GPS: Geoscience Partnership Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schuster, Dwight

2010-01-01

To promote and expand geoscience literacy in the United States, meaningful partnerships between research scientists and educators must be developed and sustained. For two years, science and education faculty from an urban research university and secondary science teachers from a large urban school district have prepared 11th and 12th grade…

Faculty Teaching Perspectives about an Urban-Focused Teacher Education Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ukpokodu, Omiunota N.

2017-01-01

This qualitative study investigates the perspectives of faculty teaching engagement in a uniquely designed, collaborative urban-focused teacher education program. The study analyzes interviews conducted with seven participating faculty from both the School of Education and the College of Arts and Sciences in an urban university. The findings…

Cultivation of science identity through authentic science in an urban high school classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chapman, Angela; Feldman, Allan

2017-06-01

This study examined how a contextually based authentic science experience affected the science identities of urban high school students who have been marginalized during their K-12 science education. We examined students' perceptions of the intervention as an authentic science experience, how the experience influenced their science identity, as well as their perceptions about who can do science. We found that the students believed the experience to be one of authentic science, that their science identity was positively influenced by participation in the experience, and that they demonstrated a shift in perceptions from stereotypical to more diverse views of scientists. Implications for science education are discussed.

Urban Middle-School Science Teachers Beliefs about the Influence of Their Astronomer-Educator Partnerships on Students' Astronomy Learner Characteristics

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Miranda, Rommel J.

2012-01-01

This qualitative study investigates the extent to which urban middle-school science teachers' beliefs about their students' astronomy learner characteristics were influenced by their partnership with an astronomer in their classroom. Twelve urban middle-school science teachers were interviewed after their participation in Project ASTRO during the…

A Longitudinal Study of the Educational and Career Trajectories of Female Participants of an Urban Informal Science Education Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fadigan, Kathleen A.; Hammrich, Penny L.

2004-01-01

The purpose of this longitudinal case study is to describe the educational trajectories of a sample of 152 young women from urban, low-income, single-parent families who participated in the Women in Natural Sciences (WINS) program during high school. Utilizing data drawn from program records, surveys, and interviews, this study also attempts to…

The Three C's for Urban Science Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Emdin, Chris

2008-01-01

In this article, the author outlines briefly what he calls the three C's--a set of tools that can be used to improve urban science education. The author then describes ways that these tools can support students who have traditionally been marginalized. These three aligned and closely connected tools provide practical ways to engage students in…

The Black-White "Achievement Gap" as a Perennial Challenge of Urban Science Education: A Sociocultural and Historical Overview with Implications for Research and Practice.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Norman, Obed; Ault, Charles R., Jr.; Bentz, Bonnie; Meskimen, Lloyd

2001-01-01

Explores how sociocultural factors involved in the manifestation and eventual disappearance of the gap for these groups may shed light on how to address the achievement gap for African American students in urban science education. (Contains 47 references.) (DDR)

Affiliation and Alienation: Hip-Hop, Rap, and Urban Science Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Emdin, Christopher

2010-01-01

The critiques of rap artists and other participants in hip-hop culture provide data for teachers and researchers to investigate the attitudes of US urban youth towards schooling. This study explores the complex relationships between hip-hop and science education by examining how rap lyrics project beliefs about schooling, the relevance of existing…

Chapter 11: City-Wide Collaborations for Urban Climate Education

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Snyder, Steven; Hoffstadt, Rita Mukherjee; Allen, Lauren B.; Crowley, Kevin; Bader, Daniel A.; Horton, Radley M.

2014-01-01

Although cities cover only 2 percent of the Earth's surface, more than 50 percent of the world's people live in urban environments, collectively consuming 75 percent of the Earth's resources. Because of their population densities, reliance on infrastructure, and role as centers of industry, cities will be greatly impacted by, and will play a large role in, the reduction or exacerbation of climate change. However, although urban dwellers are becoming more aware of the need to reduce their carbon usage and to implement adaptation strategies, education efforts on these strategies have not been comprehensive. To meet the needs of an informed and engaged urban population, a more systemic, multiplatform and coordinated approach is necessary. The Climate and Urban Systems Partnership (CUSP) is designed to explore and address this challenge. Spanning four cities-Philadelphia, New York, Pittsburgh, and Washington, DC-the project is a partnership between the Franklin Institute, the Columbia University Center for Climate Systems Research, the University of Pittsburgh Learning Research and Development Center, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, New York Hall of Science, and the Marian Koshland Science Museum of the National Academy of Sciences. The partnership is developing a comprehensive, interdisciplinary network to educate urban residents about climate science and the urban impacts of climate change.

Science education in urban settings: Seeking new ways of praxis through critical ethnography

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Calabrese Barton, Angela

2001-10-01

The challenges faced in urban science education are deeply rooted in the ongoing struggle for racial, class and gender equity. Part of this struggle is tied to huge differences in class and involves making more equitable the distribution of resources. Another part of this struggle is tied to the rich diversity of children who attend urban schools and involves generating new ways of understanding, valuing, and genuinely incorporating into school-based practices the culture, language, beliefs, and experiences that these children bring to school. Thus, this article argues that to address these two challenges - and indeed to achieve a more just science education for all urban students - explicitly political research methodologies must be considered and incorporated into urban education. One potential route for this is critical ethnography, for this kind of methodology emerges collaboratively from the lives of the researcher and the researched and is centrally about praxis and a political commitment to the struggle for liberation and in defense of human rights. In making this argument, I have drawn from stories from my own research with homeless children.

Urban School Leadership for Elementary Science Education: Meeting the Needs of English Language Learners

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Alarcon, Maricela H.

2012-01-01

Science education reform and state testing accountability call upon principals to become instructional leaders in science. Specifically, elementary school principals must take an active role in science instruction to effectively improve science education for all students including English Language Learners. As such, the research questioned posed…

Potentialities beyond Deficit Perspectives: Globalization, Culture and Urban Science Education in the Bronx

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Pitts, Wesley

2011-01-01

The major focus of this ethnographic study is devoted to exploring the confluence of global and local referents of science education in the context of an urban chemistry laboratory classroom taught by a first-generation Filipino-American male teacher. This study investigates encounters between the teacher and four second-generation immigrant…

Becoming urban science teachers by transforming middle-school classrooms: A study of the Urban Science Education Fellows Program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Furman, Melina Gabriela

The current scenario in American education shows a large achievement and opportunity gap in science between urban children in poverty and more privileged youth. Research has shown that one essential factor that accounts for this gap is the shortage of qualified science teachers in urban schools. Teaching science in a high poverty school presents unique challenges to beginner teachers. Limited resources and support and a significant cultural divide with their students are some of the common problems that cause many novice teachers to quit their jobs or to start enacting what has been described as "the pedagogy of poverty." In this study I looked at the case of the Urban Science Education Fellows Program. This program aimed to prepare preservice teachers (i.e. "fellows") to enact socially just science pedagogies in urban classrooms. I conducted qualitative case studies of three fellows. Fellows worked over one year with science teachers in middle-school classrooms in order to develop transformative action research studies. My analysis focused on how fellows coauthored hybrid spaces within these studies that challenged the typical ways science was taught and learned in their classrooms towards a vision of socially just teaching. By coauthoring these hybrid spaces, fellows developed grounded generativity, i.e. a capacity to create new teaching scenarios rooted in the pragmatic realities of an authentic classroom setting. Grounded generativity included building upon their pedagogical beliefs in order to improvise pedagogies with others, repositioning themselves and their students differently in the classroom and constructing symbols of possibility to guide their practice. I proposed authentic play as the mechanism that enabled fellows to coauthor hybrid spaces. Authentic play involved contexts of moderate risk and of distributed expertise and required fellows to be positioned at the intersection of the margins and the center of the classroom community of practice. In all, this study demonstrates that engaging in classroom reform can support preservice teachers in developing specialized tools to teach science in urban classrooms.

Dimensions of Communication in Urban Science Education: Interactions and Transactions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Emdin, Christopher

2011-01-01

This paper is birthed from my lifelong experiences as student, teacher, administrator, and researcher in urban science classrooms. This includes my years as a minority student in biology, chemistry, and physics classrooms, 10 tears as science teacher and high school science department chair, 5-years conducting research on youth experiences in…

Urban science classrooms and new possibilities: on intersubjectivity and grammar in the third space

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Emdin, Christopher

2009-03-01

In this article I explore research in urban science education inspired by the work of Kris Gutierrez in a paper based on her 2005 Scribner Award. It addresses key points in Gutierrez's work by exploring theoretical frameworks for research and approaches to teaching and research that expand the discourse on the agency of urban youth in corporate school settings. The work serves as an overview of under-discussed approaches and theoretical frameworks to consider in teaching and conducting research with marginalized urban youth in urban science classrooms.

A longitudinal study of the educational and career trajectories of female participants of an urban informal science education program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fadigan, Kathleen A.; Hammrich, Penny L.

2004-10-01

The purpose of this longitudinal case study is to describe the educational trajectories of a sample of 152 young women from urban, low-income, single-parent families who participated in the Women in Natural Sciences (WINS) program during high school. Utilizing data drawn from program records, surveys, and interviews, this study also attempts to determine how the program affected the participants' educational and career choices to provide insight into the role informal science education programs play in increasing the participation of women and minorities in science, math, engineering, and technology (SMET)-related fields. Findings revealed 109 participants (93.16%) enrolled in a college program following high school completion. Careers in medical or health-related fields followed by careers in SMET emerged as the highest ranking career paths with 24 students (23.76%) and 21 students (20.79%), respectively, employed in or pursuing careers in these areas. The majority of participants perceived having staff to talk to, the job skills learned, and having the museum as a safe place to go as having influenced their educational and career decisions. These findings reflect the need for continued support of informal science education programs for urban girls and at-risk youth.

Boundary Spanners as Bridges of Student and School Discourses in an Urban Science and Mathematics High School

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Buxton, Cory A.; Carlone, Heidi B.; Carlone, David

2005-01-01

A key to improving urban science and mathematics education is to facilitate the mutual understanding of the participants involved and then look for strategies to bridge differences. Educators need new theoretical tools to do so. In this paper the argument is made that the concept of "boundary spanner" is such a tool. Boundary spanners…

Best Policies and Practices in Urban Educational Reform: A Summary of Empirical Analysis Focusing on Student Achievements and Equity.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kim, Jason J.; Crasco, Linda M.

Under the sponsorship of the National Science Foundation, 22 urban school districts have been involved in a long-term educational reform through the Urban Systemic Initiative (USI) program since 1994. This paper presents a brief summary of findings regarding best policies and practices in the educational reform effort focusing on student…

Hip-Hop, the "Obama Effect," and Urban Science Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Emdin, Christopher; Lee, Okhee

2012-01-01

Background/Context: With the ever increasing diversity of schools, and the persistent need to develop teaching strategies for the students who attend today's urban schools, hip-hop culture has been proposed to be a means through which urban youth can find success in school. As a result, studies of the role of hip-hop in urban education have grown…

Science Education for Empowerment and Social Change: A Case Study of a Teacher Educator in Urban Pakistan.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zahur, Rubina; Barton, Angela Calabrese; Upadhyay, Bhaskar Raj

2002-01-01

Discusses the purpose of science education for children of the very poor classes in caste-oriented developing countries such as Pakistan. Presents a case study of one teacher educator whose beliefs and practices sharply deviated from the norm--she believes that science education ought to be about empowering students to make physical and political…

Improving Urban Science Education: New Roles for Teachers, Students, and Researchers. Reverberations: Contemporary Curriculum and Pedagogy

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Tobin, Kenneth, Ed.; Elmesky, Rowhea, Ed.; Seiler, Gale, Ed.

2005-01-01

Many would argue that the state of urban science education has been static for the past several decades and that there is little to learn from it. Rather than accepting this deficit perspective, this book strives to recognize and understand the successes that exist there by systematically documenting seven years of research into issues salient to…

Planning for Reform-Based Science: Case Studies of Two Urban Elementary Teachers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mangiante, Elaine Silva

2018-02-01

The intent of national efforts to frame science education standards is to promote students' development of scientific practices and conceptual understanding for their future role as scientifically literate citizens (NRC 2012). A guiding principle of science education reform is that all students receive equitable opportunities to engage in rigorous science learning. Yet, implementation of science education reform depends on teachers' instructional decisions. In urban schools serving students primarily from poor, diverse communities, teachers typically face obstacles in providing reform-based science due to limited resources and accountability pressures, as well as a culture of teacher-directed pedagogy, and deficit views of students. The purpose of this qualitative research was to study two white, fourth grade teachers from high-poverty urban schools, who were identified as transforming their science teaching and to investigate how their beliefs, knowledge bases, and resources shaped their planning for reform-based science. Using the Shavelson and Stern's decision model for teacher planning to analyze evidence gathered from interviews, documents, planning meetings, and lesson observations, the findings indicated their planning for scientific practices was influenced by the type and extent of professional development each received, each teacher's beliefs about their students and their background, and the mission and learning environment each teacher envisioned for the reform to serve their students. The results provided specific insights into factors that impacted their planning in high-poverty urban schools and indicated considerations for those in similar contexts to promote teachers' planning for equitable science learning opportunities by all students.

