Journey into Space (JIS) is designed to improve student, educator, and general public understanding of earth/space science and its relationship to NASA goals and objectives through the use of a traveling GeoDome (inflatable planetarium) and engaging supporting programming at The Journey Museum. The Museum collaborates with area colleges, school districts, K-12 educators, youth serving organizations, astronomical affiliations, and others. The overall goal of JIS is to improve student, educator, and general public understanding of STEM and its relationship to NASA goals and objectives. JIS objectives are: 1) To increase student and public interest and awareness in STEM areas; 2) To increase student interest in pursuing STEM careers; 3) To improve teacher knowledge of NASA related science; 4) To increase teacher comfort level and confidence in teaching NASA related science in their classrooms; 5) To increase collaboration between informal and formal science educators; 6) To increase student and public understanding of Plains Indians ethno astronomy; and 7) To increase museum visitors’ interest and understanding of NASA related science. The Museum produced 2 films (“Cradle of Life”, “Looney Moons”) that are offered daily, 4 recurring monthly programs (Final Frontier Friday, Amazing Science, SciGirls that became Science Explorer’s Club, and Black Hills Astronomical Society meetings), summer robotics classes and teachers’ workshops, annual Earth Science Day, in addition to the GeoDome programming that has toured the region including presentations in the three poorest counties in the United States. The ethno-astronomy is underway in partnership with Oglala Lakota College and South Dakota Space Grant Consortium.
Since August of 2011, Project iLASER (Investigations with Light And Sustainable Energy Resources) has engaged children, youth and adults in public science education and hands-on activities across the entire length of the U.S.-Mexico border, from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. The two main themes of Project iLASER activities focus on sustainable energy and materials science. More than 1,000 children have been engaged in the hands-on activities developed through Project iLASER at 20+ sites, primarily in after-school settings in Boys & Girls Clubs. Sites include Boys & Girls Clubs in California (Chula Vista, Imperial Beach, El Centro and Brawley); Arizona (Nogales); New Mexico (Las Cruces); and Texas (El Paso, Midland-Odessa, Edinburg and Corpus Christi). The project was co-funded between the NSF Division of Chemistry (CHE) and the Division of Research on Learning in Formal and Informal Settings (DRL).
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Southwestern CollegeDavid BrownDavid Hecht
The National Girls Collaborative Project (NGCP) seeks to maximize access to shared resources within projects and with public and private sector organizations and institutions interested in expanding girls’ participation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Funded primarily by the National Science Foundation, the NGCP is a robust national network of more than 3,000 girl-serving STEM organizations. Currently, 31 Collaboratives, serving 40 states, facilitate collaboration between more than 12,800 organizations who serve more than 7.7 million girls and 4.4 million boys. The NGCP occupies a unique role in the STEM community because it facilitates collaboration with all stakeholders who benefit from increasing diversity and engagement of women in STEM. These stakeholders form Regional Collaboratives, who are connected to local girl-serving STEM programs. Regional Collaboratives are led by leadership teams and advisory boards with representatives from K-12 education, higher education, community-based organizations, professional organizations, and industry. NGCP strengthens the capacity of girl-serving STEM projects by facilitating collaboration among programs and organizations and by sharing promising practice research, program models, and products through webinars, collaboration training, and institutes. This is accomplished through a tested comprehensive program of change that uses collaboration to expand and strengthen STEM-related opportunities for girls and women. In each replication state, the NGCP model creates a network of professionals, researchers, and practitioners, facilitating collaboration within this network, and delivering high-quality research-based professional development. Participating programs can also receive mini-grant funding to develop collaborative STEM-focused projects. To date, over 27,000 participants have been served in 241 mini-grant projects, and over 17,000 practitioners have been served through in-person events and webinars. The NGCP’s collaborative model changes the way practitioners and educators work to advance girls’ participation in STEM. It facilitates the development of practitioners in their knowledge of good gender equitable educational practices, awareness of the role of K-12 education in STEM workforce development, and mutual support of peers locally and across the United States.
