Re: [xmca] Request for selection activity

Helena!

Great work! How much time can you devote to the selection process? If
warranted then having a workshop over two or three days would merit
consideration. Obviously attendance (both punctuality and endurance) would
factor into the decision. At the workshop activities could be goal
orientated with a construction focus. Your candidates would clearly stand
out.

what do you think?
eric

                                                                                                                               
                      "Helena Harlow
                      Worthen" To: "eXtended Mind, Culture,Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
                      <hworthen@ad.uiu cc:
                      c.edu> Subject: [xmca] Request for selection activity
                      Sent by:
                      xmca-bounces@web
                      er.ucsd.edu
                                                                                                                               
                                                                                                                               
                      06/25/2007 05:41
                      PM
                      Please respond
                      to "eXtended
                      Mind, Culture,
                      Activity"
                                                                                                                               
                                                                                                                               

Hello, xmca --

I suspect that someone on this list might be able to answer this
question.

I am working with a group of people here in Chicago that has to select
36 students to enter a high-powered pre-apprenticeship training program.

The 36 students have to come from targeted disadvantaged groups:
minority, women, low-income, etc. They will probably be mostly African
American, mostly men.

The pre-apprenticeship program is grant-funded from the State of
Illinois, the outcome of some serious politicking. It is a full-day 5
days a week 11-week program where the students will get paid $300 a
week, get bus passes, childcare, tools and safety equipment, and when
they graduate they'll get a union card and a very minor hoop to jump
through (a math test, for which they will get preparation assistance)
before getting into the full four-year Carpenters' Apprenticeship
Program. This is an expensive program: it costs about $1,000 per week
per student. The idea is that it is designed to address ALL the barriers
to minority entry into the building trades. It's got a lot of math and
hands-on carpentry and physical training in it.

Since the first class starts in September, we have a very short time to
recruit and select the students. We need an effective way to distinguish
between the ones that are going to make it and the ones that are going
to drop out or get dropped. Drug testing is a given; we have to do drug
testing at the beginning and randomly throughout the program. We figure
that drug testing will eliminate half the applicants. So it's the other
things I have to focus on. It's not academics, either -- the teachers
in this program take the attitude that as long as someone is showing
progress, no matter how slow, they stay in the program. What we're
looking for is people who can show commitment, act responsibly, and
build trust with the people they're working with.

So here is my question: Does anyone know an activity that measures how
well someone learns in a group? I imagine that it would be some kind of
group activity with a slowly rising challenge built into it.

Any ideas or references?

Thank you --

Helena Worthen
hworthen@uiuc.edu
312-996-8733
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Received on Tue Jun 26 07:03 PDT 2007