<p> The college education gap between Latinas/os and whites has grown to 29 percentage points (Kolodner, 2017). I am a product of this gap. As a high school principal, I believe the solution to this problem lies within the creative minds of school principals/leaders. When a resource was not available to address the college readiness gap at my campus, I created one. The resource I created is <i>College Ready-the Game</i>. You can create one too! </p><p> The purpose of this qualitative study is to discover the experiences of middle and high school AVID students who played <i>College Ready-the Game</i>. John Dewey’s theory of pragmatism guided the study. The intent behind the development of <i>College Ready-the Game</i> was to create a vocabulary resource that students can <i>learn by doing</i>. </p><p> The methodological framework was based upon tenets of Action Research. Patterns of experiences from participants of the same social group (students in the AVID program) that had played the college-ready game were observed through an interpretivist lens. Data from interviews were unitized and sorted into categories. </p><p> Secondary AVID classrooms who most widely use the game were chosen for the selection of participants. The classrooms are located in Title I and Non-Title I campuses to help ensure diversity of the participants. </p><p> The emergent patterns of responses conclude the following: • Game-play of <i>College Ready-the Game</i> sparked conversations that developed college-ready vocabulary. • <i>Physical movement, competition, and repetition</i> of <i>game-play</i> motivated students to learn college-ready vocabulary. • <i>Community of inquiry</i> and a <i>college-going culture</i> were established through game-play. • <i>Bank of college-ready vocabulary</i> empowered students to participate in <i>college-talk</i> and earn <i>social and cultural capital</i>. • The <i>social and cultural capital </i> led the students to the critical <i>predisposition</i> stage to pursue college with their counselors, peers and parents. </p><p> While the study adds to the literature of college readiness, future qualitative studies are recommended to uncover the experiences from a variety of student and parent populations, such as speakers of other languages. Longitudinal quantitative studies are recommended to discover the effects of students who play <i>College Ready-the Game</i> throughout their school years. </p><p>
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PROQUEST/oai:pqdtoai.proquest.com:10641631 |
| Date | 22 February 2018 |
| Creators | Reynolds-Perez, Cecilia Cissy |
| Publisher | Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi |
| Source Sets | ProQuest.com |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | thesis |
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