Planning Science Instruction for Critical Thinking: Two Urban Elementary Teachers' Responses to a State Science Assessment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mangiante, Elaine Silva

2013-01-01

Science education reform standards have shifted focus from exploration and experimentation to evidence-based explanation and argumentation to prepare students with knowledge for a changing workforce and critical thinking skills to evaluate issues requiring increasing scientific literacy. However, in urban schools serving poor, diverse populations,…

Fostering Spaces of Student Ownership in Middle School Science

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

O'Neill, Tara B.

2010-01-01

A critical challenge in urban science education is determining how to provide empowering science learning experiences for all students. In an effort to address the achievement gap in science education, I have focused on the concept of ownership, specifically when and how students gain ownership in science learning. This paper presents a teacher…

Career moves of urban science teachers: Negotiating constancy, change, and confirmation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rinke, Carol Riegelman

2007-12-01

This dissertation addresses the issue of teacher retention in urban science classrooms, in which a revolving door of new teachers leads to an inexperienced teaching force and reduced academic attainment for students. Urban science teachers are particularly susceptible to attrition due to extensive professional opportunities outside the classroom. This study follows eight case study teachers in an urban school district in order to better understand how today's urban science teachers think about their careers and career moves. Based on traditional research on teacher retention and existing literature on teachers' professional lives, this study focuses in particular on urban science teachers' professional priorities, community participation, and process of career decision making in order to determine the ways in which these factors may be consequential for their career paths. The study uses a qualitative case study methodology. Data collection methods include a survey of all first, second, and third year science teachers in one urban district followed by the selection of eight case study teachers using a variety of demographic, certification, and workplace characteristics. In-depth case studies included monthly interviews and professional observations over parts of two school years. The experiences and perspectives of the eight case study teachers revealed three patterns. First, the eight case study teachers followed two distinct paths through the profession, those who aimed to integrate and were oriented toward the educational system and those who wanted to participate and oriented themselves away from the educational system. These professional trajectories were influential in shaping case study teachers' experiences in schools as well as their career directions. Second, the eight case study teachers continually considered their professional alternatives, either within or outside of the educational system. Finally, the case study teachers aimed to get past the challenges inherent in urban teaching and reach professional confirmation before moving on to new roles and responsibilities. These themes indicate the centrality of urban science teachers' professional orientations for recruitment, preparation, and retention, demonstrate the need for in-depth and longitudinal research on teacher retention, and suggest the pivotal nature of professional growth in career mobility.

Science Education in Tanzania: Challenges and Policy Responses

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Semali, Ladislaus M.; Mehta, Khanjan

2012-01-01

Students in rural and urban areas in Tanzania, and elsewhere in Africa, continue to have limited or lack access to culturally and employment-relevant science education. The current case study, a 2007-2009 examination of barriers to the reform movement of science education in Tanzania, uses data from interviews, classroom observations, document…

Urban school leadership for elementary science instruction: Identifying and activating resources in an undervalued school subject

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Spillane, James P.; Diamond, John B.; Walker, Lisa J.; Halverson, Rich; Jita, Loyiso

2001-10-01

This article explores school leadership for elementary school science teaching in an urban setting. We examine how school leaders bring resources together to enhance science instruction when there appear to be relatively few resources available for it. From our study of 13 Chicago elementary (K-8) schools' efforts to lead instructional change in mathematics, language arts, and science education, we show how resources for leading instruction are unequally distributed across subject areas. We also explore how over time leaders in one school successfully identified and activated resources for leading change in science education. The result has been a steady, although not always certain, development of science as an instructional area in the school. We argue that leading change in science education involves the identification and activation of material resources, the development of teachers' and school leaders' human capital, and the development and use of social capital.

Outreach and education in urban Los Angeles Schools: integration of research into middle and high school science curriculum through the NSF GK-12 SEE-LA program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Daniel, J. C.; Hogue, T. S.; Moldwin, M. B.; Nonacs, P.

2012-12-01

A National Science Foundation Graduate Teaching Fellows in K- 12 Education program at UCLA (SEE-LA; http://measure.igpp.ucla.edu/GK12-SEE-LA/ ) partners UCLA faculty and graduate students (fellows) with urban middle and high school science teachers and their students to foster programs of science and engineering exploration that bring the environment of Los Angeles into the classroom. UCLA science and engineering graduate fellows serve as scientists-in-residence at four partner schools to integrate inquiry-based science lessons, facilitate advancements in science content teaching, and ultimately, to improve their own science communication skills. As part of their fellowship, graduate students are required to develop three "major" lessons, including one based on their PhD research at UCLA. During the first four years of the project, the SEE-LA fellows have developed a range of research-based activities, including lessons on sustainable fisheries, ecosystems and remote sensing, earthquakes, urban water quality including invertebrate observations, and post-fire soil chemistry, among others. This presentation will provide an overview of the SEE-LA GK-12 program and development of research lessons that also address California State Science Standards. We also discuss potential sustainability of GK-12 type outreach and education programs. The SEE-LA program has provided development of graduate student communication and teaching skills while also contributing significantly to the integration of science education into K-12 curriculum in Los Angeles schools.

Urban Science Classrooms and New Possibilities: On Intersubjectivity and Grammar in the Third Space

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Emdin, Christopher

2009-01-01

In this article I explore research in urban science education inspired by the work of Kris Gutierrez in a paper based on her 2005 Scribner Award. It addresses key points in Gutierrez's work by exploring theoretical frameworks for research and approaches to teaching and research that expand the discourse on the agency of urban youth in corporate…

Math Is All around Us: Exploring the Teaching, Learning, and Professional Development of Three Urban Mathematics Teachers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cosby, Missy; Horton, Akesha; Berzina-Pitcher, Inese

2017-01-01

The MSUrbanSTEM fellowship program aims to support science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) educators teaching in an urban context. In this chapter, we used a multiple case studies methodology to examine the qualitatively different ways three urban mathematics educators implemented a yearlong project in their mathematics classrooms…

Advocating for Equitable Science-Learning Opportunities for Girls in an Urban City Youth Club and the Roadblocks Faced by Women Science Educators.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Davis, Kathleen S.

2002-01-01

Reports on a study that examined the obstacles women science educators faced as they facilitated Explorers, an after-school science program for girls aged 6-12. The program provides girls with opportunities to legitimately participate in science activities. (Contains 39 references.) (Author/YDS)

Retired African American female urban middle school science teachers' beliefs and practices

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Whitney, Frances M.

The purpose of this paper is to give a voice to a dedicated group of professionals who unselfishly labored twenty-five plus years educating the children of America's poorest taxpaying citizens. These retired African American female urban middle school science teachers (RAAFUMSST) explain the experiences that gave them the fortitude to stay in the urban school system until their retirement. The goal is to give you a glimpse into the distractions, challenges, and victories the teachers encountered as they strove to teach science in an overcrowded, underserviced, and depressed urban school district of a major city. Most times sacrificing self for service, the participants of this study held fast to their beliefs that all of America's children, regardless of their parents' socioeconomic status, deserve a quality education. It is through individual interviews that the five retired science teachers of this project share their reflections on the events and circumstances that altered their labor of love. Critical Race Theory (CRT) serves as the theoretical frame for this study.

Resiliency to Success: Supporting Novice Urban Teachers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Huisman, Sarah; Singer, Nancy Robb; Catapano, Susan

2010-01-01

Each year, the National Center for Educational Statistics, through the US Department of Education Institute of Educational Sciences, publishes information about the need for millions of new teachers in the USA. Many of these positions are in urban schools. What makes new teachers beat the odds and remain in challenging schools? This study…

Bridging Theory and Practice: Using Hip-Hop Pedagogy as a Culturally Relevant Approach in the Urban Science Classroom

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Adjapong, Edmund S.

2017-01-01

This dissertation explores the context of urban science education as it relates to the achievement and engagement of urban youth. This study provides a framework for Hip-Hop Pedagogy, an approach to teaching and learning anchored in the creative elements of Hip-Hop culture, in STEM as an innovative approach to teaching and learning demonstrates…

Environmental challenges threatening the growth of urban agriculture in the United States.

PubMed

Wortman, Sam E; Lovell, Sarah Taylor

2013-09-01

Urban agriculture, though often difficult to define, is an emerging sector of local food economies in the United States. Although urban and agricultural landscapes are often integrated in countries around the world, the establishment of mid- to large-scale food production in the U.S. urban ecosystem is a relatively new development. Many of the urban agricultural projects in the United States have emerged from social movements and nonprofit organizations focused on urban renewal, education, job training, community development, and sustainability initiatives. Although these social initiatives have traction, critical knowledge gaps exist regarding the science of food production in urban ecosystems. Developing a science-based approach to urban agriculture is essential to the economic and environmental sustainability of the movement. This paper reviews abiotic environmental factors influencing urban cropping systems, including soil contamination and remediation; atmospheric pollutants and altered climatic conditions; and water management, sources, and safety. This review paper seeks to characterize the limited state of the science on urban agricultural systems and identify future research questions most relevant to urban farmers, land-use planners, and environmental consultants. Copyright © by the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America, Inc.

Scientific Discourse in Three Urban Classrooms: The Role of the Teacher in Engaging High School Students in Argumentation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McNeill, Katherine L.; Pimentel, Diane Silva

2010-01-01

Argumentation is a core practice of science and has recently been advocated as an essential goal of science education. Our research focuses on the discourse in urban high school science classrooms in which the teachers used the same global climate change curriculum. We analyzed transcripts from three teachers' classrooms examining both the…

Science in the 21st Century: More than Just the Facts

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Price, Jeremy F.; Pimentel, Diane Silva; McNeill, Katherine L.; Barnett, Michael; Strauss, Eric

2011-01-01

The authors have worked to meet the demands of the 21st century by using the Urban EcoLab, an urban ecology curriculum based on the National Science Education Standards. This curriculum emphasizes the local and community-based nature of science and is freely available for teachers to view, download, and use. As part of the curriculum the authors…

Urban fifth graders' connections-making between formal earth science content and their lived experiences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brkich, Katie Lynn

2014-03-01

Earth science education, as it is traditionally taught, involves presenting concepts such as weathering, erosion, and deposition using relatively well-known examples—the Grand Canyon, beach erosion, and others. However, these examples—which resonate well with middle- and upper-class students—ill-serve students of poverty attending urban schools who may have never traveled farther from home than the corner store. In this paper, I explore the use of a place-based educational framework in teaching earth science concepts to urban fifth graders and explore the connections they make between formal earth science content and their lived experiences using participant-driven photo elicitation techniques. I argue that students are able to gain a sounder understanding of earth science concepts when they are able to make direct observations between the content and their lived experiences and that when such direct observations are impossible they make analogies of appearance, structure, and response to make sense of the content. I discuss additionally the importance of expanding earth science instruction to include man-made materials, as these materials are excluded traditionally from the curriculum yet are most immediately available to urban students for examination.

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. New York City Department of Education. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. New York City Department of Education. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

A Longitudinal Study of Implementing Reality Pedagogy in an Urban Science Classroom: Effects, Challenges, and Recommendations for Science Teaching and Learning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Borges, Sheila Ivelisse

Statistics indicate that students who reside in forgotten places do not engage in science-related careers. This is problematic because we are not tapping into diverse talent that could very well make scientific strides and because there is a moral obligation for equity as discussed in Science for all (AAAS, 1989). Research suggests that one of the reasons for this disparity is that students feel alienated from science early on in their K--12 education due to their inability to connect culturally with their teachers (Tobin, 2001). Urban students share an urban culture, a way of knowing and being that is separate from that of the majority of the teacher workforce whom have not experienced the nuances of urban culture. These teachers have challenges when teaching in urban classrooms and have a myriad of difficulties such as classroom management, limited access to experienced science colleagues and limited resources to teach effectively. This leads them to leaving the teaching profession affecting already high teacher attrition rates in urban areas (Ingersol, 2001). In order to address these issues a culturally relevant pedagogy, called reality pedagogy (Emdin, 2011), was implemented in an urban science classroom using a bricolage (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005) of different theories such as social capital (Bourdieu, 1986) and critical race theory (Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1995), along with reality pedagogy to construct a qualitative sociocultural lens. Reality pedagogy has five tools, which are cogenerative dialogues, coteaching, cosmopolitanism, context, and content. In this longitudinal critical ethnography a science teacher in an alternative teaching certification program was supported for two years as she implemented the tools of reality pedagogy with her urban students. Findings revealed that the science teacher enacted four racial microaggressions against her students, which negatively affected the teacher-student relationship and science teaching and learning. As the tools of reality pedagogy were implemented the teacher-student relationship in the science classroom changed from negative to positive. This then impacted the teachers' decision whether to stay in the teaching profession. Where initially she wanted to leave teaching due to the disconnect with her culturally diverse urban students she decided to stay teaching in urban schools as a consequence of implementing reality pedagogy. In addition, students together with their science teacher were able to redefine the traditional science curriculum by including their community health and science concerns. This led to an increase in students' interest in school science because their urban science interests were incorporated in the science curriculum. Moreover, in order to inform other science teacher educators and teachers on how to implement reality pedagogy this study describes how it was implemented, the challenges that were encountered, and recommendations of an effective sequence of the tools.

