6 Teacher Treatment

INTERVIEW GUIDE FOR TEACHERS AND COUNSELORS

TARGETED RESPONDENT: These interview questions are intended for teachers and counselors at schools served by grantees. 

CONTENT:  This document contains draft interview questions to be asked of teachers and counselors at schools served by grantees. 

SCHOOL & TURNAROUND PLAN CONTEXT

1. Please describe how long you’ve been at this school, your role, and how long you’ve been working in education.

2. Is there any additional information or context that you think is important for understanding your school and community?

3. How aware are you of your school’s turnaround plan? How does your school leadership team provide you with information on the turnaround plan and school progress towards turnaround goals?

4. In addition to your School Turnaround AmeriCorps members, are there other school partners, volunteers, or external support staff with whom you work or are familiar with who support your school’s turnaround efforts? If so, who are they and what do they do?

   • How are the activities of external partners similar to those of School Turnaround AmeriCorps members? How are they different?

PROGRAM DESIGN/ACTIVITIES

5. What are the key activities do School Turnaround AmeriCorps members do are engaging in at your school this year?

   • Have theseDid the activities changechanged over the course of the School Turnaround AmeriCorps program? throughout the year? If so, then why?

6. What level of interaction do you have with School Turnaround AmeriCorps members this year? In what capacity, if any, do you work directly with AmeriCorps members?

7. Can you please describe theWhat is the process for assigning tasksselecting students to receive services from School Turnaround AmeriCorps members?

8. If School Turnaround AmeriCorps members are working with students you teach or counsel, hHow do you communicate with School Turnaround AmeriCorps membersthem about the progress of your students with whom they were workingthese students?

9. Please describe how School Turnaround AmeriCorps members are supervised at your school.?

   • Do your School Turnaround AmeriCorps members have an on-site supervisor, or some other kind of supervision? If so, is that person from the AmeriCorps organization or your school? What are the supervisor’s roles and responsibilities?

1. If have on-site supervisor, How effective is the on-site supervisor? How have they been helpful in managing and implementing the program? Is there anything that could be done to better manage the program?

STAFF-MEMBER RELATIONSHIP

10. Do you feel that members were well-prepared and had the skills necessary to be effective in your school this year? If not, how do you think School Turnaround AmeriCorps members could be better prepared?

11. What is the relationship like between School Turnaround AmeriCorps members and school staff this year? How well do you feel staff understand the role of the AmeriCorps members? How has this relationship and understanding changed over time?

12. What challenges have you experienced in implementing School Turnaround AmeriCorps members’ interventions in your classroom or in student counseling/tutoring programs? How were they resolved?

PERCEIVED EFFECTIVENESS

13. One central objective of School Turnaround AmeriCorps is to help schools meet their turnaround goals. How, if at all, have School Turnaround AmeriCorps members helped build your school’s capacity to address those goals?

    • Probe: Did they affect relationships between students and staff? Involve families? Improve the school climate? Support the academic needs of specific groups of students? Support students’ behavioral and/or socio-emotional health needs? Provide before school, after school, or extended learning time programming?

14. Which of your turnaround goals has the School Turnaround AmeriCorps program been more helpful in addressing either directly or indirectly? Which of your turnaround goals was the program less helpful in addressing? How so?

• What specific member strategies or activities were most successful in addressing turnaround goals? What were less successful?

15. What lessons have you learned from observing and working with the program (and members) at your school that might be helpful to other sites/schools?

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