Description of program
Sunnyside's Career Ladder Program offers Action Research as an alternative for documenting the requirements and responsibilities of teachers participating in the Career Ladder program. Teachers in good standing may elect this option. Depending on years of experience in Action Research, teachers choose the entry level (A1), second year (A2) or the experienced researcher (B) placements.
In this alternative teachers reflect on their classroom practices (examine and assess their work), pose questions that are meaningful to them and their students, make decisions about how to pursue answers to these questions, collect, organize, examine, interpret and analyze data relative to their questions; work in collaborative learning communities and share findings in multiple ways.
This option offers teachers an opportunity to be continuous learners and engage in intellectual dialogue; to promote and support teacher development; to impact the classroom at the student and teacher level.
Group A1: Novice Action Researchers
Teachers in this Career Ladder option are in their first year of the program. During this year, action researchers learn about the process and examine various aspects of their teaching, read and summarize appropriate literature, plan data collection and analysis and develop a question.
Group A2: Second Year Action Researchers
Teachers in this Career Ladder option are in their second year of Action Research. During this year, action researchers build on their work from their first year, when they learned about the processes of action research. At this level, they venture more deeply into the process, examining questions of importance to teaching and learning in their classrooms.
Group B: Experienced Action ResearchersParticipants in Group B have a minimum of three year’s experience as Action Researchers. This group represents the District’s most experienced researchers in the Action Research Program, some with more than ten years experience. Several researchers have participated in the Teacher Research Institute through the Southern Arizona Writing Project (SAWP) at the University of Arizona.
Participation in Group B provides teachers with a forum to reflect on their teaching practices, implement/test theory, and support collegial interaction and discussion.
Tips for navigating the site
This is a multi-level website, linking four separate sites to provide the most detailed experience for viewers. This main site links to each of the Action Research Groups' sites. We have created links on each site that enable you to move back and forward between the various groups and this site. You may go to the Index of Action Researchers to explore projects by grade level and/or topic.
This site is best viewed with Google Chrome (no surprise there!), but Internet Explorer seems to be working reasonably well.
Please notify us of any broken links or problems with Internet Explorer. | 
