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Young Minds Armed

With Opportunity
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Table of Contents
Section Page Number

Introduction Page 3

Background.... Page 3

Proposal.. Page 5

Staffing....Page 6

Advertising and Transportation...Page 7

Budget Page 7

Future and Conclusion... Page 8

Authorization LetterPage 9

Sources. Page 10

Targeted Q&A and One Sentence Pitch... Page 11

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Introduction
We are Raytheon, and our objective is to implement a project to save Dallas Independent
School District's (DISD) floundering test scores. Raytheon is a large American defense
contractor that has core manufacturing concentrations in weapons, military, and commercial
electronics. Questions may be raised concerning how a major defense contractor could possibly
have anything to do with funding education. The answer, perhaps surprisingly, is quite a lot.
Throughout this proposal we will discuss how Raytheon can positively affect the low
standardized test scores of the Dallas Independent School District.

Our company already operates a tutoring program dubbed, Young Minds, which is an
education program paired with Boys and Girls Clubs of America to provide children of
military families with opportunities. Raytheon wants to ensure even more military children grow
up with the social, emotional and educational support they need no matter where they go. Ten
million dollars had been pledged to the funding of Young Minds to fund education initiatives
for service members and their families from 2015 to 2020 (Raytheon, 2015).

Young Minds has a heavy focus on STEM fields and due to our increasing knowledge
about the fields relevance. Raytheon hopes to better the childrens lives by teaching them these
technical skills that are highly sought after in the workforce of today, preparing them for a
successful future. Our programs help military kids build STEM skills and become more
confident in their future career prospects. Their lives are better because of that support.
Raytheon has proven itself in the field of education and shown the country we are ready and
willing to invest in the future of our children.

Background
We will be addressing DISDs subpar student performance on the State of Texas
Assessment of Academic Readiness (STAAR) test. The gap between DISD and the state average
STAAR exam passing rate has been widening ever since the inception of the STAAR in 2012.
DISD has lost ground to comparable school districts in Texas for 9 out of the 11 STAAR test
curriculums. DISD registered up to 43 failing campuses in 2014, which is a step backwards from
the 34 registered failing campuses in the previous year. In comparison, Fort Worth and Houston
were able to lower the amount of failing schools in their districts. (Haag, 2015)

We need to address this as low test scores lead to local brain-drain, less funding for
schools, and a bad reputation for the city. (Greater Schools, 2016) (Thompson, n.d.) Young
people are the future of this country and society needs to make sure that they grow up to be
productive adults. The Dallas business community would also suffer if there was a shortage of
knowledge workers to match the number of available jobs that would be provided by the citys
economic growth. People will also be deterred from moving to Dallas if they learn of the poor
state of DISDs student performance. Childrens education could motivate parents to move to
another urban center if the quality of education there is superior to what DISD can provide. This
would result in a loss of capable workers to other cities which would give their companies an
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edge over the large and small businesses that have been faithfully serving the Dallas community
for decades.

As seen from the graphs, DISDs scores are significantly lower than that of the state average for
these standardized tests.

Fourth Grade Writing

(Haag, 2015)(Texas Education Agency, 2015)

Seventh Grade Reading

(Haag, 2015)(Texas Education Agency, 2015)

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Eighth Grade Social Studies

(Haag, 2015)(Texas Education Agency, 2015)

Proposal
Our plan is to expand and improve our Young Minds program to now focus on not only STEM
but also reading, writing, and social studies so as to aid DISD in raising their low STAAR scores
by covering all academic bases. We will serve not only the children of veterans, but with this
proposal, all struggling DISD students. We want to start working with 10 of the 72 schools listed
on the official DISD website for the first six-month trial period.

We will rent space at local community centers and churches to host tutoring sessions. This will
allow us to work in a family friendly environment so parents do not have to worry about where
their children are being tutored.

We have designed our program around the Texas Education Agencys (TEA) calendars. The
staff will begin preparation for the program during summer break. We will start in October 2017
to give students time to identify where they may have shortcomings and where they need
improvements and then end sessions in March 2018 as to not interfere with the set dates of the
STAAR tests. (Texas Education Agency, 2016)

Our weekly tutoring schedule will be as follows:

Monday Reading and Writing
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Wednesday Math and Science

Friday Social Studies/Short Review*

Saturday Comprehensive Review**

*Will cover all topics discussed that week in case a student has missed a day.
**This review specifically targets students who are seriously struggling and/or are not able to
attend the weekday sessions due to an extenuating circumstance.