Hip-Hop as a Resource for Understanding the Urban Context: A Review of Christopher Edmin's--Science Education for the Hip-Hop Generation, Sense Publishers, Rotterdam, 2010

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brown, Bryan

2010-01-01

This review explores Edmin's "Science education for the hip-hop generation" by documenting how he frames hip-hop as a means to access urban student culture. He argues that hip-hop is more than a mere music genre, but rather a culture that provides young people with ways of connecting to the world. Two primary ideas emerged as central to…

77 FR 37064 - Request for Nominations for the Invasive Species Advisory Committee; Extension of Submission...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2012-06-20

... research and education societies; urban and suburban park management; energy and mineral resource..., boating, and angling; invasive plant or animal science; plant pathology; environmental education; science...; natural resource political science; and relevant areas of law and regulatory policy. Nominees should have...

Exploring the Potential and Complexity of a Critical Pedagogy of Place in Urban Science Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schindel Dimick, Alexandra

2016-01-01

What does it mean to engage in critical pedagogy of place in formal science education? Although Gruenewald's (2003a) theoretical construct of a critical pedagogy of place has been heavily cited, there is nonetheless a lack of empirical research on critical pedagogy of place, particularly within formal science education. This paper provides a case…

Only STEM Can Save Us? Examining Race, Place, and STEM Education as Property

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bullock, Erika C.

2017-01-01

The rhetoric about science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education in urban schools reflects a desire to imagine a new city that is poised to compete in a STEM-centered future. Therefore, STEM has been positioned as a critical part of urban education reform efforts. In various US cities, schools labeled as "failing"…

Aiding cities in their work on climate change adaptation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hamilton, P.

2013-12-01

Urban areas around the world are at the frontlines of climate change because of their enormous aggregate populations and because of their vulnerability to multiple climate change stressors. Half of our planet's 7.1 billion inhabitants currently reside in cities with six billion people projected to call cities home by 2050. In the U.S. and much of the rest of the world, cities are warming at twice the rate of the planet. Superimposed on urban climate changes driven by global warming are the regional effects of urban heat domes driven by large differences in land use, building materials, and vegetation between cities and their rural surroundings. In megacities - those with populations exceeding 10 million people - such as Tokyo - urban heat domes can contribute to daytime temperatures that soar to more than 11°C higher than their rural surroundings. In addition, the localized warming can alter patterns of precipitation in metropolitan regions and perhaps even influence the frequency and severity of severe weather. Municipal officials need to accelerate their efforts to prepare and implement climate change adaptation strategies but what are the institutions that can help enable this work? Informal science education centers can play vital roles because they are overwhelmingly in urban settings and because they can act as ';competent outsiders.' They are neither responsible for conducting climate change research nor accountable for implementing public policies to address climate change. They instead can play an essential role of ensuring that solid science informs the formulation of good practices and policies. It is incumbent, therefore, for informal science education centers to accelerate and enhance their abilities to help translate scientific insights into on-the-ground actions. This session will explore the potential roles of informal science education centers to advance climate change adaptation through a review of the urban climate change education initiatives for municipal officials that the Science Museum of Minnesota has implemented over the past two years.

Educational Turbulence: The Influence of Macro and Micro-Policy on Science Education Reform

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Johnson, Carla C.

2013-01-01

Enactment of federal educational policy has direct implications for states and local school districts across the nation, particularly in the areas of accountability and funding. This study utilized constructivist grounded theory to examine the impact of policy on science education reform in a large, urban school district over a 5-year period. The…

Increasing Resilience Through Engagement In Sea Level Rise Community Science Initiatives.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chilton, L. A.; Rindge, H.

2017-12-01

Science literate and engaged members of the public, including students, are critical to building climate resilient communities. USC Sea Grant facilitates programs that work to build and strengthen these connections. The Urban Tides Community Science Initiative (Urban Tides) and the Youth Exploring Sea Level Rise Science Program (YESS) engage communities across the boundaries of public engagement, K-12 education, and informal education. YESS is an experiential sea level rise education program that combines classroom learning, field investigations and public presentations. Students explore sea level rise using a new curricula, collect their own data on sea level rise, develop communication products, and present their findings to city governments, researchers, and others. Urban Tides engages community members, informal education centers, K-12 students, and local government leaders in a citizen science program photo- documenting extreme high tides, erosion and coastal flooding in Southern California. Images provide critical information to help calibrate scientific models used to identify locations vulnerable to damage from future sea level rise. These tools and information enable community leaders and local governments to set priorities, guidelines, and update policies as they plan strategies that will help the region adapt. The program includes a mobile app for data collection, an open database to view photos, a lesson plan, and community beach walks. Urban Tides has led to an increase in data and data-gathering capacity for regional scientists, an increase in public participation in science, and an increase in ocean and climate literacy among initiative participants. Both of these programs bring informed and diverse voices into the discussion of how to adapt and build climate resilient communities. USC Sea Grant will share impacts and lessons learned from these two unique programs.

The kids at Hamilton Elementary School: Purposes and practices for co-opting science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ortiz, Loaiza

The purpose of this study was to explore youth's purposes and motivations for engaging in science through the lens of science practices. The construct of science practices allowed me to see science in youths' lives in a holistic way, shaped by social, political, historical, economic and cultural forces. The framework for understanding urban youths' science practices is grounded in the intersections of critical and feminist theory, sociocultural learning theories, especially as applied in research in urban science education, and recent work in critical literacy studies. As I explored the answers to my research questions---(1) When 5th grade youth, living in predominantly Latino communities struggling with urban poverty, engage in science how and why do they co-opt science in ways that result in changes in participation in science? (2) What are the science practices that facilitate youths' coopting of science? And how are those practices framed by context (school, out-of-school), content (LiFE curriculum), and funds of knowledge? (3) In what ways are science practices expressions of youths' scientific literacy? And (4) In what ways do youth use science practices as tools for expressing identities and agency?---I engaged in feminist ethnography with embedded case studies. Data were collected in 2004 in school and in out of school settings. I recorded numerous informal conversations, interviews, and observations both during after-school and students' regular science and non-science classes. Findings describe how and why students co-opted science for purposes that make sense for their lives. These purposes included gaining and activating resources, building and maintaining social relationships, bridging home and school knowledge, positioning themselves with authority, and constructing science identities. Findings also explored what practices facilitated youth's co-opting of science. I highlighted three practices: making ideas public, storytelling and prioritizing and using evidence. Finally, I present an in-depth analysis of the science practice of storytelling. Analysis revealed that students engaged in storytelling to facilitate co-opting of science by: allowing them to change the discourse of the science classroom, to seek legitimacy, and to position themselves with authority. I end with implications for urban science education, teacher education and for future research.

Rural Science Education: Valuing Local Knowledge

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Avery, Leanne M.

2013-01-01

Whether playing outdoors or working on the farm, rural children acquire science and engineering skills throughout their daily lives. Although 11.4 million children in the United States grow up in rural areas, compared to 14.6 million in urban areas, relatively little attention is given to rural science education. This article demonstrates that…

Using Learning Stories to Capture "Gifted" and "Hard Worker" Mindsets within a NYC Specialized High School for the Sciences

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Pride, Leah D.

2014-01-01

All science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) educators working in urban public school systems are expected to provide opportunities for students to develop foundational scientific literacy skills in mathematics and science learning. However, the demands on STEM educators teaching the "gifted" or…

Science Education in a Secular Age

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Long, David E.

2013-01-01

A college science education instructor tells his students he rejects evolution. What should we think? The scene unfolds in one of the largest urban centers in the world. If we are surprised, why? Expanding on Federica Raia's (2012) first-hand experience with this scenario, I broaden her discussion by considering the complexity of science education…

Planning for Reform-Based Science: Case Studies of Two Urban Elementary Teachers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mangiante, Elaine Silva

2018-01-01

The intent of national efforts to frame science education standards is to promote students' development of scientific practices and conceptual understanding for their future role as scientifically literate citizens (NRC 2012). A guiding principle of science education reform is that all students receive equitable opportunities to engage in rigorous…

Indigenous and Western Knowledges in Science Education: An Ethnographic Study of Rural and Urban Secondary Schools and Classrooms in Kenya

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

O'Hern, Darren M.

2010-01-01

In Kenya, indigenous knowledges related to the natural sciences are not considered in the formal science education of secondary students. Despite the prevalence of studies that examine indigenous knowledges in Kenyan school and community contexts, the perspectives of students and teachers concerning indigenous natural science knowledges and their…

Informal Science Education for Girls: Careers in Science and Effective Program Elements

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fadigan, Kathleen A.; Hammrich, Penny L.

2005-01-01

Addressing the need for continued support of after-school and summer science enrichment programs for urban girls and at-risk youth, this paper describes the educational and career paths of a sample of young women who participated in the Women in Natural Sciences (WINS) program during high school. This study also attempts to determine how the…

Social Justice, Place, and Equitable Science Education: Broadening Urban Students' Opportunities to Learn

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Leonard, Jacqueline; Chamberlin, Scott A.; Johnson, Joy B.; Verma, Geeta

2016-01-01

In this paper, results from a 2-year informal science education study are presented. Children (aged 8-12) in this study participated in multi-aged groups to learn science within the context of paleontology and climate change. The goals of the project were to increase science content knowledge among underrepresented minority students and to enhance…

The (Un)Bearable Educational Lightness of Common Practices: On the Use of Urban Spaces by Schoolchildren

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gomes, Elisabete Xavier

2012-01-01

The present paper is about the author's current research on children's education in urban contexts. It departs from the rising offer of programmes for school children in out-of-school contexts (e.g. museums, libraries, science centres). It asks what makes these practices educational (and not just interesting, entertaining and/or audience…

Science education in a secular age

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Long, David E.

2013-03-01

A college science education instructor tells his students he rejects evolution. What should we think? The scene unfolds in one of the largest urban centers in the world. If we are surprised, why? Expanding on Federica Raia's (2012) first-hand experience with this scenario, I broaden her discussion by considering the complexity of science education in a secular age. Enjoining Raia within the framework of Charles Taylor's A Secular Age, I task the science education community to consider the broad strokes of science, religious faith, and the complexity of modernity in its evolving, hybridized forms. Building upon anthropological approaches to science education research, I articulate a framework to more fully account for who, globally, is a Creationist, and what this means for our views of ethically responsive science education.

The effectiveness of a head-heart-hands model for natural and environmental science learning in urban schools.

PubMed

Jagannathan, Radha; Camasso, Michael J; Delacalle, Maia

2018-02-01

We describe an environmental and natural science program called Nurture thru Nature (NtN) that seeks to improve mathematics and science performance of students in disadvantaged communities, and to increase student interest in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) careers. The program draws conceptual guidance from the Head-Heart-Hands model that informs the current educational movement to foster environmental understanding and sustainability. Employing an experimental design and data from seven cohorts of students, we find some promising, albeit preliminary, indications that the program can increase students' science knowledge and grades in mathematics, science and language arts. We discuss the special adaptations that environmental and sustainability education programs need to incorporate if they are to be successful in today's resource depleted urban schools. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Universities Reaching Outwards: Science Education Partnerships with Urban School Systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sandifer, Cody

2013-03-01

The goals of this talk are to: (1) describe how universities, physics departments, and individual faculty can partner with urban school systems to benefit K-16 students, teacher education programs, and university instructors, (2) summarize research on effective university-school system education partnerships, and (3) offer advice and share lessons learned so that university partners can avoid common pitfalls and maximize the potential for collaborative success. Possible areas of university-school collaboration include resident teachers, curricular review, early teaching experiences, demo sharing sessions, ongoing professional development, on- and off-campus science outreach, RET programs, science education resource centers, and others. University-school educational partnerships offer numerous benefits but can be challenging to implement and maintain. Research shows that most successful partnerships possess the following characteristics: mutual self-interest, participant commitment, mutual trust and respect, shared decision-making, information sharing, and ongoing evaluation. K-16 course and curriculum redesign is a specific issue that has its own unique set of contextual factors that impact the project's chance at success, including available materials, administrative support, formative assessments, pilot-testing and instructor feedback, and ongoing professional development. I have learned a number of lessons in own science education collaborations with the Baltimore City Public School System, which is an urban school system with 200 schools, 84,000 students, and 10,700 teachers and administrators. These lessons pertain to: communication, administrative power, and the structure of the school system; relevant contextual factors in the university and K-12 schools; and good old-fashioned common sense.Specific advice on K-16 science education partnerships will be provided to help universities increase student and instructor satisfaction with their physics and teacher education programs, maintain a positive and mutually beneficial relationship with local schools, and improve science education at all levels of instruction. Common sense is encouraged, but not required, to attend the invited talk.

