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Business Host Externship Manual

Teacher Team Externship Program Summer 2015

A collaborative program with Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce and

The Academies of Nashville

Program Overview

Thank you for taking the time to be a part of the Teacher Team Externship Program! We hope you find this experience as rewarding as the teachers and student will. We appreciate your partnership with MNPS and look forward to another wonderful year within this program.

The Teacher Team Externship is an opportunity for teachers to observe and interact with your company (Business Host) and have a real-world business experience to bring back to the classroom. Through this program, teachers learn to work together to create an interdisciplinary, project-based lesson(s) that will reinforce the theme of their academy across subjects areas. The Teacher Team Externship Project will also provide teacherswith industry exposure and to apply to the classroom.

A team of 3-5 teachers representing your partner high school will spend three consecutive days working with your company, learning about the industry, and assisting/observing in the business’s daily work (Teacher Team Visit). This experience will allow the teachers to create a curriculum for their students to present to MNPS and the Business Host representatives for feedback. This will allow for feedback and final submission to the Director of Curriculum and the Director of the Academies of Nashville prior to enacting the curriculum in the classroom.

We hope you find this experience to be both rewarding and interactive. Ultimately, this experience is the springboard to opening future doors and opportunities for interaction between the partner high school and Business Host.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Detailed Schedule of Company Visit……………………………..……………….. pg. 4

Business Host Responsibilities Pre-Teacher Team Visit/Planning……………….pg. 5

Business Rules and Conduct – Completed with Teacher Team at Luncheon………..pg. 6

Planning with Teacher Team – Completed during Luncheon………………………..pg. 7

Business Host Responsibilities during Teacher Team Visit………………………pg. 8

Sample Program Itinerary ………………………………………………………...…pg. 9

Goals and Outcomes of Program…………………………………………………….pg. 10

Business Host Responsibilities Post-Teacher Team Visit……………………...…pg. 11

MNPS Contact Information………………………………………………………..pg. 12

Education Terms …………..………………………………………………………..pg. 13

Project-Based Learning Video………………………………………………………pg. 14

Detailed Schedule of Company Visit

May 6, 3:00-4:00 PM–Externship Host Orientation Day. First time Business Hosts are requested to send their primary contact person to this orientation to learn what to expect, how to guide the teacher team through your company to achieve the best results, and answer any questions. Previous Company Hosts will share best practices and lessons learned. The Business Host will meet with the Academy Coach to plan for the externship, share expectations, and finalize logistical arrangements (pgs 6-7 of this document).

June 1-July 14 – Teacher Team Visits Your Company.Teacher Teams visit their assigned Business Host for 3 consecutive days during agreed upon time period.

July 8 or July 14, 2:00-4:00 PM –Project Feedback.Business Hosts are invited to join in on the proposed Teacher Team Externship Project.This will be a time where you can addyour expertise on the project presented and assist with student project development. Members of the Senior Management teams will be invited to attend as are all Executive and Assistant Principals for the respective schools.

Business Host Responsibilities Pre-Teacher Team Visit/Planning

How to plan for the unknown:

  • Appoint a representative to serve as the main contact and participate in the planning and implementation from start to finish.
  • Develop a schedule for the company visit with your designated Academy Coach. He/She is your liaison to your Teacher Team and expert on planning.
  • Attend the Externship Host Orientation Day, which will help you plan activities for the externship experience and give a better understanding of the entire process on May 6, from 3-4 p.m.
  • Provide your Academy Coach/Teacher Team with information, terms, definitions, websites or any other content they can study before visiting your company that would be helpful to have beforehand.
  • Schedule your three-day Teacher Team visits with your Academy Coach. They can help guide you. Keep in mind that your Teacher Team will be there from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.—please allow time for lunch and 1-2 hours at the end of the day for teachers to debrief.
  • Schedule activities within each department for the best understanding of how your company works. Keep in mind that the teachers are producing curriculum that involves all subjects working together, similar to different departments working together. An understanding of each department and the skills required will help them understand how they work together to run the company efficiently.
  • Before the Teacher Team visits, inform each department that the Teacher Team is there to observe, learn from them, and interact with them to take back to their students. If possible, allow the Teacher Team to communicate with your coworkers for the best understanding of job duties, personality of job fit and relevance to curriculum. As appropriate, create guidelines on how teachers can contact coworkers after visit for follow-up.
  • Allow some room in the schedule for flexibility in accordance to the teacher team project direction, i.e. different departments or re-visiting a department.

