Morgan Grieser

School Assessment
PPE 310
February 2nd, 2016

Las Sendas Elementary

Assessment Results
Overall Grade: CDuring School: 60%
Keep going! You're already well on your way to an Active &
Healthy Schools environment. Get teachers and staff
involved, perhaps introduce some additional activities, and
you'll be looking great!
Curriculum: 40%
Room for improvement. Studies show the importance of an
effective PE curriculum to overall student health and
academic performance. A stronger emphasis on PE can go a
long way toward creating an Active & Healthy environment.
Recess / Lunch: 100%
Terrific! With a solid nutritional program and sufficient
physical activity, students acquire the habits of the Active &
Healthy Program and can provide a positive example to
others.
After School: 80%
Outstanding! Adding one or two after-school activities or a
take-home newsletter can make your school an Active &
Healthy center in your neighborhood!

Las Sendas is known as one of the best public school in Mesa Public
Schools District. Their non-Title great parent involvement and non-Title
I rating make them a great school to teach at. However, in terms of
being a healthy school there are some strengths as well as deficits that
the school can increase. On major strength that I see on campus is
their no junk food policy. They are very adamant about making sure
that teachers dont give candy and cookies as motivation incentives.
Another major strength is their steps toward healthier lunches. Their
school lunch choices are much healthier than I have seen in the past.
Many lunches include salad bar choices, and desserts are often
applesauce. However, one thing the school lack is modeling healthy
eating. While they do advocate for it, many students often come to
school with little to no food, and dont have any knowledge of what
they should be eating. Another issue is that they dont require teacher
do to brain breaks and physical activities during instructional time.
One way that Las Sendas could improve its health policies is by
making students more aware of healthy habits and routines. They
would benefit from more modeling and awareness programs. Having
students start at a younger age to create good eating and exercise
habits with the schools help would be a great policy to have. Another
way to improve the policies in the school is to require brain breaks and

moving activities as part of the curriculum during instructional time

throughout the day. Besides recess, getting the students up and
moving while and in between learning will benefit the students.
Participating in active lessons will help the students retain more
information and keep them engaged and focused.
In order to get parents and administrator on the bandwagon to a
healthy campus, they need to be aware current issues within the
school, or be aware of how they can help. A great way to get parents
involved is by giving them ideas to do at home. Some of these ideas
might include: what should be apart of their childs diet, how much
they should be exercising daily, or clubs that are offered locally.
Especially at my school, parents love to be involved and want to do
whatever they can for their students. Just by making them aware and
giving them options. Administrators love ways to improve their schools.
If it will help their students get more involved in learning and make
parents happy, they are more than willing to advocate a program.
Approaching an administrator at my school with research and being
willing to be involved with the programs will move mountains. I believe
that starting a health club, or being willing to write a newsletter that
gets sent home is something that will be successful. If given the right
tools to succeed, teachers always love to implement new ideas to keep
their students engaged in the curriculum. Giving the teachers a list of
resources to use in the classroom would help immensely.

As part of my signature assignment, chose to stay in the area of

physical education and its effects on academic performance or mental
health. I think that studying how a student learns based on their
physical education would be very educational. Being able to do
research on the effects of physical activity for the Signature
assignment will explain a lot about students scores in my resource
room as well as general education classes. If the research is positive
that might prove to be beneficial in starting programs in my school to
make it healthier.

Statistics
Las Sendas Elementary
Total Students: 820
Pupil/Teacher Ratio: 21.5:1
Full Time Teachers: 38.1

Grade level

Number
enrolled

Kindergarten

96

1st

130

2nd

111

3rd

119

4th

126

5th

115

6th

123

Las Sendas is not a Title 1 school. The campus is located in a high class
to high middle-class suburban area in Mesa, Arizona. They are Public
school located in Mesa Public Schools District. They are currently
graded at an A level, and are currently petitioning for A+ status.
According to Schooldigger.com, Las Sendas has only 10.2% of its
students qualifying for free and reduced lunch.

Arizona School Rankings. (n.d.). Retrieved February 02, 2016, from

http://www.schooldigger.com/go/AZ/schoolrank.aspx
Las Sendas Elementary School. (n.d.). Retrieved February 02, 2016,
from http://elementaryschools.org/directory/az/cities/mesa/las-sendaselementary-school/40497001186/#section-1