Hip-hop as a resource for understanding the urban context

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brown, Bryan

2010-06-01

This review explores Edmin's "Science education for the hip-hop generation" by documenting how he frames hip-hop as a means to access urban student culture. He argues that hip-hop is more than a mere music genre, but rather a culture that provides young people with ways of connecting to the world. Two primary ideas emerged as central to his work. First, he contends that students develop communal relationships and collective identities based on the common experiences expressed in hip-hop. Second, he identifies how the conscious recognition of institutional oppression serves a central feature in urban schools. Emdin's rich, and personal call for a greater understanding of hip-hop culture provides the text with an unmatched strength. He skillfully uses personal narratives from his own experience as well as quotes and references from hip-hop songs to make the nuances of hip hop transparent to science educators. Conversely, the limitation of this text is found in its unfulfilled promise to provide pragmatic examples of how to engage in a hip-hop based science education. Emdin's work is ultimately valuable as it extends our current knowledge about urban students and hip-hop in meaningful ways.

Subject-Matter Experts in Urban Schools: Journeys of Enacted Identities in Science and Mathematics Classrooms

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ye, Li; Varelas, Maria; Guajardo, Raphael

2011-01-01

This study explored how two mathematics/science subject-matter experts (Fellows) conceptualized urban classrooms and the students they worked with for a year, how they negotiated academic achievement with cultural and sociopolitical competence, and how their identities as educators were co-constructed and enacted. Using grounded theory, Fellows'…

How the Cultural Contexts of Urban Teaching Affect Novice Science Educators: Implications for School Leaders

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Duncan, Marlina

2014-01-01

While the challenge to retain highly competent teachers affects all schools, the crisis is critical in urban districts, which historically suffer from high teacher turnover (Ingersoll, 2004). This high turnover is especially problematic in the content areas of science (Ingersoll & Perda, 2010). Through ethnographic case studies the first year…

Urban Fifth Graders' Connections-Making between Formal Earth Science Content and Their Lived Experiences

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brkich, Katie Lynn

2014-01-01

Earth science education, as it is traditionally taught, involves presenting concepts such as weathering, erosion, and deposition using relatively well-known examples--the Grand Canyon, beach erosion, and others. However, these examples--which resonate well with middle- and upper-class students--ill-serve students of poverty attending urban schools…

Successful Schools: How School-Level Factors Influence Success with Urban Advantage. Working Paper #01-14

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Weinstein, Meryle; Whitesell, Emilyn Ruble; Leardo, Michele

2014-01-01

Informal science education institutions have been identified as critical participants in helping students succeed in science by working in collaboration with school systems across the country. The results of one such collaboration, the Urban Advantage (UA) program found that participation in UA improved student achievement, on average, by 0.6…

Science Initial Teacher Education and Superdiversity: Educating Science Teachers for a Multi-Religious and Globalised Science Classroom

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

De Carvalho, Roussel

2016-01-01

Steven Vertovec (2006, 2007) has recently offered a re-interpretation of population diversity in large urban centres due to a considerable increase in immigration patterns in the UK. This complex scenario called superdiversity has been conceptualised to help illuminate significant interactions of variables such as religion, language, gender, age,…

Connecting Urban Students with Engineering Design: Community-Focused, Student-Driven Projects

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Parker, Carolyn; Kruchten, Catherine; Moshfeghian, Audrey

2017-01-01

The STEM Achievement in Baltimore Elementary Schools (SABES) program is a community partnership initiative that includes both in-school and afterschool STEM education for grades 3-5. It was designed to broaden participation and achievement in STEM education by bringing science and engineering to the lives of low-income urban elementary school…

Engaging Disenfranchised Urban Youth in Science Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

D'Elia, Luis Alberto; Wishart, Diane

2014-01-01

The purpose of this work was to elicit the perceptions of science educators regarding enhancing opportunities to retain disenfranchised students in secondary schools. The article shows selective international perspectives on how teachers, university professors, and researchers in teacher education programs strive to support school completion for…

Learning to teach science in urban schools

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tobin, Kenneth; Roth, Wolff-Michael; Zimmermann, Andrea

2001-10-01

Teaching in urban schools, with their problems of violence, lack of resources, and inadequate funding, is difficult. It is even more difficult to learn to teach in urban schools. Yet learning in those locations where one will subsequently be working has been shown to be the best preparation for teaching. In this article we propose coteaching as a viable model for teacher preparation and the professional development of urban science teachers. Coteaching - working at the elbow of someone else - allows new teachers to experience appropriate and timely action by providing them with shared experiences that become the topic of their professional conversations with other coteachers (including peers, the cooperating teacher, university supervisors, and high school students). This article also includes an ethnography describing the experiences of a new teacher who had been assigned to an urban high school as field experience, during which she enacted a curriculum that was culturally relevant to her African American students, acknowledged their minority status with respect to science, and enabled them to pursue the school district standards. Even though coteaching enables learning to teach and curricula reform, we raise doubts about whether our approaches to teacher education and enacting science curricula are hegemonic and oppressive to the students we seek to emancipate through education.

Urban Environmental Education: Leveraging Technology and Ecology to Engage Students in Studying the Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barnett, Michael; Vaughn, Meredith Houle; Strauss, Eric; Cotter, Lindsey

2011-01-01

In this paper, we describe the outcomes of the first year of an intensive, urban ecology focused, summer program for urban high school youth. Students in our program conduct scientific investigations of their urban ecosystems while exploring potential career options in science and technology fields. In conducting their investigations, the students…

Developing a World View for Science Education: A Message from the NSTA President

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Padilla, Michael

2005-01-01

Substantial growth of Hispanic and Asian immigration in the United States during the past decade has begun to affect almost all school systems, not just those in urban or coastal areas. This realization has led the author to choose Developing a World View for Science Education as the theme for his National Science Teachers Association (NSTA)…

Rural/Urban Disparities in Science Achievement in Post-Socialist Countries: The Evolving Influence of Socioeconomic Status

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kryst, Erica L.; Kotok, Stephen; Bodovski, Katerina

2015-01-01

Disparities in educational outcomes exist between students in rural areas as compared to students in urban settings. While there is some evidence that these rural disparities are present in eastern Europe, little is known about young peoples' lives in the rural areas of this region. This paper presents an analysis of science achievement by…

How Does Education Affect Environmental Knowledge: A Survey in Urban and Regional Planning Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ergen, Baris; Ergen, Zeynep

2011-01-01

This paper aims at measuring of environmental knowledge of students who select environmental science course in Urban and Regional Planning Department at Bozok University. This article includes a survey research, with this survey, we can get information about knowledge of environment of students and where they learn them. First briefly, it provides…

Gateway to Understanding: Indigenous Ecological Activism and Education in Urban, Rural, and Remote Contexts

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lowan-Trudeau, Gregory

2017-01-01

This article is a response to Kassam, Avery, and Ruelle's insights as presented in this forum on rural science education. Topics considered include troubling the urban/rural divide in the context of Indigenous knowledge and expanding to include the common Canadian notion of the "remote," a designation rooted in our national colonial…

A Review of the Electronic Coursework Efforts of the University of Nebraska-Omaha in the Earth System Science Education Alliance

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shuster, R. D.; Grandgenett, N.

2007-12-01

The University of Nebraska at Omaha has been a state leader in helping Nebraska teachers embrace earth systems science education, with a special emphasis in online coursework. UNO was one of the initial members in the Earth Systems Science Education Alliance (ESSEA) and has offered three different ESSEA courses, with a total of 167 students having taken ESSEA courses at UNO for graduate credit. UNO is currently involved in expanding its earth system science courses, modules, and educational research. We are also integrating these courses into several degree programs, including a Masters of Science in Education, a new Middle School Endorsement, a Certificate in Urban Education, and the Graduate Program for the Department of Geography/Geology. UNO is beginning to examine teacher content learning and science reasoning within its coursework. Feedback surveys from earlier ESSEA offerings already indicate a strongly positive perception of the courses by the teachers enrolled in the coursework. Project impact has been documented in teacher projects, quotes, and lessons associated with the coursework activities. We will describe the UNO earth system science efforts (emphasizing ESSEA coursework), and describe past efforts and teacher perceptions, as well as new strategies being undertaken to more closely examine content learning and science reasoning impact with course participants. We will also describe online course modules being developed within the UNO online course efforts, including one on the global amphibian crisis, and also the impact of urbanization on a local native prairie environment.

Continued Effort and Success: An Urban Professional School Development Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Corrigan, Diane G.; Weber, Edward J.; Francis, Kiffany

2013-01-01

The PDS partnership between the Cleveland State University Master of Urban Secondary Teaching (MUST) program and the Cleveland School of Science and Medicine (CSSM) has an established history of preparing educators to teach in urban schools. Recently awarded the NAPDS Award for Exemplary Professional Development School Achievement, this…

Higher Geography Education in Bulgaria: Problems and Perspectives

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Vodenska, Maria

2004-01-01

Geography is a traditional subject in Bulgarian education, both secondary and higher. Some of the most eminent Bulgarian scientists were geographers and theirs are many publications dealing not only with geography, but also with history, economics, ethnology, ethnography, political science, urban science and other disciplines. Major changes have…

Urban schools' teachers enacting project-based science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tal, Tali; Krajcik, Joseph S.; Blumenfeld, Phyllis C.

2006-09-01

What teaching practices foster inquiry and promote students to learn challenging subject matter in urban schools? Inquiry-based instruction and successful inquiry learning and teaching in project-based science (PBS) were described in previous studies (Brown & Campione, [1990]; Crawford, [1999]; Krajcik, Blumenfeld, Marx, Bass, & Fredricks, [1998]; Krajcik, Blumenfeld, Marx, & Solloway, [1994]; Minstrell & van Zee, [2000]). In this article, we describe the characteristics of inquiry teaching practices that promote student learning in urban schools. Teaching is a major factor that affects both achievement of and attitude of students toward science (Tamir, [1998]). Our involvement in reform in a large urban district includes the development of suitable learning materials and providing continuous and practiced-based professional development (Fishman & Davis, in press; van Es, Reiser, Matese, & Gomez, [2002]). Urban schools face particular challenges when enacting inquiry-based teaching practices like those espoused in PBS. In this article, we describe two case studies of urban teachers whose students achieved high gains on pre- and posttests and who demonstrated a great deal of preparedness and commitment to their students. Teachers' attempts to help their students to perform well are described and analyzed. The teachers we discuss work in a school district that strives to bring about reform in mathematics and science through systemic reform. The Center for Learning Technologies in Urban Schools (LeTUS) collaborates with the Detroit Public Schools to bring about reform in middle-school science. Through this collaboration, diverse populations of urban-school students learn science through inquiry-oriented projects and the use of various educational learning technologies. For inquiry-based science to succeed in urban schools, teachers must play an important role in enacting the curriculum while addressing the unique needs of students. The aim of this article is to describe patterns of good science teaching in urban school.

Science and environmental field experiences at a formal environmental education site: An investigation of teacher participation and educators' perceptions in a large urban school district

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sugg, Paul G.

The state curriculum in Texas was amended in 1997 to require field investigations in all science classes. This study attempted to explore and add to the research base of information about the efficacy and use of field investigations as important but often underutilized tools in science and environmental instruction. The underlying theme of the study was the view that urban students should receive more instruction in natural settings and that doing so not only improves science learning but also environmental literacy. A sequential mixed method approach was employed to investigate teacher and principal participation in, and perceptions of, outdoor field investigations in public school instruction. In the quantitative phase, surveys were administered to 277 science teachers and 96 principals in a large, urban, Texas district. Significant differences (p ≤ .05) were found between teachers and principals who utilized the field investigation and those who did not. In the qualitative phase, 12 teachers were interviewed about various factors related to field investigations. The study found that while science teachers generally have positive opinions of field studies, awareness of the requirement to provide them is low and obstacles remain which prevent teachers from employing the method. Many science teachers are not providing opportunities for their students to experience science and environmental education instruction in natural settings. Half of the teachers and more than a third of the principals surveyed were not aware of the requirement to provide students with field investigations. The study generated quantitative and qualitative evidence demonstrating that teacher use of the field investigation method is strongly linked to the following factors: (a) teacher and principal awareness of the requirement; (b) administrator support; (c) funding for transportation to appropriate natural settings; (d) intra or interdepartmental competition for limited field trip opportunities; and (e) teacher training. The presence or absence of these factors has significant implications for policy and practice in science and environmental education. The findings supply data that could be used by state and local administrators, curriculum superintendents, science curriculum leaders, elementary and secondary principals, and science educators to guide and improve science and environmental instruction in the state.

