

We decided to display the results on a t-test.

We used the six basic questions that focused on a lack of materials, i.e.: In general, I feel that there are sufficient materials and resources available to

students at my school. There is no shortage of textbooks in the classrooms at my school. My school has an adequate number of computers available for student use. My school provides teachers with adequate resources for their teaching

activities.

Each question had a possible answer range of 1-5. One being strongly agree and five being strongly disagree.

Therefore there was a maximum of 30 points and minimum of 6.

The greater the number it meant the more inadequate the school resources were. Also the better supported our hypothesis would be.

THE COMPARISONS IN RESULTS

North Miami Beach North Miami

The higher the mean the more inadequate

Standard Deviation :2.12

Mean: 19.5

The lower the mean the more adequate

Mean: 16.6Standard Deviation: 2.84

CONCLUSION AND DISCUSSION

• There is in fact a difference between the two high schools.

• North Miami has fewer resources and materials.

Differences

• With the rates of citywide cuts future generations are basically being set up for less supplies

• The funding for certain courses and programs are being cut out certain schools.

Budget cuts • Qualities of a good education are school systems that provide enough materials for their students

• A good school system should provide well experienced teachers to take on the responsibilities of helping the students succeed in graduating. Great Educational

system

Based on our results and as residents and students of North Miami Senior high school we personally believe that there should be more textbooks for the classroom, more computers for research, and more experienced teachers to better suit the educational needs of the students.

STEVE ALEXIS HERINE BARON

ISLANGIA LEVEILLE MARIANA OSORIO YETSANIA FLORES

Sexually Transmitted Diseases in North Miami

compared to North Miami Beach

July 17, 2009

OUR GOAL & HYPOTHESIS

Goal The goal of this project is to determine the level STD’s

(AIDS, Gonorrhea, Syphilis, Chlamydia) of the cities of North Miami and North Miami Beach (NMB).

We believe that the main factor of the alarming rates of STDs is because the educational level on the issue is very low.

Hypothesis The clinics in the City of North Miami will have more

patients than North Miami Beach coming in to get tested, because patients think that there’s a probability that they might be infected with a STD.

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SURVEY TARGET: CLINICS

North Miami Beach Clinics:

Around the Clock

Women & Teen Health

American Urgent Care

AIDS Healthcare Foundation

North Miami Clinics:

Alert

Planned parent hood

Universal Medical Bldg.

Doctors Medical

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METHODS

As a group we went to 8 clinics in the area of North Miami and North Miami Beach to gather information on STDs in the neighborhood.

We stated that, “We are in the STUDY Program for the CRA of North Miami and we are completing a research project on STDs in our community and in the community of North Miami Beach”.

Survey population Physicians – Nurses – Executive directors – Managers

Extra information that wasn’t stated in the questionnaire, such as: charts, brochures & websites were also given to us.

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SURVEY RESULTS

North Miami Patient population: three out of four clinics (75%), stated that it was about

the same number of males and females that came in to get tested. 75% of the clinics agreed with the statement that African Americans visit the

clinic more likely than other ethnic groups. (75%) said there was no decrease in the past ten years.

North Miami Beach Two out of the four clinics (50%) stated that more females than males get

tested. (75%) of the clinics agreed with the statement that there isn’t a primary

group that best describes their patient population. Furthermore, (50%) of the clinics in North Miami Beach disagreed when

asked if African Americans get tested for STDs more than any other ethnic groups.

When it comes to the future increases four out of four (100 %)clinics strongly agree that there will be an increase of positive result of STD in the future.

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CONCLUSION

The clinics that we surveyed (Doctors Medical, American Urgent Care) mentioned that the age ranges of the highest STD cases are 15-24.

One way to prevent an increase in the amount of STD cases in both North Miami and North Miami Beach is to provide educational focus of STDs throughout the community.

You can do so by passing out flyers, getting grants from large companies and the government to provide free condoms to clinics that aren’t able to provide it to the public.

Websites such as: http://www.rapituppresents.com/, gyt.com, mtv.com, alerthealth.org, plannedparenthood.org, womenandteenshealthcare.com, aidshealth.org should be advertised more .

