By Joan Wojcik

High school math students analyze East Village

Most residents are unaware that nestled between the fifth and eighth floors of the Downtown Central Library is a high school. In the fall of 2013, e3 Civic High Charter School opened its doors in the library for grades nine ­– 12.

e3 Civic High’s unique name “e3” explains its emphasis on “engage, educate and empower.”

Ms. Kimberly Morris, who has been a math instructor for two years at the charter high school, motivates her math students to the “3rd power.” She holds a Bachelor of Science in math and a Master of Arts in education from UC Riverside. Her emphasis at e3 is algebra, statistics and pre-calculus and has challenged her students to an extensive use of their math skills during this year’s curriculum.

The project currently being created by Morris’ 12th-grade math class is a yearlong project focused on the opportunity to make a positive change in the East Village community.

At the beginning of the school year, Morris posed a very thought-provoking question to her 12th-grade math students: “What businesses, products, or services will positively impact the East Village community?”

During the students’ initial observances of East Village, it was decided that the students would put forth a comprehensive online survey to gather evaluations from residents about their own neighborhood. The survey focused on the following areas: convenience and affordability of the neighborhood, amenities within the community, safety issues, and homelessness.

Students met with local community groups and businesses to help get the word out and distributed the survey link to residents and business owners of East Village.

After several months, the students had received over 363 responses to the survey. Based on a population of approximately 13,000, the 363 responses constituted an acceptable +/– margin of error of less than 7 percent. They were finally ready to create a statistical spreadsheet and a comprehensive analysis on the residents’ evaluations of the neighborhood, based on the survey results.

The final results of the survey, including the written analysis, data collection methods, results and conclusions, were presented by the students March 30 at the East Village Residents Group general membership meeting, held at Urban Discovery Academy.

One of the many results of the survey revealed that 95 percent of East Village residents believe homelessness is a serious problem in neighborhood.

“Most of the comments from our survey were negative and specifically pointed out that the homeless people are an issue to the community, and how this issue is not being addressed by the city,” said Maya, an e3 senior involved in the project.

“The students hope this survey, which is only a segment of the yearlong project, will bring some sort of positive change to the community and that the community members who took the time to complete the survey can feel their voices were heard,” Morris said.

Her goal for next year is to do a follow-up survey and compare the results between the two years.

The final presentation of the students’ complete business plan and marketing campaign will be presented to a panel of community members and potential investors at the e3 Civic High School exhibition, to be held June 8 at the high school.

Residents interested in seeing the complete results of the survey can visit tinyurl.com/zvr2qqb.

— Joan Wojcik is the president of the East Village Residents Group. Contact Joan at [email protected] or visit evrgsd.org.