Euclid’s First Ring Leaders headed to Cleveland State University on October 15, to begin another exciting year of Youth Participatory Action Research with the First Ring Schools Collaborative (FRSC).
The FRSC is an organization of more than 100 superintendents and administrators from 16 school districts that border the City of Cleveland. The FRSC was first established in 2000 to help districts address the interrelated challenges that uniquely impact First Ring Districts. In addition to sponsoring the First Ring Leadership Academy, which is designed to help grow teachers and aspiring administrators, the FRSC also sponsors the First Ring Student Leadership Institute.
The First Ring Student Leadership Institute (FRSLI) is built to inspire and empower high school students to recognize the issues impacting their lives, give voice to their unique perspective about those issues, and take an active role in solving them.
FRSLI is built on a social justice framework called Youth Participatory Action Research that recognizes students as experts in their own experiences and emphasizes student-adult collaboration to make change. Entering the program as sophomores, students work in school teams to identify an important issue in their school, research the nature and scope of the problem, and at the final meeting pitch their recommendations to their principals and superintendents. As juniors and seniors, students return to the program to work collectively to assess and address a state-level issue in education while helping to lead the Sophomore class.
Students are nominated for the Institute by EHS Principal Mr. Russell and work with Advisors Sara Mattinson and Phil Gasper throughout the year.
After being nominated, the students attend eight all-day sessions during the school year where they share their ideas, engage in hands-on activities, and collaborate with students from other districts.
First-year students (Sophomores) began the work of identifying ways to improve their school experiences and building their public speaking skills.
Students in years two and three of the program spent the day digging into state-wide issues with students from all of the 15 other districts. These students will work with FRSLI’s sister program, The Ohio State University Student Leadership and Research Collaborative, to complete a joint, state-wide research project.
“We are looking forward to an exciting and productive year of growth among some of our bright, young change-makers,” Advisor Sara Mattinson said after the first all-day session.