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Quote
of the Week:
All solitary dreamers know that they hear differently when they close their eyes.-Gaston Bachelard
Watch the outliers: an information graphic
This is one of the twenty-something graphics I created for a book on Participatory Action Research, called (aptly enough) Participatory Action Research for Educational Leadership: Using Data-Driven Decision Making to Improve Schools, by E. Alana James, Margaret T. Milenkiewicz, and yours truly. The graphic pertains to outliers, and keying in on them when examining constituencies within a learning environment. From Chapter 11: Educational Leadership:
[this graphic] displays a school, showing both the diversity and clustering of activity within the main influences of the staff and student populations and the few instances where entirely different forces are at work. Leaders at all levels within complex environments such as this illustration continually need to evaluate the questions presented by individuals on the fringe
Speaking from personal experience, I can attest to this. From the time I became a teenager until I graduated from college, I was an outlier within my educational environment. Like a substantial minority of kids, I dressed differently, made different decisions on my educational focus (art! band! philosophy! eek!) and enjoyed being unpredictable enough--at least in the eyes of my peers--that I could fit in with anyone, without really being of any particular group (except for when I was). I never gave educators a headache, but I was an outlier in many ways, and there were enough of us that I am sure we had to be dealt with in a special way--even if it was just to give us a special activity or class to occupy us and keep us out of trouble and enrich us at the same time.
Outliers are more than just social groups. As the book states,Outliers may also indicate the start of important trend. Imagine how strong the academic potential of a school the created a robust [English as a Second Language] department as immigration emerged in the neighborhood rather than waited until the challenge became overwhelming.
So the outlier becomes the hub of "normal" within a few years, and those who weren't paying attention missed the boat.
As to the diagram: I think it does a good job of showing the variety in a typical educational environment, along with the clustering-with-overlapping-and-connecting elements that are present in any catholic environment (bonus points to my readers who know the nonreligious meaning of "catholic", by the way :) In the book it's black and white, but I present it here as displayed in the book's precursor, which was a web-based professional development tool.
If I was developing this solely for the web today, I'd animate it using Flash, to show the change of outliers becoming the norm over time, as well as showing how people within the "norm" move around, how groups wax and wane in popularity and population, and in general showing how dynamic the educational environment really is.Labels: alana, illustration, information graphics, PAR, visual information
posted at 7:47 AM Leave your comments here: 0 comments
10.09.2007
#9 with a bullet
I just wanted to mention that Alana's, Margie's and my book on Participatory Action Research is currently listed as the ninth best selling research book on amazon.com. So for all three university researchers who have bought this book, I thank you ;)Labels: alana, book, margie, PAR
posted at 10:41 PM Leave your comments here: 0 comments
7.20.2007
It's almost shipping, I swear!
posted at 6:22 PM Leave your comments here: 0 comments
6.26.2007
Participatory Action Research for Educational Leadership book update
I got this e-mail from our editorial coordinator at SAGE yesterday:
Hello Alana, Alan, and Margaret,
It is my pleasure to let you know that Participatory Action Research for Educational Leadership has gone to press today, on schedule, for printing in July.
Your patience as we worked out the kinks in order to get your book into great shape has been greatly appreciated. I wish the book all the success that it deserves!
Best regards,
Tracy
I can't tell you how excited I am to see this on-press and nearly on the shelves!
posted at 3:54 PM Leave your comments here: 0 comments
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