Identity, culture and shared experiences: The power of cogenerative dialogues in urban science classrooms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bayne, Gillian Ursula

2007-05-01

The research presented in this dissertation details four major examples of work that took place during a three-year longitudinal study in a small urban New York City public high school for high achieving youth. It aims to play a role in contributing to the understanding of the breakdown between and amongst those parties involved in urban science education. The work outlined herein responds to the calls for improvement within urban education, utilizing the experiences, knowledge and practices of its students, in order to help inform and improve science teaching and learning. Theoretical lenses upon which this critical ethnographic research is grounded primarily involve those that are socio-cultural in nature and examine the sociology of emotions. In this research, I address how urban students, who have been historically alienated by science, develop forms of culture, enact them in science classes and then make transitions from participating marginally toward participating more centrally, demonstrating increasing science and science-like practices with higher levels of expertise. This work involves investigating human agency and its expansion as it becomes increasingly incorporated and internalized into individual and collective habitus. The protocol utilized in this critical ethnography (videotapes of cogenerative dialogues, classroom practices and interviews; journal entries, field notes, student and teacher generated artifacts) facilitates the exploration and understanding of the ways by which aligning culture and expanding student roles, both inside and outside of the classroom can occur. The results of this study include concrete examples and interpretations of these expansions and, provide suggestions by which more adaptable forms of teaching and learning can be enacted. These practices ultimately benefit a wider variety of students who as result will become better at creating their own structures to succeed.

Effects of ethnoscience instruction, school location, and parental educational status on learners' attitude towards science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fasasi, Rasheed Adekunle

2017-03-01

This study investigated the effect of Ethnoscience instruction and moderating effects of school location and parental educational status on students' attitude to science. It employed pretest-posttest, non-equivalent control group quasiexperimental design. Participants were 352 Junior Secondary School 1 (aged 9-12 years) students from two schools, each in urban and rural areas of Ìbàdàn, southwestern Nigeria. Instruments used are: Teachers Instructional Guide on Ethnoscience instruction, Teachers Instructional Guide on Modified Lecture Method and Attitude Toward Science Scale (r = 0.86). Three null hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. Data were analyzed using Analysis of Covariance. Significant main effect of treatment on attitude to science (F(1, 347) = 296, p < 0.05) was recorded, with Ethnoscience instruction group performing better than the Modified Lecture Method group. Effect size of treatment was strong (η2 p = 0.46). Also recorded were significant main effects of school location (F(1, 347) = 10.2, p < .05) and parental educational status (F(1, 347 = 3.37), p < 0.05) on students' attitude to science with weak effect sizes (η2 p = 0.029 and η2 p = 0.019 respectively). Learners in rural schools performed better than those in urban schools and those from lowly educated parents had better performance than highly educated parents. Ethnoscience instruction promoted learners' attitude to science. Therefore, its use in educational instruction, especially among traditional science learners, should be explored.

AGI's Boulder Operation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Romey, William D.

1972-01-01

Environmental Studies for Urban Youth (ES) for first grade through college and the primary concerns of the Earth Science Teacher Preparation Project (ESTPP), both developed by the AGI's Earth Science Education Program, are considered. (PR)

Rethinking Pedagogy in Urban Spaces: Implementing Hip-Hop Pedagogy in the Urban Science Classroom

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Adjapong, Edmund S.; Emdin, Christopher

2015-01-01

A significant amount of research regarding Hip-Hop Based Education (HHBE) fails to provide insight on how to incorporate elements of Hip-Hop into daily teaching practices; rather Hip-Hop based educators focus mainly on incorporating Hip-Hop culture into curricula. This study explores the benefits of using two specific Hip-Hop pedagogical practices…

Exploring the Educational and Career Plans of Urban Minority Students in a Dual Enrollment Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Medvide, Mary Beth; Blustein, David L.

2010-01-01

This qualitative study examined the educational and career plans of a sample of urban minority high school students who voluntarily participated in a dual enrollment program at a private, technology-based community college in a metropolitan center in the northeastern United States. This program allows students to take college courses in science,…

Highly qualified does not equal high quality: A study of urban stakeholders' perceptions of quality in science teaching

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Miranda, Rommel Joseph

By employing qualitative methods, this study sought to determine the perceptions that urban stakeholders hold about what characteristics should distinguish a high school science teacher whom they would consider to demonstrate high quality in science teaching. A maximum variation sample of six science teachers, three school administrators, six parents and six students from a large urban public school district were interviewed using semi-structured, in-depth interview techniques. From these data, a list of observable characteristics which urban stakeholders hold as evidence of high quality in science teaching was generated. Observational techniques were utilized to determine the extent to which six urban high school science teachers, who meet the NCLB Act criteria for being "highly qualified", actually possessed the characteristics which these stakeholders hold as evidence of high quality in science teaching. Constant comparative analysis was used to analyze the data set. The findings suggest that urban stakeholders perceive that a high school science teacher who demonstrates high quality in science teaching should be knowledgeable about their subject matter, their student population, and should be resourceful; should possess an academic background in science and professional experience in science teaching; should exhibit professionalism, a passion for science and teaching, and a dedication to teaching and student learning; should be skillful in planning and preparing science lessons and in organizing the classroom, in presenting the subject matter to students, in conducting a variety of hands-on activities, and in managing a classroom; and should assess whether students complete class goals and objectives, and provide feedback about grades for students promptly. The findings further reveal that some of the urban high school science teachers who were deemed to be "highly qualified", as defined by the NCLB Act, engaged in practices that threatened quality in science teaching and often failed to display the characteristics which urban stakeholders hold as evidence of high quality in science teaching. Thus, the criteria for "highly qualified" prescribed by policy makers and politicians do not necessarily translate into effective science teaching in urban settings. These findings emphasize the importance of stakeholder involvement in the design of educational reform initiatives.

Bridging Theory and Practice: Using Hip-Hop Pedagogy As A Culturally Relevant Approach In The Urban Science Classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Adjapong, Edmund S.

This dissertation explores the context of urban science education as it relates to the achievement and engagement of urban youth. This study provides a framework for Hip-Hop Pedagogy, an approach to teaching and learning anchored in the creative elements of Hip-Hop culture, in STEM as an innovative approach to teaching and learning demonstrates the effect that Hip-Hop Pedagogy, as a culturally relevant approach to teaching has on teaching and learning in an urban science classroom. This study establishes practical tools and approaches, which were formed from by theory and research that transcend the traditional monolithic approaches to teaching science. Participants in this study are middle school students who attend an urban school in one of the largest school systems in the country. This research showed that as result of utilizing Hip-Hop pedagogical practices, students reported that they developed a deeper understanding of science content, students were more likely to identify as scientists, and students were provided a space and opportunities to deconstruct traditional classroom spaces and structures.

Science Specialists or Classroom Teachers: Who Should Teach Elementary Science?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Levy, Abigail Jurist; Jia, Yueming; Marco-Bujosa, Lisa; Gess-Newsome, Julie; Pasquale, Marian

2016-01-01

This study examined science programs, instruction, and student outcomes at 30 elementary schools in a large, urban district in the northeast United States in an effort to understand whether there were meaningful differences in the quality, quantity and cost of science education when provided by a science specialist or a classroom teacher. Student…

The Problem Is Education Not "Special Education"

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fellner, Gene

2015-01-01

In his article, "Urban special education policy and the lived experience of stigma in a high school science classroom," Chris Hale persuasively argues that the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and subsequent special education policies have largely failed to serve special education students who are stigmatized by their deficit…

Museums, zoos, and gardens: how formal-informal partnerships can impact urban students' performance in science.

PubMed

Weinstein, Meryle; Whitesell, Emilyn Ruble; Schwartz, Amy Ellen

2014-12-01

Informal science education institutions (ISEIs) are critical partners in public science education, as they support the science efforts of school systems by providing authentic opportunities for scientific inquiry. This study reports findings from an evaluation of urban advantage (UA), a collaboration between the New York City Department of Education and eight ISEIs designed to improve science education in New York City (NYC) middle schools. Now in its 10th year, the program harnesses the resources and expertise of NYC's ISEIs to (a) enhance the science content knowledge of middle school science teachers, (b) develop teachers' skills at using inquiry-based approaches in their classrooms, and (c) improve the science achievement of middle school students. We examine whether the UA program has led to increased student achievement on the eighth-grade New York State standardized science exam for students in participating schools; in supplemental analyses, we examine the effects on longer term (ninth-grade) outcomes. We use a difference-in-differences framework with school fixed effects to estimate the impact of attending a UA school in eighth grade on science achievement. Our key outcome is performance on New York State's eighth-grade intermediate-level science assessment; longer term outcomes include enrollment at specialized science, technology, engineering, and math high schools as well as taking and passing the high school (Regents) science exams. We find that attending a UA school increases student performance on the eighth-grade science exam by approximately 0.05 SD, and there is some evidence of small effects on Regents taking and passing rates. © The Author(s) 2014.

Contestation and possibilities: Experiences in the 'other' urban classrooms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grimes, Nicole K.

The research presented in this dissertation is a response to the general lack of research conducted in independent urban schools. In my work, I present varied vignettes that aim to provide a glimpse into the lifeworlds of students within such schools and how they too struggle to learn science. There are two major goals of this study. First, I encourage readers to rethink current conceptions of urban schooling and redefine what it means to be an urban learner. Secondly, I intend to demonstrate how the cogenerated action plans of coteachers and cogenerative dialogue groups can serve to make science accessible to students whom are diagnosed and placed in mainstreamed educational settings. The idea is to show that by transforming science learning contexts into cosmopolitan learning communities, students can become successful in science. Through a three-year ethnographic study of middle science classrooms in an independent school in New York City, I present explorations of the culture and context of the independent urban classroom as a chief means to meet my stated goals. By utilizing cogenerative dialogues and coteaching, I show how students and teachers can work together as co-researchers and coteachers that engage in a dual process of creating structures that support science success.

The Impact of High School Science Teachers' Beliefs, Curricular Enactments and Experience on Student Learning during an Inquiry-Based Urban Ecology Curriculum

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McNeill, Katherine L.; Pimentel, Diane Silva; Strauss, Eric G.

2013-01-01

Inquiry-based curricula are an essential tool for reforming science education yet the role of the teacher is often overlooked in terms of the impact of the curriculum on student achievement. Our research focuses on 22 teachers' use of a year-long high school urban ecology curriculum and how teachers' self-efficacy, instructional practices,…

Government and the Climate for Science

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cloud, Preston

1969-01-01

Discusses what the government might do to affect the environment for science favorably, including its influence on the inclination of youth to enter a scientific career. The need to have new planned urban facilities, trained technicians and greater government efforts for science education is emphasized. (LC)

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Baltimore City Public Schools. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Boston Public Schools. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Atlanta Public Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Atlanta Public Schools. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Fresno Unified School District. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Cleveland Metropolitan School District. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Detroit Public Schools. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Austin Independent School District. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Austin Independent School District. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. School District of Philadelphia. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Detroit Public Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Milwaukee Public Schools. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Houston Independent School District. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Milwaukee Public Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Cleveland Metropolitan School District. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Boston Public Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. School District of Philadelphia. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Fresno Unified School District. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Baltimore City Public Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Chicago Public Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

Navigating role forces and the aesthetic|authentic caring dialectic: a novice urban science teacher's developmental trajectory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rivera Maulucci, Maria S.

2010-09-01

Examining role forces and resources available to new teachers is crucial to understanding how teachers use and expand cultural, social, and symbolic resources and how they engage teaching for social justice and caring in urban science education. This critical narrative inquiry explores three levels of story. First, the narratives explore my role as a district science staff developer and my efforts to leverage district resources to improve students' opportunities to learn science. Second, the narratives explore the ways in which a novice science teacher, Tina, navigated role forces and the aesthetic|authentic caring dialectic in a high poverty, urban school. A third level of narrative draws on sociological theories of human interaction to explore role forces and how they shaped Tina's developmental trajectory. I describe how Tina expanded cultural, social, and symbolic resources to enact her teaching role.

Theme: Trends and Issues Affecting the Future of Agricultural Education.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Agricultural Education Magazine, 2000

2000-01-01

Articles discuss trends and issues in agricultural education, community and technical colleges, career/technical studies, Australian agriculture, agricultural science and technology programs in urban areas, genetic engineering, the impact of changing technologies on agricultural education, volunteers, and performance-based assessment. (JOW)

Exploring the contexts of urban science classrooms. Part 2: The emergence of rituals in the learning of science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Emdin, Christopher

2007-04-01

In Part 1 of this paper, I described the corporate and communal nature of research, teaching, and learning in urban science classrooms as both a theoretical approach to understanding, and way of viewing practices within these fields. By providing a new approach to theorizing the cultural misalignments that are prevalent in urban schools, I look to provide an informative tool for investigating under-discussed dynamics that impact science teaching and learning. In this body of work, I further expose the nature of the corporate|communal by describing practices that define communal practice. I do so conversant of the fact that synthesizing my previous work on corporate and communal practices necessarily pushes science education researchers and teachers to look for somewhat tactile explications of communal practices. That is to say, if communal practices do exist within the corporate structures of science classrooms, how do they present themselves and how can they be targeted? This paper begins a journey into such a study and focuses on student transactions, fundamental interactions and rituals as a key to redefining and attaining success in urban science classrooms.

