Many urban New Yorkers believe that the Hudson River is so polluted that nothing could possibly live there. In reality, the estuary is thriving, and The River Project (TRP), a marine science field station in lower Manhattan, exists to showcase its vast biodiversity through place-based education. In 2014, TRP began collaborating on a city-wide initiative with New York Harbor Foundation and eight other partner organizations to integrate restoration science into Title I middle school curricula through the Curriculum and Community Enterprise for Restoration Science (CCERS). Teachers in the
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Elisa CarefMelissa RexAnnie LederbergGaylen Moore
This position paper, co-authored Center for Childhood Creativity's Director Elizabeth Rood and Director of Research Helen Hadani, details the importance of exposing children ages 0-8 to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) experiences. The review of more than 150 empirical studies led Rood and Hadani to conclude that, despite what has been previously thought, modern research supports the understanding that children are capable of abstract thinking and STEM-learning from infancy, beginning before their first birthday.
The Roots of STEM Success, authored in support of classroom
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Helen Shwe HadaniElizabeth RoodAmy EisenmannRuthe FousheeGarrett JaegerGina JaegerJoanna KauffmannKatie KennedyLisa Regalla
In this case study, we highlight the work of the Bay Area STEM Ecosystem, which aims to increase equity and access to STEM learning opportunities in underserved communities. First, we lay out the problems they are trying to solve and give a high level overview of the Bay Area STEM Ecosystem’s approach to addressing them. Then, based on field observations and interviews, we highlight both the successes and some missed opportunities from the first collaborative program of this Ecosystem. Both the successes of The Bay Area STEM Ecosystem--as well as the partners’ willingness to share and examine
The Bay Area Regional Collaboration to Expand and Strengthen STEM (RECESS) is a regional, unified STEM continuum effort from preschool through graduate school and career. RECESS is based on successful collective impact efforts in other fields and employs a participatory action research (PAR) approach to broaden participation in STEM. In the PAR framework, youth and their families will help to define the issues and develop expertise about community needs through a shared research process.
RECESS introduces participatory action research as an innovative element to the collective impact social agency framework. The intent is to determine the extent to which the engagement and involvement of the students and communities targeted can effectively shape the function of the collective impact network of organizations.
During the two year planning phase, RECESS (a) conducts a comprehensive needs assessment and gap analysis; (b) establishes a functioning organization of stakeholders with a common agenda and governance model; and (c) develops a detailed action plan. It is a significant contribution to the body of knowledge on effective and innovative collective impact structures designed to promote STEM education and participation.
The data collection for this project involved three audiences: (1) a post-event survey completed by participants at the 'Eight-Legged Encounters' event, (2) a club experience survey completed by middle school students in an after-school club, and (3) focus groups, observations, and end-of-course evaluations conducted with students in the BIOS 497/897 'Communicating Science through Outreach' seminar class at the University of Lincoln, Nebraska. Year two data collection was completed from September 2013 - March 2014. Appendix includes survey.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
University of Nebraska-LincolnEileen Hebets
This report is the result of a project to investigate through a sociocultural lens whether girls-only, informal STEM experiences have potential long-term influences on young women's lives, both in terms of STEM but also more generally. The authors documented young women's perceptions of their program experiences and the ways in which they influenced their future choices in education, careers, leisure pursuits, and ways of thinking about what science is and who does it. This report includes the questionnaire used in the study.
One World, One Sky: Big Bird's Adventure (OWOS) is a bi-national, China-US cooperative project to produce and distribute a planetarium show based on popular characters from Sesame Workshop's television productions in each country for preschool- and kindergarten-aged children, as well as accompanying outreach materials for children, parents and teachers to further enhance learning. The project aims to: (1) provide young Chinese and American children aged four to six with an age-appropriate introduction to astronomy; (2) promote positive attitudes toward science among young children in both
Sesame Workshop created a new planetarium show and outreach activities for children ages 5 and 6 and their families, teachers and other caregivers. The Adler Planetarium & Astronomy Museum, the Beijing Planetarium and the Liberty Science Center also collaborated on the "sharing the sky" themed show to help Chinese and American children identify differences and similarities in their respective associations to astronomy.