This paper encompasses a reflection of my experience engaging Algebra 1 students in a math classroom. 5 main strategies were focused on: incorporating games in the classroom, asking students to create (projects, word problems, etc), using technology in the classroom, fostering student collaboration, and allowing student choice. Each strategy was implemented three times in the classroom, student feedback collected, and the level of student engagement was assessed.

Education is known for being powerful in reducing poverty, improving health, promoting healthier economies, and providing peaceful and productive opportunities for young people worldwide. It’s a key to success that has been threatened in the state of Arizona through low funding, teacher shortages, and a lack of resources. Inadequate learning environments further educational inequalities and hinder academic achievement among students. In finding a solution, the objectives of education policy in Arizona are analyzed from an economic and equity standpoint.

The paper analyzes migrant education in Arizona. For the purposes of this paper, migrant students are children of farm workers. The paper analyzes the challenges this student demographic faces in obtaining an education. Included is also a bill proposal for the Arizona State Legislature to enact. The bill proposes that there be a migrant scholarship program for students attending a university in the Arizona Board of Regents.

This thesis first examines the history and contemporary landscape of school mental health, offering evidence for schools as an essential component of the child and adolescent system of care. It then provides contemporary discussion around the importance of design in public administration, as well as analyzes the current design model of school-based mental health services, including key actors, normative assumptions, and underlying conceptual models to demonstrate the outdated presumptions that have led to a model that is not designed to adapt to the unique needs of students, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. Building on contemporary theory of design in public administration, I argue that the largely fragmented, decentralized, bureaucratic, complex, and underdeveloped design of school-based mental health services mainly developed in the 1970s and 1980s has reached its limits and cannot adapt to new societal variables. Lastly, I discuss said limitations of this model to argue for a conceptual and practical re-design of the current system of school-based mental health systems in the United States.