A longitudinal study of the educational and career trajectories of female participants of an urban informal science education program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fadigan, Kathleen Ann

The purpose of this study is to describe the educational trajectories of a sample of young women from urban, low-income, single-parent families who participated in the Women in Natural Sciences (WINS) program during their ninth and/or tenth grade years of high school. This study also attempts to determine how the WINS program affected the participants' educational and career choices in order to provide insight into the role informal science education programs play in increasing the participation of women and minorities in science, math, engineering, and technology (SMET)-related fields. The research takes the form of a longitudinal, descriptive case study. The case is composed of 152 WINS participants who applied for, were accepted into, and completed at least one year of the program between 1992 and 1997. Data were drawn from program records, surveys, and interviews. Pre-WINS desired educational and career trajectory data were available for 152 participants. Post-WINS actual educational and career trajectory data were available for 101 of the young women in the sample. Seventy-eight women completed a WINS survey. The researcher conducted semi-structured interviews with 12 former participants. Findings revealed a 100 percent high school completion rate. A total of 109 participants (93.16%) enrolled in a college program following high school completion. Careers in medical or health-related fields followed by careers in SMET emerged as the highest ranking career paths with 24 students (23.76%) and 21 students (20.79%), respectively, employed in or pursuing careers in these areas. Taking a greater number of advanced or honors level SMET high school courses was the only contextual variable showing a significant relationship to pursuing a career in SMET. The majority of participants perceived having the WINS staff as people you could talk to, the job skills learned in WINS, and having the museum as a safe place to go as having influenced their educational and career decisions. These findings reflect the need for continued support of informal science education programs for urban girls and at-risk youth. Additional longitudinal studies of similar programs are crucial to understanding their effects on the education and career paths of young women with an initial interest in science.

"Hold up..do pigs eat bacon?!" An investigation of science instruction for urban Black youth and the need for a culturally considerate response

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ridgeway, Monica Lynn

As a critical race ethnography, this dissertation attempts to foreground the richness of Black urban youth culture during and around science classroom instruction. Ironically, during an era of much diversity rhetoric in the United States, the culture of urban Black youth is rarely reflected in mainstream public school culture. I attempt to explicate such a worldview compassionately and authentically for both insiders and outsiders of the lived experiences of Black America. Education in the United States can be damning for Black youth who do not fit the mainstream mold, and several authors have provided detailed critique of mechanisms that shape, direct, and marginalize outliers to the successful academic cultural model. The U.S. through this lens is experiencing an opportunity gap, not an achievement gap--one which equitable educational experience can best be viewed through the richness of critical ethnographic methods. This methodical approach allowed me as a researcher to listen to marginalized voices and to incorporate lived interactions with youth, their parents, and community stakeholders all committed to provide support for the today's youth. As a Black female science educator, I explore the evidence for reform impact as I examine in school experiences and science teaching of culturally relevant pedagogies for urban, working-class and poor families of color in grades six-eight who participated in a Western New York academic enrichment program. Findings suggest that skepticism of reform efforts and new pedagogical approaches existed for all stakeholders aforementioned, but that students were the most amenable and responsive to alternative educational approaches. Specific recommendations for engaging students in inquiry processes are given for teachers, institutions, parents and students on the basis of videotaped lessons, interviews, and instructional artifacts. Implications include the recommendations that educators working with youth of color need to be prepared to discuss the ethnic and racial identities of students and jointly construct a sense of activism and empowerment in the face of existing systemic oppression that can and should be eliminated if we are to reach the national goal (AAAS, 1986) of "Science for All Americans," professed as many as three decades ago.

Middle School Science: Working in a Confused Context.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Berns, Barbara Brauner; Swanson, Judy

This paper presents the stories of two urban middle school science teachers, both identified as leaders in their districts. Both bring substantial expertise to science education, though neither has experienced optimal conditions for flourishing as teacher leaders. One teacher has strong content knowledge and a deep understanding of standards. The…

Math and Science Model Programs Manual.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sawyer, Donna, Comp.; And Others

This implementation manual has been developed to describe four model mathematics and science programs designed to increase African-American students' interest in mathematics and science. The manual will help affiliates of the Urban League to mobilize existing community resources to achieve the goals of the national education initiative. The four…

Urban High School Students' Learning about HIV/AIDS in Different Contexts

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brotman, Jennie S.; Mensah, Felicia Moore; Lesko, Nancy

2011-01-01

Science education researchers increasingly focus on the use of controversial science topics in the classroom to prepare students to make personal and societal decisions about these issues. However, researchers infrequently investigate the diverse ways in which students learn about controversial science topics outside the classroom, and how these…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. San Diego Unified School District. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. San Diego Unified School District. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Los Angeles Unified School District. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Jefferson County Public Schools (Louisville, KY). Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Grade 4, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Jefferson County Public Schools (Louisville, KY). Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Los Angeles Unified School District. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

The Nation's Report Card Science 2009 Trial Urban District Snapshot Report. Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Grade 8, Public Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Center for Education Statistics, 2011

2011-01-01

Guided by a new framework, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science assessment was updated in 2009 to keep the content current with key developments in science, curriculum standards, assessments, and research. The 2009 framework organizes science content into three broad content areas. Physical science includes concepts…

Starting a Learning Progression for Agricultural Literacy: A Qualitative Study of Urban Elementary Student Understandings of Agricultural and Science Education Benchmarks

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hess, Alexander Jay

2010-01-01

Science and agriculture professional organizations have argued for agricultural literacy as a goal for K-12 public education. Due to the complexity of our modern agri-food system, with social, economic, and environmental concerns embedded, an agriculturally literate society is needed for informed decision making, democratic participation, and…

Nurture thru Nature: Creating Natural Science Identities in Populations of Disadvantaged Children through Community Education Partnership

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Camasso, Michael J.; Jagannathan, Radha

2018-01-01

In this article we describe the development, implementation, and some of the early impacts of Nurture thru Nature (NtN), an American after-school and summer program designed to introduce elementary school students in disadvantaged, urban public schools to natural science and environmental education. The program, which began operations in 2010 as a…

Facing the Future: Sharing Habitats with Wildlife; A Civic Engagement Partnership between St. Mary's College and Lindsay Wildlife Museum through SENCER-ISE

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Baldridge, A. M.; Bachofer, S.; Pan, W.

2014-12-01

The phrase "Enter to Learn, Leave to Serve " is at the heart of St Mary's College of California's education philosophy. The community engagement requirement of the core curriculum requires that students leave the classroom and engage with the world "to apply their intellectual experiences to communities beyond [the campus]". St. Mary's College actively participates with SENCER-ISE (Science Education for New Civic Engagements and Responsibilities-Informal Science Education), a National Science Foundation program developed to inspire more community engagement science projects in higher education to make science more real, accessible and civically important. Through this program, St. Mary's College and Lindsay Wildlife Museum have developed the project "Facing the Future: Sharing Habitats with Wildlife", which explores issues of urban habitats - their ephemerality, and the need for citizens to share responsibility and promote their success. The institutions are (1) studying a San Francisco Bay Area watershed habitat; (2) designing data collection methods, (GIS mapping and mobile app creation) intended to educate children and adults on urban habitats and the need to protect them; and (3) preparing interpretive materials to raise awareness of habitat issues. Here we report on the impact of this work, which is in the first year of a three-year grant and how a durable partnership can be established.

Teaching science in a poor urban school in pakistan: Tensions in the life history of a female elementary teacher

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Upadhyay, Bhaskar; Calabrese Barton, Angela; Zahur, Rubina

2005-09-01

In this paper, we draw from a narrative life history approach to report in depth on the experiences of one teacher, Shagufta, in a high-poverty urban elementary school in Lahore, Pakistan. The purpose of reporting Shagufta's story is twofold. First, we want to make sense of her role as a science teacher - what should the children in her school learn in science, and why, if these children are expected by Pakistani society to leave formal education before the eighth grade? Second, what core tensions mark Shagufta's story as she has tried to craft her science teaching practice?

Sisters in Science: Using Sports as a Vehicle for Science Learning.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hammrich, Penny L.; Richardson, Greer M.; Green, Tina Sloan; Livingston, Beverly

This paper describes a project for upper elementary and middle school minority girl students called the Sisters in Sport Science (SISS). The SISS program addresses the needs of urban girls in gaining access to equal education in science and mathematics by using athletics as a vehicle for learning. The program provides a non-competitive and…

The Application of School Science by Urban High School Youth through Problem-Solving in Everyday Life

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gitari, Wanja

2016-01-01

This qualitative study investigated non-guided applications of school science by high school youth in Ontario in non-school contexts. Although science education (in Ontario and elsewhere) mostly focuses on the meaningful learning of science, learning that can lead to knowledge application, non-guided application of acquired knowledge is rarely…

The Market and Vocational Education.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Peregudov, F. I.

1992-01-01

Examines needed changes in vocational education in former Soviet Union as the nation shifts to a market economy. Suggests that there should be more emphasis on individual student needs. Argues that vocational education must include training in information sciences, computers, foreign languages, social psychology, and urban ecology. Recommends…

Learning to teach science in urban schools by becoming a researcher of one's own beginning practice

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Furman, Melina; Calabrese Barton, Angela; Muir, Ben

2012-03-01

An urgent goal for science teacher educators is to prepare teachers to teach science in meaningful ways to youth from nondominant backgrounds. This preparation is challenging, for it asks teachers to critically examine how their pedagogical practices might adaptively respond to students and to science. It asks, essentially, for new teachers to become researchers of their own beginning practice. This study explores the story of Ben as he coauthored a transformative action research project in an urban middle school as part of a teacher education program and, later, over his first year of teaching at that same school. We describe how Ben and his partner teacher created innovative spaces for science learning. This offered Ben an opportunity to make some of his deeply engrained pedagogical beliefs come alive within a context of distributed expertise, which provided for him a space of moderate risk where he could afford the chances of failure without undermining how he felt about his own capacity as a teacher. Our study highlights the importance of creating reform opportunities within the context of teacher education programs that may help beginner teachers construct positive images of teaching that they can hold on to in their future practice.

Lessons Learned from the San Diego Urban Systemic Project (USP): Implications for Funders and Future Project Designers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

St. John, Mark; Heenan, Barbara; Helms, Jenifer

2007-01-01

This brief draws upon the five-year evaluation study of the San Diego Urban Systemic Project (USP) that Inverness Research Associates conducted from 2001 to 2006. The intended audiences for this brief are those interested in investing in, supporting, or designing initiatives that aim to improve math and science education in large urban districts.…

The nature of culturally responsive pedagogy in two urban African American middle school science classrooms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bondima, Michelle Harris

This ethnographic in nature study explores how two middle school science teachers who have classes populated by urban African Americans teach their students and how their students perceive their teaching. Since urban African American students continue to perform lower than desired on measures of science achievement, there is an urgent need to understand what pedagogical methodologies assist and hinder urban African American students in achieving higher levels of success in science. A pedagogical methodology that theorists posit assists subordinated school populations is culturally responsive pedagogy. Culturally responsive pedagogy is defined as a teaching methodology concerned with preparing students to question inequality, racism, and injustice. Teachers who use culturally responsive pedagogy respect the culture students bring to the class, and require that the teachers willingly do whatever is necessary to educate students (Nieto, 2000). The teacher participants were two female African Americans who were identified by their school supervisors as being highly effective with urban African American students. The researcher presented the teachers in separate case studies conducted over a data collection period of nine months. Data were collected by participant observation, interviews, and artifact collection. Data were analyzed by application of grounded theory techniques. Findings of the teachers' (and the students') beliefs about pedagogy that both assisted and hindered the students' performance in science were reported in a rich and nuanced storytelling manner based on multiple perspectives (teachers', students', and the researcher's). Pedagogical methodologies that the teachers used that assisted their students were the use of cultural metaphors and images in science and applications of motivational techniques that encouraged a nurturing relationship between the teacher and her students. Pedagogical methodologies that hindered students varied by teacher. Metaphorically, the teachers differed vividly. One was a nurturing mother, sister, and friend who assisted her students to cross the cultural line between the science classroom and their home and community. The other was a stern disciplinarian who painted a picture of order and hard work as keys for her students' success in school science. The researcher, who promotes a social justice ideology, made implications and recommendations for science teacher education and public policy.

Federal Efforts in Science and Mathematics Education. Hearing before a Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations. United States Senate, One Hundred First Congress, Second Session. Special Hearing.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Congress of the U.S., Washington, DC. Senate Committee on Appropriations.

