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- All Subjects: Arizona
- Creators: Department of Finance
- Creators: Division of Teacher Preparation
The inspiration of the book came from my personal upbringing. I was born and raised in Mesa, Arizona, where I would see title loans businesses in every street corner. Many close family friends grew a dependency on these loans. As I grew older, I became aware of the long-term effects these businesses had on these families and I became inspired to make a change.
My book is meant to introduce simple financial terms into a child’s life with the hopes that they will begin to converse with family and friends about these terms. My book specifically incorporates the terms: loans, opportunity costs, savings, and affordability. These four topics were chosen through surveying a high school class by gathering information such as what they know, how much they know, and what they would like to learn more about. The intended audience would be students reading at a 3rd grade reading level. This grade level is ideal for my book based off information found on the Arizona Department of Education’s website. Final revisions were done with the help of my committee as well as through feedback received from children.
The book itself is 31 pages long with illustrations on every page. The illustrations consist of photographs and drawings. The drawings were purposely placed, roughly, and without color, on the photographs to symbolize the rough patches in life in yet a colorful world.
Proposition 1184 plays a major role in the future of my book. Proposition 1184 is
currently working its way through the Arizona legislature and would require all high school students to take a class on financial basics, replacing the current economics class requirement. I plan to continue working with Mesa Public Schools to get my book, or a similar project, incorporated into the Mesa Public Schools curriculum. I envision the book starting discussions related to financial topics which will in turn familiarize children with these terms’ definitions and begin the movement of financial education in Arizona.
Cultural Perceptions of Leisure and Well-being in Rock Climbing Communities of Peru and Arizona, USA
Families of students with disabilities and those who are culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD), are looking for better educational opportunities. Charter schools offer promise as they were designed to promote student learning with limited control from the state. Charter schools though, have been criticized for relying on exclusionary discipline policies that affect CLD students and students with disabilities disproportionately. This study was designed to understand how Arizona charter schools use exclusionary discipline practices, with a focus on students with disabilities and CLD students. Two participants, a fourth grade and fifth grade teacher from a Phoenix metropolis charter school completed surveys and interviews where they answered questions about their classroom and their school’s discipline policies. Teachers were asked how they have adapted and administered classroom discipline policies and to what extent have positive behavioral strategies been implemented in an online setting due to the COVID-19 pandemic when schools transitioned to virtual learning. The results showed that in a virtual setting, teachers retained the practice of removing students from the “classroom”, expectations had to be modified to meet the needs of the new environment, and the school counselor served in conflicting roles. The findings suggested that charter schools and teachers may be transferring and adapting their reliance on exclusionary discipline practices even for an online setting with classrooms that have students with disabilities and those who are CLD.