After every period of three months have passed, we will issue an optional evaluation exam to the
students. This will be under the parent's consent, allowing them to see if their child is improving.
This will also be a standard of measurement regarding how well our tutoring program is working
and if any adjustments should be made.

Bringing up these test scores will positively affect these kids for the rest of their lives because
upon leaving the program, they will have acquired well-enforced study habits and have a
different outlook on education. When DISDs STAAR exam averages are then raised, funding
will funnel back into the district, bringing back faith in our local education systems, and a good
reputation back to our schools.

Intensive small group tutoring sessions like ours are proven to be effective in improving student
performance. It is impossible for teachers of a 25 to 30 student class to accommodate each
student's needs. But through small group tutoring sessions, tutors are able to focus more on one
tough subject than trying to rush through all the material. This is often not possible for
overstretched teachers at crowded public schools. (Rich 2014)

Staffing
The staff will come from a varied group of local qualified tutors. We will be using local
qualified tutors such as: current tutors involved in the Young Minds program, full time and
substitute teachers from DISD, private tutors, and high school/college student volunteers. We
will have up to a maximum of 25 paid tutors for each tutoring center. All tutors that we will
employ will have to go through a background check as to ensure the safety of the children, and
any student-volunteer must have at least a 3.4 GPA as well as be a member of the NHS to get
involved with our program. (National Honor Society, n.d.)

We wish to address the issue that Laurie Fox wrote in her Dallas News article in 2010,
concerning how sometimes children are afraid to interact with their teacher, whether it be that
they are are intimidated or just that they are afraid of being made fun of by classmates. (Fox,
2010) High schoolers are seen by young children as being much more approachable and are
more likely to be influential than an adult teacher would be to a middle schooler. That is why we
decided to allow high school students to be tutors in our program.
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Advertisement
We plan to bring awareness to our program by advertising on two fronts. Our first front
will be targeting the students directly by having our program mentioned during the daily
announcements and hanging posters around the school so that the students themselves can make
the choice to join our program. The second front will be targeting the parents by sending home
flyers with the children and by having the program mentioned on the report cards of children
who are struggling. We chose these methods as they do not force the children to join the program
and since the children are in elementary and middle school the parents are more likely to see
their child's report card and learn of the program so that they can help their child improve in the
subjects they are struggling in.

Transportation
Students will be transported to the program by their parents or by the school buses. We
are planning to rent rooms at churches and community centers that are on the selected schools
bus routes as to make it easier on parents. If a school has students that cannot reach the program
by bus, their parents will have to transport them there or ride with one of our hired and checked
tutors.

Budget
Rent: We will be renting 5 facilities for the 10 schools. Each facility has no limit on
amount of space and will host 2 schools. The cost of renting these facilities will cost
$79,000 for the 6 months. The majority of this cost comes from hosting the Saturday
session but we want everyone to have a chance to attend this program. (Dallas Park &
Recreation, n.d.)
Staff: The highest cost for this project is the cost of tutors with the average cost being
$10/hr-$15/hr will total from $108,000 to $162,000. (Care, 2016) However, the higher
figure represents a worst case scenario in which we have 0 volunteers and 25 paid tutors,
which is unlikely. So, since we anticipate a fair number of student volunteers, who need
not be paid, a medium between our two estimates is what is most probable. (Fox, 2010)
Supplies: The cost of supplies will be $5,000 ($1,000 per facility) and it is to last the
whole 6 months. These supplies will include but not limited to paper, pencils, and
calculators.
The aggregate cost of this project will total around $246,000.
Misc.: Our company's net income amounts to 2 billion of which 10 million is already
donated annually to the Young Minds program, so our proposed donational increase of
$250,000 isnt a relatively large burden. We also plan on attracting financial support
from: the city of Dallas, the schools, Dallas businesses, of course from the Dallas
Chamber of Commerce, and from families with students to aid with the cost. We will also
be saving on our operation costs by only operating within the timeframes specified in our
Proposal section.
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The Future
In the future, we plan on incorporating more DISD schools into the program and
purchasing our own building to house the Young Minds program once DISD STAAR scores
improve. Although the initial expense of the acquisition of a building may be high, the structure
we operate within will, in the long run, cut costs and save us money by eliminating our rent
expenditure. We also hope to reach out to former students who have graduated from the program
themselves to return as tutors once they reach secondary school.