This report contains a transcript of the hearing discussing federal efforts in science and mathematics education held before the Subcommittee on Veterans Administration (VA), Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and Independent Agencies of the Committee on Appropriations. Spokespersons for the Executive Office of the President--Office of Science…

A Mathematics and Science Trail

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smith, Kathy Horak; Fuentes, Sarah Quebec

2012-01-01

In an attempt to engage primary-school students in a hands-on, real-world problem-solving context, a large urban district, a mathematics and science institute housed in a college of education, and a corporate sponsor in the southwest United States, joined forces to create a mathematics and science trail for fourth- and fifth-grade students. A…

Community Organizations' Programming and the Development of Community Science Teachers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Varelas, Maria; Morales-Doyle, Daniel; Raza, Syeda; Segura, David; Canales, Karen; Mitchener, Carole

2018-01-01

In this study, we explored how science teacher candidates construct ideas about science teaching and learning in the context of partnerships with urban community-based organizations. We used a case study design focusing on a group of 10 preservice teachers' participation in educational programming that focused on environmental racism and connected…

The Effects of Teachers' Social and Human Capital on Urban Science Reform Initiatives: Considerations for Professional Development

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Yoon, Susan A.; Yom, Jessica Koehler; Yang, Zhitong; Liu, Lei

2017-01-01

Background: Recent research investigating the conditions under which science teachers can successfully implement science education reforms suggests that focusing only on professional development to improve content knowledge and teaching skills--often referred to as human capital--may not be enough. Increasingly, possessing social capital, defined…

Place-Based Geosciences Courses in a Diverse Urban College: Lessons Learned

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Boger, Rebecca; Adams, Jennifer D.; Powell, Wayne

2014-01-01

Recognizing the need to attract more students, especially those from underrepresented groups, a team of college faculty and experienced New York City Department of Education (DOE) Earth Science Teachers redesigned the two foundational Earth and Environmental Science courses required for all teacher and science major students in the Department of…

Toward a Lived Science Curriculum in Intersecting Figured Worlds: An Exploration of Individual Meanings in Science Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Price, Jeremy F.; McNeill, Katherine L.

2013-01-01

As knowledge of and familiarity with science becomes an increasingly important aspect of contemporary life and citizenship, efforts have been made to make the science curriculum a “lived” curriculum (Hurd, 2000), one that reaches out to the lives, communities, and experiences of students. In this research around a high school urban ecology…

Science initial teacher education and superdiversity: educating science teachers for a multi-religious and globalised science classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

De Carvalho, Roussel

2016-06-01

Steven Vertovec (2006, 2007) has recently offered a re-interpretation of population diversity in large urban centres due to a considerable increase in immigration patterns in the UK. This complex scenario called superdiversity has been conceptualised to help illuminate significant interactions of variables such as religion, language, gender, age, nationality, labour market and population distribution on a larger scale. The interrelationships of these themes have fundamental implications in a variety of community environments, but especially within our schools. Today, London schools have over 300 languages being spoken by students, all of whom have diverse backgrounds, bringing with them a wealth of experience and, most critically, their own set of religious beliefs. At the same time, Science is a compulsory subject in England's national curriculum, where it requires teachers to deal with important scientific frameworks about the world; teaching about the origins of the universe, life on Earth, human evolution and other topics, which are often in conflict with students' religious views. In order to cope with this dynamic and thought-provoking environment, science initial teacher education (SITE)—especially those catering large urban centres—must evolve to equip science teachers with a meaningful understanding of how to handle a superdiverse science classroom, taking the discourse of inclusion beyond its formal boundaries. Thus, this original position paper addresses how the role of SITE may be re-conceptualised and re-framed in light of the immense challenges of superdiversity as well as how science teachers, as enactors of the science curriculum, must adapt to cater to these changes. This is also the first in a series of papers emerging from an empirical research project trying to capture science teacher educators' own views on religio-scientific issues and their positions on the place of these issues within science teacher education and the science classroom.

Community-Based Engineering

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dalvi, Tejaswini; Wendell, Kristen

2015-01-01

A team of science teacher educators working in collaboration with local elementary schools explored opportunities for science and engineering "learning by doing" in the particular context of urban elementary school communities. In this article, the authors present design task that helps students identify and find solutions to a…

[Science in the Outdoors].

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sarage, Joe; And Others

Designed for instruction of emotionally handicapped children and youth, this resource guide presents science activities and concepts relative to rural and urban outdoor education. Included are 25 different articles, varying from broadly generalized to highly specific concept/activity suggestions which include film and book bibliographies and…

Urban Astronomy in the Philippines

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Torres, Jesus Rodrigo F.

Astronomy in the Philippines is among the most interesting fields of study according to Filipino students. The science, however, suffers from neglect because most Philippine institutions of higher learning have campuses in urban areas. Common understanding dictates that satisfactory astronomical observations and studies can only be done at dark sites away from urban lights. This study aims to prove that astronomical work can be done even in light-polluted urban settings, and to convince educational policymakers to consider establishing observatories in urban campuses and to offer astronomy as a subject or major.

Toward the sociopolitical in science education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tolbert, Sara; Bazzul, Jesse

2017-06-01

In this paper, we explore how Jacques Rancière's (The ignorant schoolmaster: five lessons in intellectual emancipation. Stanford University Press, Stanford, 1991) notions of radical equality and dissensus reveal horizons for activism and sociopolitical engagement in science education theory, research, and practice. Drawing on Rochelle Gutiérrez' (J Res Math Educ 44(1):37-68, 2013a. doi: 10.5951/jresematheduc.44.1.0037; J Urban Math Educ 6(2):7-19, b) "sociopolitical turn" for mathematics education, we identify how the field of science education can/is turning from more traditional notions of equity, achievement and access toward issues of systemic oppression, identity and power. Building on the conversation initiated by Lorraine Otoide who draws from French philosopher Jacques Rancière to experiment with a pedagogy of radical equality, we posit that a sociopolitical turn in science education is not only imminent, but necessary to meet twenty-first century crises.

GLOBE Earth Science Education and Public Outreach in Developing Countries GLOBE Earth Science Education and Public Outreach in Developing Countries

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sparrow, E. B.; Boger, R. A.

2005-12-01

GLOBE is an international hands-on earth science education program that involves scientists, teachers and students in more than 16,000 primary and secondary schools. GLOBE is funded by the National Aeronautics Administration (NASA), the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the U.S. Department of State. GLOBE works with schools (teachers and students) through more than 100 U.S. GLOBE partnerships with universities, state and local school systems, and non-government organizations. Internationally, GLOBE is partnered with 109 countries that include many developing nations throughout the world. In addition to the GLOBE's different areas of investigation e.g. Atmosphere/ Weather, Hydrology, Soils, Land Cover Biology and Phenology ( plant and animal), there are special projects such as the GLOBE Urban Phenology Year Project (GUPY) that engages developing and developed countries ( Finland, United States, Japan, Philippines, Thailand, Jordan, Kyrgystan, Senegal, Poland, Estonia, and the Dominican Republic) in studying the effects of urbanization on vegetation phenology, a sensitive indicator of climate change. Vegetation phenology integrates different components of the Earth system i.e. carbon and geochemical cycling, water cycling and energy cycling and is an excellent way to engage students in collaborative projects. This presentation will highlight the GUPY project and provide additional examples of local initiatives and collaborations with indigenous communities that use GLOBE and an inquiry approach to revise science education in developing countries .

An Assessment of Changes in Science Instruction and Science Facilities Initiated by NDEA Title III Funds Used for High School Science in Tennessee Between 1965 - 1970.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Davis, James Taylor

In this investigation, questionnaires were sent to 64 selected urban and rural high schools that were participating in the NDEA Title III science programs. The study revealed that Title III funds were responsible for the improvement of science laboratories, teaching materials and equipment, and the educational advancement of teachers. New courses…

The Urban Ecology Institute's field studies program: utilizing urban areas for experiential learning and ecological research

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Starry, O.

2005-05-01

The Urban Ecology Institute (UEI) promotes the stewardship of healthy urban ecosystems by improving science and civic education for middle and high school youth and by working with urban communities to protect and transform natural resources. Established in 1999, UEI's field studies program engages over 1000 youth in the greater Boston area. A substantial component of this program involves water quality monitoring. We have recently adapted protocols from published leaf breakdown studies for incorporation into the UEI water quality curriculum. A 2004 pilot study of these leaf breakdown activities, conducted at four sites, compared rates of red maple breakdown to those of Norway maple, a potentially invasive urban street tree. Preliminary data from this successful pilot study suggest that leaf litter inputs from the two different tree species have varying effects on stream ecosystem function. We present this study as an example of how urban areas can be utilized for both ecological research and inclusive experiential learning through which science and mathematic knowledge can be effectively communicated.

Narratives of silenced critiques and how they inform pedagogy and policy: Conversations with low-income urban parents about education, science, and science education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

St. Prix, Courtney Desmond

This dissertation examines the concerns of fourteen, low-income, urban parents for their children's needs in education in general and science education in particular. A motivation behind this investigation is to resist the top-down dissemination of educational policy and value the perspectives of so-called "culturally deprived" parents. I contrast the parents' vision for science education with those expressed by AAAS and NRC. I collected data through interviews, conversation groups, and participant observation conducted at a homeless shelter in a major American city. Initially, I conducted individual interviews that were coded, and themes of social mobility and issues of pedagogy surfaced as major areas of concern for parents. I developed questions under each theme for discussion with parents in conversation groups comprised of five parents. Additional conversation groups were developed later under emergent themes of parent-school relations and science education reform. As an assistant in both the after-school program and the parent-teachers association, I obtained additional data through field-notes. I analyzed the data using critical theory as my lens. However, it was a critical theory that had been repositioned from a eurocentric viewpoint to encompass the critical elements that emerge through the struggles of people of color and women. The parents considered the educational system to be uncaring and inflexible. They expressed that science is not taught in an engaging manner that is relevant to the lives of poor students. There was a great deal of overlap between the parents' vision and that of the science education reform initiatives. However, while the reform initiatives focused on "what" and "how" science was being taught, the parents' recommendations focused on "who" was being taught. They called for a more flexible, caring educational system that pays attention to the needs of the whole child. Finally, I analyzed the parents' perspectives as reflecting enculturation, resistance, or the "third space." This analytical approach helped emphasize the need for dialogue between parents, administrators, and teachers. It showed the need for them to interact in a zone of struggle, but emerge with a shared and understood vision for the development of all children in education and science education.

The New Environmentalist.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Waller, Edmund

1991-01-01

Basic training in the earth sciences, social sciences, and visual arts is discussed as essential for the education and training of government advisers on physical planning matters. Urban planning examples are presented that highlight the ecological factors, social influences, and aesthetic values which need to be considered when dealing with…

Moving toward equitable, systemic science education reform: The synergy among science education and school-level reforms in an urban middle school

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kelly, Mary Kathryn

The purpose of this study was to develop an understanding of the relationships among school-level and science education reform efforts and how, collectively, they contribute to the progress of equitable, systemic science education reform. A case study research design was employed to gather both qualitative and quantitative data between 1995 and 1999. The site of this study is a non-selective, urban middle school in a large district that participated in several reform efforts. These reforms include both efforts focused on school-level change and efforts focused on change in science teaching and learning. Its program incorporates aspects of several school-level reforms---from the underlying Paideia philosophy, to structural characteristics of middle schools, to site-based decision-making, to its status as a magnet school, to its participation as a professional development school. Further, the participation of all science teachers in the intensive, standards-based professional development offered by Ohio's systemic reform of mathematics and science created a critical mass of reform-oriented teachers who supported one another as they incorporated reform-based practices into their teaching. The interplay of the reform efforts has manifested in a high level of science achievement in comparison to the school's district. Addressing the third component of O'Day and Smith's model for systemic reform, the need for school-level change to enable implementation of curriculum frameworks and aligned policies, this study illustrates two important points. First, the high-quality teacher professional development increased teachers' capacity to change their practices by enhancing their knowledge of and skills in implementing standards-based teaching practices. Second, because of the synchrony among the school-level reforms and between the school-level and science education reforms, the context of Webster provided a supportive environment in which lasting changes in science teaching and learning were implemented. Science education reform efforts were mediated by the school's context to create an environment in which the reform practices could be implemented and sustained. Using Kahle's (1998) Equity Metric, this study demonstrates that the synergy of the policies and practices of school-level and science education reforms can contribute to the progress of equitable, systemic science education reform.

The Effects of the Mystery Motivator Intervention in an Urban Classroom

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Beeks, Amirah; Graves, Scott, Jr.

2016-01-01

The purpose of this project was to examine the effect of the implementation of the Mystery Motivator intervention as an interdependent group contingency to decrease disruptive behavior in an urban eighth-grade general education science classroom. The study was conducted using an A-B changing criterion design. The effectiveness of the intervention…

From Churches to Pavements: Urban Geology and Paleontology in Algarve

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Azevedo Rodrigues, Luis

2015-04-01

Urban environments were and are tremendous consumers of geologic resources, offering excellent places for Geosciences outreach activities. Since 2011, three distinct science outreach activities were planned, produced and performed in three Algarve cities - Faro (GeoStories of Faro's Downtown), Lagos (Geology at the Corner) and Tavira (From the Museum to the Convent). Urban structures - churches, monuments, buildings and urban equipments were the starting point of the geological and paleontological stories that constitute the core of these informal education visits which also combine Art History and Heritage aspects. The urban buildings were the narrative tool to these Geosciences stories being the characters the rocks and/or the fossils as well as the city itself. Beyond the natural science element, the analyzed objects have relevant esthetical, historical or symbolic dimensions, conferring this way two levels of interpretation to the stories: the geosciences level; the other, the Historical and Architectural Heritage. The nineteen visits had 350 participants - Tavira (6; 100), Faro (4; 70) e Lagos (9; 180). Promoting and contribute to the Geosciences (Geology and Paleontology) outreach was the main objective of these walks, as well as: - modify the way that the general population looks at urban buildings; - contribute to the informal education of a general public especially among the public which is interested in Architecture, History and Heritage; - integrate different areas of human knowledge - Geosciences and Architecture, History and Heritage. The visits were tested and implemented and presently constitute one of the science outreach activities of the Ciência Viva Centers in the Algarve. As a result of these visits three bilingual books (Portuguese and English) of the Geosciences walks were edited. The guides, with 120 pages each, focus on the geological and paleontological characteristics of the visited places as well as the art history framework of the different monuments and urban areas.

