The Story Behind the Campus Lawn Project

The director of the Grounds and Maintenance Department for the school district asked students in a chemistry class to advise him on the most effective, economical, and environmentally safe grass fertilizer for the lawns in the school district. The students were to produce an analytical report with detailed procedures and conclusions and to make a recommendation to the director.

The students were given seven weeks to complete the project. They were responsible for all arrangements, such as making contacts with outside resources and obtaining the permissions they needed to complete the plan. The students visited other campuses to collect soil samples, both in class time and during their own time. They also used time outside school to complete the project research, analysis, and write up.

The students divided into groups with responsibility for specific components of the project plan. The director of the Grounds and Maintenance Department worked closely with the class during the project both as an advisor and as a client who would benefit from the project. The teacher facilitated the project and assisted the students as a resource person. Much of the project was completed as practical science work.

The written work produced as part of Applied Learning projects commonly contains some errors. Documentation of these projects includes notes, journal entries and plans that students produced as working documents for their personal use. These kinds of documents were not prepared with the expectation of eventual publication and they have not been revised for inclusion in this book.

It is expected that finished work produced as part of an Applied Learning project will contain virtually error free writing.

This project illustrates a standard-setting performance for the following parts of the standards:
b	Problem Solving: Improve a system.
b	Communication: Prepare a formal written proposal or report.
a	Information: Gather information.
a	Working With Others: Participate in the establishment and operation of a self-directed work team.
c	Working With Others: Complete a task in response to a commission from a client.

What the work shows
b Problem Solving: The student troubleshoots problems in the operation of a system in need of repair or devises and tests ways of improving the effectiveness of a system in operation; that is, the student:

The students investigated the requirements for maintenance of campus lawns in the school district in order to arrive at recommendations to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of existing operations.

These documents show the plan the students developed for undertaking the project and the way they sequenced the work. These show awareness of the nature of the system they were researching and the range of requirements that needed to be taken into account.

a Tools and Techniques for Working With Others: The student participates in the establishment and operation of self-directed work teams; that is, the student:

The timetable shows that students shared the load of the work required for the project by forming groups, each with responsibility for a specific component of the project. The information recorded here also provides evidence of cooperation among the groups to set objectives and maintain time frames. However, the available evidence does not allow for commentary on the effectiveness of the work processes the students adopted or the strategies they adopted for reviewing their progress. The students produced this table for their own use and did not revise it for publication.

a Information Tools and Techniques: The student gathers information to assist in completing project work; that is, the student:

The students used library research to investigate the types of grass used in the campus lawns, including the maintenance requirements for each type. They also undertook field research to measure the campus lawns and collected soil samples for analysis. They researched the economics-related aspects of the system by directly calling suppliers and comparing costs. Note: The wide range of lawn areas of the various school campuses raises doubt about the adequacy of the sample used to arrive at the estimate of total lawn area. Given its derivation from the sample, the use of the exact figure (1,426,127 square feet) for some calculations is inaccurate. Rounding of the figure to 33 acres would have been preferable, as was used in “Organic vs. Inorganic.”
b Problem Solving: The student troubleshoots problems in the operation of a system in need of repair or devises and tests ways of improving the effectiveness of a system in operation; that is, the student: • explains the structure of the system in terms of its:   – logic, sequences, and control;   – operating principles, that is, the mathematical, scientific and/or organizational principles underlying the system; • analyzes the way the system works, taking account of its functional, aesthetic, social, environmental, and commercial requirements, as appropriate, and using a relevant kind of modeling or systems analysis; • evaluates the operation of the system, using qualitative methods and/or quantitative measurements of performance; • develops and tests strategies to put the system back in operation and/or optimize its performance; • evaluates the effectiveness of the strategies for improving the system and supports the evaluation with evidence. The students studied the scientific principles underlying the maintenance of the system, and analyzed the design and management of the system, especially with regard to environmental requirements and cost analysis.

Page 1 | 2

Back to Index