Conclusion
In conclusion, we plan to benefit the community by expanding our Young Minds
tutoring program to all DISD students for free with the end goal being that test scores will
increase and that Dallas next generation will become a well-educated and well-equipped one.
The continued tarnishing of this communitys reputation will only lead to massive brain drain
due to the flight of our talent to other cities which offer better school districts. We therefore must
make certain the reality of DISDs gradual academic decline comes to a halt. A halt we believe
Young Minds can facilitate.
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Authorization
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The Dallas Chamber of Commerce hereby authorizes Raytheon to proceed with its
proposal,The revision of the Young Minds Program, as presented on December 5, 2016. The
Chamber of Commerce will agree to assist fund the program with up to $50,000 and allow
Raytheon to continue and expand the program once signs of improvement begin to appear.

Notarized Authorization Signatures

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References

Care. (n.d.). Dallas Tutors. Retrieved from https://www.care.com/tutors/dallas-tx

Dallas Independent School District. (2016) 2015.2016 FACTS. Retrieved from
http://www.dallasisd.org/cms/lib/TX01001475/Centricity/Domain/48/district_facts.pdf
Dallas Park & Recreation. (n.d). Make a Reservation. Retrieved from
http://www.dallasparks.org/365/Make-a-Reservation
Fox. (2010). Student-created tutoring business succeeding, growing. Retrieved from
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2010/11/01/Student-created-tutoring-
business-succeeding-6724
GreatSchools Staff (2016). State standardized test scores: Issues to consider | Parenting.
Retrieved from http://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/state-standardized-test-scores-
issues-to-consider/
Haag. (2015). Dallas ISD loses ground on state on 9 of 11 STAAR tests. Retrieved from
http://www.dallasnews.com/news/news/2015/05/26/how-do-dallas-isds-staar-results-
compare-to-the-state
National Honor Society. (n.d.). How NHS Benefits Your Student. Retrieved from
https://www.nhs.us/parents/student-membership/how-nhs-benefits-your-student
Raytheon. (n.d.). Communications, R. C. Retrieved from
http://www.raytheon.com/responsibility/stem/index.html
Rich. (2014) Intensive Small-Group Tutoring and Counseling Helps Struggling Students
Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/27/education/intensive-tutoring-and-
counseling-found-to-help-struggling-teenagers.html?_r=0
Texas Education Agency. (n.d.a). STAAR Resources. Retrieved from
http://tea.texas.gov/student.assessment/staar/
Texas Education Agency (n.d.b). Testing Calendars. Retreived from
http://tea.texas.gov/student.assessment/calendars/
Texas Education Agency. (2016). STAAR Released Test Questions. Retrieved from
http://tea.texas.gov/Student_Testing_and_Accountability/Testing/State_of_Texas_Assess
ments_of_Academic_Readiness_(STAAR)/STAAR_Released_Test_Questions/
Thompson. (n.d.). Do Standardized Test Scores Factor into How Much Money a School
Will Receive?. Retrieved from http://oureverydaylife.com/standardized-test-scores-
factor-much-money-school-receive-25534.html
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One Sentence Pitch

Our company, Raytheon, has developed a training and tutoring program, designed to help
DISD school students improve their STAAR test scores thereby attracting working families to
the Dallas area, increasing academic funding, and arming our next generation of workers with
not only the love of knowledge, but also with the know-how to apply it.

Targeted Q&A
How will you keep students in your program?

When the students come to our program, they are not indoctrinated into a second school day, the
fun environment the kids will will be placed in is designed not only to promote better learning,
but also enhances their social skills. Basically, the environment will be so much more than just
some after school tutoring.

What about children who cannot attend your program?

Unfortunately, we obviously cannot include every single student who wants to show up to our
program, but in order to accommodate as many students as possible, we here at Raytheon
incurred extra cost to have that extra weekend class.

How will you win over parents who are hesitant?

To any parents that have any qualms about the effectiveness of the program, we would ask them
to look at how involved Raytheon is already in the education field and this is just another step
toward our goal of allowing children to have a better education.

Do you think the Chamber of Commerce can afford to support this proposal financially?

Since Raytheon is a multibillion dollar company so we do plan to take the brunt of the financial
burden, actually a massive 80% of it. We are actually only requesting the Dallas Chamber of
Commerce to afford as much as they can, ideally up to 20%.

Do you plan to expand to high school?

Simple answer is no. We do not plan to expand into high school. We want to involve high school
students in the program as possible student volunteers, not teach them.