Business Rules and Conduct

(To be completed at the Business Host Orientation on May 6th)

Contact person and phone number for teachers’ families to use in case of emergency during the externship experience?

Contact person and phone number in case teacher is tardy or absent?

Specific hours for the three externship days:

Instructions for lunch:

Directions to site and parking:

Dress code or guidelines:

Important company regulations/policies:

Specific safety concerns:

Proprietary concerns:

Planning with Teacher Team

(To be completed at the Business Host Orientationon May 6th)

During the externship, the team of teachers will learn about the skills it takes to be successful in this company or industry. Please have a conversation to help them become familiar with the skills your business considers essential before starting the externship. During their visit, they will be required to look for examples of how these skills are utilized in daily work. Afterwards, they will reflect on their experience and create a project-based curriculum that reinforces these skills in their classrooms.

Conversation Guiding Questions:

1. Teachers—what is the focus of your academy team and what is your specific content area(s)?

2. Company host—howdo you see your company’s role in the community? How important is teamwork in accomplishing the goals of your company?

4. As a teacher, discuss briefly how you’d like to see the externship experience transform your classroom curriculum and the way your team functions.

5. As a company host, what kinds of experiences would you like to help provide for students that could enhance the relevance of their learning? Are there any particular professional skills that you’d like to help students reinforce?

Professional Skills for School, Work, and Life

Below is a list of professional skills/competencies and personal qualities. Are all of these relevant to the host company? If so, why? If not, why not?

Business Host Responsibilities During Teacher Team Visit

How you know the event is meeting the teachers’ needs:

  • Please complete and review all of the Business Host Responsibilities Pre-Teacher Team Visit on Page 5.
  • Guide your Teacher Team through your pre-planned schedule of visiting departments. Please keep in mind that the best learning comes from conversation;if possible, please give the teachers a chance to converse with your coworkers in the departments. A full understanding of the job requirements, personality, how and why he/she chose that job, etc. will provide the teacher team with valuable information to apply to the Teacher Team Project as well as bring back to the classroom.
  • Allow time for lunch.
  • Allow 1-2 hours for the teacher team and you to debrief about what they observed that day and time to work together on their Teacher Team Project.
  • Allow some room in schedule for shifting in accordance to the teacher team project direction, i.e. different departments or re-visiting a department.
  • Please keep in mind open communication will guide you through this process. The Teacher Team is there to observe your company. What may seem routine/simple to you is brand new to most of the teachers.

Sample Program Itinerary

Below is a suggested itinerary for the Teacher Externship Program. Business Partners may customize an itinerary for their teacher team; however, there should be a minimum of three 8-hour days visiting departments and participating/observing in an actual workday. Each day, the teachers will take notes of their experiences in a provided workbook.

Day 1:

Orientation and First Day on the Job:(full work day) On the first day at the company, we suggest the first half of the day be devoted to a tour and an overview about the company (history, culture, organization, key products/services, industry trends). During this time, we would like the teaching team to make a brief presentation of their school and academy to the business team. This should be an interactive presentation that allows time for all participants to ask questions. The second half of the day will follow the format of days 2 and 3, allowing teachers to spend time in departments around the organization and learning their respective role and functions.

Days 2, 3:

Teaching Team/Business Employee Interaction on the Job(full work day) Members of the teaching team will actively engage with employees of the hosting business throughout the course of the company’s businessacross different departments of the organization. The teaching team should gain an understanding of the interdependence of jobs or functions, the flow of communication and decision making inside the company, and be able to see how their core subject matter (math, language arts, science, or social studies) relates to daily company activities. It is also recommended that they receive something tangible (writing sample, marketing piece, example of math application, etc.) to use as examples in the classroom.