In addition, it will be great if there were more awareness posters at schools, bus stops, outside teen-clubs and billboards.

As we saw through research and talking to testing clinic supervisors we conclude that our hypothesis was correct that the clinics in the City of North Miami will have more patients than North Miami Beach coming in to get tested.

After visiting actual clinics and gathering information the group sat down and discussed that there was a low amount of STD knowledge in the community.

With the saying of “one step forward and two step back” is how informed we feel many people are when it comes to STD’s in our community. We believe that many people chose to be uninformed.

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REFERENCES

http://www.aids.org/factSheets/101-What-is-AIDS.html

http://www.cdc.gov/std/gonorrhea/stdfact-gonorrhea.htm

http://www.cdc.gov/std/syphilis/STDFact-Syphilis.htm

http://www.cdc.gov/std/Chlamydia/STDFact-Chlamydia.htm

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Gang Violence in North Miami compared to North Miami Beach

Yonie Dorval Chris Brown Lina Lubin Rotchil Noel

Lynard Williams Will’ Rod Delices

July 17, 2009S.T.U.D.Y

Introduction“Advocates for children” wrote an article and

predicted by the year of 2000 gang violence will become a greater threat to the well-being of our society and is to “spiral out of control”.

Unfortunately, their prediction became reality. Gang violence is becoming more and more of a problem today.

Our goals and objectives primarily are to compare the cities of North Miami and North Miami Beach crime rates dealing with gang violence.

Our secondary goal and objective is to provide information on how to decrease the gang violence in the city of North Miami

Methods/Procedures We completed our data by creating a questionnaire for North Miami and

North Miami Beach police officers and residents.

We had questions weighted from a scale of 1-10 and also questions whether they agree or disagree with a statement. We also were concerned with how well informed the residents are about gang violence in their prospective areas.

To obtain the information we needed we went to the North Miami and North Miami Beach Police departments and asked some of the officers to complete our questionnaire.

We also went door to door asking the residents of both cities to complete the questionnaire.

In our questionnaire sample there were 15 North Miami police, and 9 North Miami Beach police officers, overall we surveyed 23 police officers.

Furthermore, we surveyed 13 North Miami residents and 13 North Miami Beach residents. In total we surveys 51 people.

Survey Population Gender:

23 females and 28 males

Ethnicity: 26 black 10 whites, 12 Hispanic 3 others

City of residence: 28 North Miami 19 North Miami Beach

Survey Results North Miami residents and police officers

North Miami Beach residents and police officers

On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being the least and 10 being the greatest, please describe the severity of the problem of gang violence in your city?

•Scale 1-5 18%•Scale 6-10 33%• 49% No Answer

• Scale 1-5 12%•Scale 6-10 20%• 68% No Answer

My city has taken adequate steps to stop or reduce gang violence.

50% Agreed 60% Agreed

In general, I believe that North Miami has a bigger problem with gang violence than North Miami Beach.

20% Agree, 57% Disagreed, 23% Neutral


What gangs are most prevalent in your area? (please list)

•6 Ave •Westside•3rd War

One way - Victoria ParkWashington ParkUleta Park - Allen Park

Citizens’ crime watch can be effective in reducing gang violence in my city.



In general, residents of my city are well informed on gang violence.



There are enough programs in my city that discourage youth from joining gangs.



I feel that parents and guardians bear some responsibility for their wards being in gangs.



Survey Results Which of these gang related issues are significant problems in your city?

Conclusion We strongly believe that the lack of programs in the community

contribute to gang violence as well as parental involvement.

If young people cannot communicate their concerns and problems to someone significant at home, they could make a negative decision to join a gang

In our opinion, if communities were to start having programs to discourage our teens from joining gangs, gang violence will decrease tremendously. Examples of community programs we would establish are :

B.A.D – Bold Angered Delinquents ( A program that provides mentors and classes for teens in the area.)

Prop- A program that shows how to respect yourself along with your peers.

F.T.Y - For The Youth ( Basketball tournaments, Step Teams, Scholarship training.)

References

Federal Bureau of investigation .gov

NCPC.org

Violence prevention institute.gov

Wikipedia.com

Documents

July 17, 2009