SciGirls CONNECT is a broad national outreach effort to encourage educators, both formal and informal, to adopt new, research-based strategies to engage girls in STEM. SciGirls (pbskids.org/scigirls) is an Emmy award-winning television program and outreach program that draws on cutting-edge research about what engages girls in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) learning and careers. The PBS television show, kids' website, and educational outreach program have reached over 14 million girls, educators, and families, making it the most widely accessed girls' STEM program available nationally. SciGirls' videos, interactive website and hands-on activities work together to address a singular but powerful goal: to inspire, enable, and maximize STEM learning and participation for all girls, with an eye toward future STEM careers. The goal of SciGirls is to change how millions of girls think about STEM. SciGirls CONNECT (scigirlsconnect.org) includes 60 partner organizations located in schools, museums, community organizations and universities who host SciGirls clubs, camps and afterschool programs for girls. This number is intended grow to over 100 by the end of the project in 2016. SciGirls CONNECT provides mini-grants, leader training and educational resources to partner organizations. Each partner training session involves educators from a score of regional educational institutions. To date, over 700 educators have received training from over 250 affiliated organizations. The SciGirls CONNECT network is a supportive community of dedicated educators who provide the spark, the excitement and the promise of a new generation of women in STEM careers. Through our partner, the National Girls Collaborative Project, we have networked educational organizations hosting SciGirls programs with dozens of female role models from a variety of STEM fields. The SciGirls CONNECT website hosts monthly webinars, a quarterly newsletter, gender equity resources, SciGirls videos and hands-on activities. SciGirls also promotes the television, website and outreach program to thousands of elementary and middle school girls and their teachers both locally and nationally at various events.
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
In October 2009, the Tennessee Aquarium began an ambitious program, Connecting Tennessee to the World Ocean (CTWO), funded by a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. CTWO consists of several individual projects, all intended to increase the ocean literacy of Aquarium audiences and to promote their adoption of an ocean stewardship ethic. This formative evaluation report summarizes the extent to which the Aquarium has made progress toward these goals in the first year of the project and provides an information base for identifying opportunities to strengthen
In the Community Science Learning through Youth Astronomy Apprenticeships (YAA) project, underrepresented urban high school youths, working with recent college grads, conducted astronomy investigations, then translated their personal learning and enthusiasm into outreach programs for younger children, families and community members in an astronomy and space science program. Science education centers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Boston community-based after school centers and the Institute for Learning Innovation collaborated.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Irene PorroMary DussaultSusan O'ConnorJohn Belcher
SciGirls is a multimedia project designed to encourage and empower more girls to pursue careers in STEM. It is a bold and unique experiment--the first television series on PBS designed specifically for girls aged 8-13. The approach is based on the findings of prior gender research. The television show and the Web site are integrally linked. Episodes are available for distribution on many of the newest digital platforms, e.g., Vimeo and iTunes for downloads, free of charge. SciGirls launched in February 2010 and reaches over 80% of the country. This project will support further research and development to advance SciGirls' online and outreach activities. Specifically, the deliverables include: (1) enhancement of the SciGirls website on pbs.org; (2) maintenance of the SciGirls Educator Networks and outreach to new partners; and (3) R&D on other media platforms. The project's two strategic partners are the National Girls Collaborative Project (NGCP) in Seattle and The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. The NGCP links SciGirls with its network of 500 community-based science programs for girls, and The Franklin Institute coordinates an affiliate network of science museums to implement SciGirls' outreach activities. The project will also work with the Girl Scouts of America's new "Girl Scout Leadership Experience" program, which emphasizes STEM learning. The most significant web component is a social networking feature that allows girls who are interested in science to connect with peers across the nation. To date, there have been over 300,000 unique visitors and 20,000 registered "SciGirls."
The City as Learning Lab (CaLL) is a comprehensive research and development initiative designed to create new measures of audience impact in technology experiences; identify features of university-community collaboration that facilitate sustainable community programs; and produce a set of tools and resources that allow other cities to tailor creative robotics programs to unique audiences. Project partners include the University of Pittsburgh Center for Learning in Out-of-School Environments (UPCLOSE), the Community Robotics Education and Technology Empowerment (CREATE) lab at Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute, and the Georgia Institute of Technology as well as local museums, community organizations, and afterschool clubs. CaLL builds on the work of three existing youth technology programs in Pittsburgh targeting audiences ages 9-15: the Robot Diaries, Neighborhood Nets, and Robot 250. Research questions relate to creative processes in informal learning settings, use of robotics to engage diverse audiences, and changes in technological fluency after students leave the informal learning setting and apply their new knowledge and skills at home or in other learning contexts. The research incorporates data from up to 1000 program participants. Findings will establish evidence for how technological fluency can be measured, supported, and developed through informal technology learning experiences. Project deliverables include a CaLL curriculum, toolkit, new measures of audience impact, and identification of factors that support university/community collaborations. Broader impacts in informal technology education will be achieved by developing flexible toolkits that allow other communities to adapt and adopt CaLL technologies, curricula, and activities.