Goals and Outcomes of Program

Goals

  1. RIGOR – Experience a contemporary workplace environment for the development of an interdisciplinary classroom project that has the power to dramatically change students’ thinking and understanding. This experience should connect skills such as math, verbal and written communications, cultural awareness and technology with the world beyond their classroom.
  1. RELEVANCE – Apply real-world career situations to classroom curriculum to provide students with relevant information and skills connecting with local economic needs and opportunities.
  2. RELATIONSHIPS – Foster meaningful relationships between the participating academies and local businesses such that both parties develop a deeper understanding of the partnership between business and education. Both the academy and the business can benefit from an ongoing alignment of workforce and economic needs with the skills learned in the classroom.
  3. READINESS – Develop a pipeline of students who are prepared to proceed to post-secondary opportunities and provide a strong local workforce base that help grow and support the local Nashville Area economy. Businesses benefit from this larger pool of educated and trained candidates for employment as the high school academies enrich the quality of the local workforce and strengthen the local economy.

Outcomes

  • Teachers gain exposure to the workplace, develop connections with professionals related to their subject areas, and incorporate new information and new ways of teaching into their classes.
  • Teachers learn the details of the workplace environment, the skills needed to be successful, and reinforce these skills in their classrooms.
  • Students gain information on specific careers and learn subject material and skills in their classes from the perspective of the professionals who daily use them.
  • Business provides the essential link between the workplace and classroom through active involvement in education and the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce helps facilitate these connections.

Business Host Responsibilities Post-Teacher Team Visit

What you do after the teacher team visits:

  • Please plan on attending the Project Feedback and Collaborative Presentations on July 8 or July 14 from 2-4 pm. Your input and feedback is essential to the Teacher Team Project completion.
  • As agreed with the Teacher Team, schedule times to implement project.
  • Participate in on-going communication and activities as agreed upon with Teacher Team.
  • Complete the externship host survey and write a brief synopsis of what was covered and accomplished during the externship for possible use in Academies of Nashville marketing and research. Please email this to y July 24, 2015. For the externship synopsis, we are looking for a couple paragraphs about the following:
  • What were the teachers exposed to during the externship?
  • What was your reaction as a host?
  • Were your employees impacted by the experience?
  • How do you think this experience will impact your partnership with the academy?
  • What do you think was most successful about the externship?

MNPS Contact Information

Beverley Flatt

Academies of Nashville
Program Manager
2601 Bransford Ave.
Nashville, TN 37209

O: 615-259-8718
M: 417-838-4056

Education Terms

The following are some terms, definitions, and relevant educational lingo that may be helpful in relating to the Teacher Teams. A complete understanding of the Teacher Team Project or outcome is not required or necessary to be a good and efficient Company Host.

  • Academies of Nashville: The Academies of Nashville is the brand name of the MNPS district redesign of the zoned highs schools into smaller learning communities. The Academies enable students to learn through the lens of a career or academic theme in a highly personalized learning community.
  • Interdisciplinary Instruction: In this style of instruction teachers employ a team approach in which the instructors of different content areas correlate some of their teaching. The most common method of implementing integrated, interdisciplinary instruction is the thematic unit, in which a common theme is studied in more than one content area.
  • MNPS: Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools
  • Project-Based Learning (PBL): This method of learning is a dynamic approach to teaching in which students explore real-world problems and challenges. With this type of active and engaged learning, students are inspired to obtain a deeper knowledge of the subjects they’re studying. Project Based Learning offers a deep and rewarding experience for learners at all levels.
  • Teacher Team: Team of 3-5 teachers that are in the same Academy that will work together during the Teacher Team Externship Program.
  • Teacher Team Externship Program: A team of teachers that will visit and observe a company for 3 days. They will then create a interdisciplinary, project-based curriculum to the classroom that will involve the practices observed during the Externship.

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Teacher Team Externships 2015