Hopa Mountain, in collaboration with Blackfeet Community College, One Step Further, and Ogala Lakota College, will develop "Native Science Field Centers (NSFC)" to provide year-round informal science education for youth ages 8-18 and adults. Informal science education professionals are also served through the publications and materials designed to support programs targeting Native communities. The "NSFCs" will be located on the Blackfeet, Fort Belknap, and Pine Ridge reservations. The centers will develop "TribalWatch" environmental science programs that will be disseminated to six other tribes in the Missouri River Watershed. The "Tribalwatch" programs create a STEM career ladder for youth and adults to develop scientific expertise, knowledge of monitoring and an understanding of management of local lands. New technologies will be created for the evaluation of Native science programs that incorporate indigenous evaluation methodologies. Key partners include the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC), the Field Museum of Natural History and the Science Museum of Minnesota. Deliverables include "Native Science Field Centers, ""TribalWatch" programs and a "TribalWatch" toolkit and training plan. Strategic impact will be realized through capacity building within Native communities, research and documentation of programming practices and dissemination of the toolkit and publications to informal science education professionals, 32 tribal colleges and other educational organizations that serve Native communities. It is anticipated that this project will reach 100,000 Native and non-Native youth, adults and informal science education practitioners in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Bonnie Sachatello-SawyerHelen AugareMichael Fredenberg
Girl Scouts of Western Washington and Seattle University have collaborated to develop an innovative model for science learning in youth programs. By embedding training and support on science inquiry facilitation directly into existing Girl Scout systems, the project is empowering volunteers to effectively facilitate inquiry science explorations with youth. We are engaging a new audience in the delivery of informal science education: volunteers, predominantly adult women and mothers, in community settings beyond typical science environments. New volunteers participate in science inquiry at Girl Scout recruiting events and in their ongoing support meetings, and also receive training through a project-developed curriculum adapted from the NSF-funded Fundamentals of Inquiry. These classes engage volunteers (who may not be science content specialists) in direct experiences with inquiry, and teach them specific skills to help youth plan, carry out, and synthesize learning from inquiry investigations. Science inquiry processes are seamlessly integrated into broader lessons about implementing Girl Scout programming, thus positioning scientific inquiry as a normal, expected part of Girl Scouting. This sustainable, replicable model enables community youth programs to build volunteers' skills to support inquiry, while at the same time increasing the organizational capacity to sustain quality science programming. Three Girl Scout councils are currently replicating the project, and their experiences will inform the final designs of the curriculum and supporting documentation. The project's mixed-methods evaluation is being conducted by Evaluation & Research Associates.
SciGirls TV Series, Website and Outreach is a transmedia project to encourage and empower girls to pursue careers in STEM. It is the first television series on PBS designed specifically for middle school girls, ages 8 - 12. The approach is based on gender research and best practices for STEM education for girls. Each episode features different real girls in active science investigations and engineering projects, while the series is unified by two appealing animated characters. The innovative format of the show forges a unique link to the Website, which is an integral part of the TV show itself. This request will support: * The production of ten new television episodes; * Enhancement of the SciGirls website on pbs.org; * Use of new technologies to create a SciGirls Smartphone app and interactive games; * Expansion of the SciGirls Museum Affiliates collaborative; a new SciGirls Mentorship Program with the AAUW and other professional organizations of scientists and engineers; and development of a new partnership with the Girl Scouts of the USA. The project's strategic partners are the National Girls Collaborative Project (NGCP) in Seattle and The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. The NGCP links SciGirls with its network of 500 community-based science programs for girls, and The Franklin Institute helps coordinate the Museum Affiliates, a network of science museums that implements SciGirls outreach activities. The project will also work with the Girl Scouts of America's new "Girl Scout Leadership Experience" program which emphasizes STEM learning. The most significant web component is a social networking feature that allows girls who are interested in science to connect with peers across the nation. To date, there have been over 800,000 unique visitors and 50,000 registered "SciGirls." SciGirls TV is produced by Twin Cities Public Television and distributed by PBS Plus. Launched in February 2010, SciGirls Season One broadcasts reached over 86% of U.S. households. In addition, all programs are streamed on pbskids.org and available on iTunes free of charge. The Spanish version will be distributed on V-me. Two separate project evaluations will be conducted. Dr. Barbara Flagg will evaluate how SciGirls improves girls' knowledge and understanding of science and engineering and gives them greater confidence in their abilities in STEM. Valerie Knight-Williams will investigate the use of SciGirls outreach materials with a national network of after-school educators.