Social Activism in Elementary Science Education: A Science, Technology, and Society Approach to Teach Global Warming

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lester, Benjamin T.; Ma, Li; Lee, Okhee; Lambert, Julie

2006-01-01

As part of a large-scale instructional intervention research, this study examined elementary students' science knowledge and awareness of social activism with regard to an increased greenhouse effect and global warming. The study involved fifth-grade students from five elementary schools of varying demographic makeup in a large urban school…

"I Am Science and the World Is Mine": Embodied Practices as Resources for Empowerment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Elmesky, Rowhea

2005-01-01

Those who are most marginalized, both culturally and economically, in society are concentrated in the nation's largest urban centers and have the least opportunities to be successful in school science or to pursue higher education and career trajectories in science, mathematics, or engineering. This article shares the results of a study in which…

Notes from California: an anthropological approach to urban science education for language minority families

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hammond, Lorie

2001-11-01

This article describes a unique and ongoing collaboration involving a team of bilingual/multicultural teacher-educators, preservice teachers, teachers, students, and community members in an urban California elementary school. According to the model this team employed, children, teachers, and student teachers gather community funds of knowledge about the science to be studied in a classroom, then incorporate this knowledge by using parents as experts and by creating community books. In this model community-generated materials parallel and complement standards-based curricula, although science topics that have natural significance in particular communities are used as a starting point. Using critical ethnography as a framework, the article focuses on a particular experience - the building of a Mien-American garden house - to show how, by drawing on participants' funds of knowledge, a new kind of multiscience can emerge, one accessible to all collaborating members and responsive to school standards.

Targeted Teacher Recruitment: What Is the Issue and Why Does It Matter? Policy Snapshot

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Aragon, Stephanie

2018-01-01

Districts across the country are facing severe shortages of teachers--especially in certain subjects (math, science, special education, career and technical education, and bilingual education) and in specific schools (urban, rural, high-poverty, high-minority, and low-achieving). The severity of the teacher shortage problem varies significantly by…

TRUST: A Successful Formal-Informal Teacher Education Partnership Designed to Improve and Promote Urban Earth Science Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sloan, H.; Drantch, K.; Steenhuis, J.

2006-12-01

We present an NSF-funded collaborative formal-informal partnership for urban Earth science teacher preparation and professional development. This model brings together The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and Brooklyn and Lehman College of the City University of New York (CUNY) to address science-impoverished classrooms that lack highly qualified teachers by focusing on Earth science teacher certification. Project design was based on identified needs in the local communities and schools, careful analysis of content knowledge mastery required for Earth science teacher certification, and existing impediments to certification. The problem-based approach required partners to push policy envelopes and to invent new ways of articulating content and pedagogy at both intra- and inter-institutional levels. One key element of the project is involvement of the local board of education, teachers, and administrators in initial design and ongoing assessment. Project components include formal Earth systems science courses, a summer institute primarily led and delivered by AMNH scientists through an informal series of lectures coupled to workshops led by AMNH educators, a mechanism for assigning course credit for informal experiences, development of new teaching approaches that include teacher action plans and an external program of evaluation. The principal research strand of this project focuses on the resulting model for formal-informal teacher education partnership, the project's impact on participating teachers, policy issues surrounding the model and the changes required for its development and implementation, and its potential for Earth science education reform. As the grant funded portion of the project draws to a close we begin to analyze data collected over the past 3 years. Third-year findings of the project's external evaluation indicate that the problem-based approach has been highly successful, particularly its impact on participating teachers. In addition to presenting these results, participating teachers from the 2004 and 2006 cohorts discuss their TRUST experiences and the subsequent impact the program has had on their respective Earth science teaching practices and professional lives.

Inquiry-based science in the middle grades: Assessment of learning in urban systemic reform

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Marx, Ronald W.; Blumenfeld, Phyllis C.; Krajcik, Joseph S.; Fishman, Barry; Soloway, Elliot; Geier, Robert; Tali Tal, Revital

2004-12-01

Science education standards established by American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the National Research Council (NRC) urge less emphasis on memorizing scientific facts and more emphasis on students investigating the everyday world and developing deep understanding from their inquiries. These approaches to instruction challenge teachers and students, particularly urban students who often have additional challenges related to poverty. We report data on student learning spanning 3 years from a science education reform collaboration with the Detroit Public Schools. Data were collected from nearly 8,000 students who participated in inquiry-based and technology-infused curriculum units that were collaboratively developed by district personnel and staff from the University of Michigan as part of a larger, district-wide systemic reform effort in science education. The results show statistically significant increases on curriculum-based test scores for each year of participation. Moreover, the strength of the effects grew over the years, as evidenced by increasing effect size estimates across the years. The findings indicate that students who historically are low achievers in science can succeed in standards-based, inquiry science when curriculum is carefully developed and aligned with professional development and district policies. Additional longitudinal research on the development of student understanding over multiple inquiry projects, the progress of teacher enactment over time, and the effect of changes in the policy and administrative environment would further contribute to the intellectual and practical tools necessary to implement meaningful standards-based systemic reform in science.

Girls' Attitudes Towards Science in Kenya

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chetcuti, Deborah A.; Kioko, Beriter

2012-07-01

This study investigated girls' attitudes towards science in Kenya. It was carried out with 120 girls from four secondary schools in the Eastern province of Kenya. These were an urban single-sex (SS) and co-educational (Co-Ed) school and a rural SS and Co-Ed school. Different schools were chosen in order to explore whether there are any differences in attitudes in SS and Co-Ed schools and in schools in rural and urban areas. The methodology included the use of both questionnaires and focus group interviews. The main aim was to gain insight into the extent and depth of students' attitudes towards science. The findings of the study showed that the majority of Kenyan girls who participated in the study have a favourable attitude towards science. Girls in SS schools were found to have a more favourable attitude than those in Co-Ed schools, while girls in rural area schools were found to find science more relevant than those in urban schools. It emerged from this study that the attitudes of Kenyan girls are influenced by their perceptions of the relevance of science, enjoyment of studying science, perceptions of the suitability of science for a career, and their perceptions of subject difficulty.

Strange bedfellows in science teacher preparation: conflicting perspectives on social justice presented in a Teach For America—university partnership

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McNew-Birren, Jill; Hildebrand, Tyra; Belknap, Gabrielle

2017-02-01

Teach For America (TFA), a widespread and well-known route into the teaching profession, frequently partners with university-based education programs to prepare and certify its corps members. However, university-based teacher education programs frequently emphasize very different understandings of socially just education and priorities for training teachers from those of TFA. Accordingly, science teachers trained through TFA-university partnerships encounter conflicting understandings of science education, justice, and urban communities as they are introduced to teaching practice. In this ethnographic case study we explored the experiences and reactions of a cohort of TFA corps members in a science methods course as they engaged with TFA's perspective focused primarily on enhancing students' social mobility and the methods course emphasizing democratic equality through scientific engagement. The study considers intersections between TFA's approach to teacher preparation and sociocultural perspectives on equitable science teaching. The study also lends insight into the contradictions and challenges through which TFA science teachers develop understandings about their role as science teachers, purposes and goals of science education, and identities of the students and communities they serve.

The NSF-RCN Urban Heat Island Network

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Twine, T. E.; Snyder, P. K.; Hamilton, P.; Shepherd, M.; Stone, B., Jr.

2014-12-01

In much of the world cities are warming at twice the rate of outlying rural areas. The frequency of urban heat waves is projected to increase with climate change through the 21stcentury. Addressing the economic, environmental, and human costs of urban heat islands requires a better understanding of their behavior from many disciplinary perspectives. The goal of this four-year Urban Heat Island Network is to (1) bring together scientists studying the causes and impacts of urban warming, (2) advance multidisciplinary understanding of urban heat islands, (3) examine how they can be ameliorated through engineering and design practices, and (4) share these new insights with a wide array of stakeholders responsible for managing urban warming to reduce their health, economic, and environmental impacts. The Urban Heat Island Network involves atmospheric scientists, engineers, architects, landscape designers, urban planners, public health experts, and education and outreach experts, who will share knowledge, evaluate research directions, and communicate knowledge and research recommendations to the larger research community as well as stakeholders engaged in developing strategies to adapt to and mitigate urban warming. The first Urban Climate Institute was held in Saint Paul, Minnesota in July 2013 and focused on the characteristics of urban heat islands. Scientists engaged with local practitioners to improve communication pathways surrounding issues of understanding, adapting to, and mitigating urban warming. The second Urban Climate Institute was held in Atlanta, Georgia in July 2014 and focused on urban warming and public health. Scientists discussed the state of the science on urban modeling, heat adaptation, air pollution, and infectious disease. Practitioners informed participants on emergency response methods and protocols related to heat and other extreme weather events. Evaluation experts at the Science Museum of Minnesota have extensively evaluated both Institutes to improve future Institutes and to inform other research coordination networks. Two more Institutes are planned for 2015 and 2016 focusing on urban warming and the built environment, and education and outreach.

Between a rock and a hard place: Learning to teach science-for-all in an urban district

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Galosy, Jodie A.

2005-07-01

Science-for-all, a contemporary science education reform initiative, envisions science classrooms where all students have opportunities to deepen their understanding of scientific concepts and practices. However, national science achievement tests indicate the reality of science-for-all is still very much a work-in-progress. Science-for-all demands much of teachers, especially those working with student populations typically underserved by science education---students of color, students with limited English proficiency, and those from families with limited economic means. A large proportion of those students attend urban districts where they are likely to encounter novice science teachers. This qualitative study investigated learning to teach science-for-all in an urban school district. Seven early career middle and high school science teachers participated in the study. Data collection took place over a period of fourteen months, through interviews and observations with teacher participants, their schools, and in their professional development activities (including new teacher support induction programs). The study examines how new teachers' use of their personal, social, and conventional resources influenced their beliefs and practices relative to science-for-all. Three reform ideals serve as the study's focal points: content goals that emphasize understanding scientific concepts and practices, hands-on activities that support students' intellectual engagement, and literacy strategies that provide access for all students to scientific content. Few novices developed beliefs and practices that supported science-for-all. Those who did brought several key personal resources to their teaching. While these personal resources were important for teacher development, they were not sufficient; novices needed additional resources. Some teachers had access to reform-based conventional resources others did not have. However, personal and social resources shaped how novices used those resources and, in turn, their beliefs about students and teaching practices. Context-specific assistance was a particularly important social resource that was in short supply for most novices. The study provides evidence that progress towards science-for-all will require substantial attention to, and investment in, teacher learning across all dimensions of the professional continuum---pre-service, induction, and in-service. The study also provides insights in two critical areas: strengthening the resources available to early career urban science teachers and shaping resource use towards the goals envisioned in science-for all.

Creating contextually authentic science in a low-performing urban elementary school

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Buxton, Cory A.

2006-09-01

This article reports on a 2-year collaborate project to reform the teaching and learning of science in the context of Mae Jemison Elementary, the lowest performing elementary school in the state of Louisiana. I outline a taxonomy of authentic science inquiry experiences and then use the resulting framework to focus on how project participants interpreted and enacted ideas about collaboration and authenticity. The resulting contextually authentic science inquiry model links the strengths of a canonically authentic model of science inquiry (grounded in the Western scientific canon) with the strengths of a youth-centered model of authenticity (grounded in student-generated inquiry), thus bringing together relevant content standards and topics with critical social relevance. I address the question of how such enactments may or may not promote doing science together and consider the implications of this model for urban science education.

Development of the Teachers Supporting Teachers in Urban Schools Program: What Iterative Research Designs Can Teach Us

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shernoff, Elisa S.; Frazier, Stacy L.; Marinez-Lora, Ane; Atkins, Marc S.; Keel, Joanna

2011-01-01

The "Teachers Supporting Teachers in Urban Schools Project" is a 3-year study funded by the Institute of Education Sciences (Development and Innovation Study) and designed to enhance new teachers' effectiveness around the two strongest empirical predictors of attrition--classroom management and engaging learners--and connectedness to…

Math and Science Academic Success in Three Large, Diverse, Urban High Schools: A Teachers' Story

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McKenzie, Kathryn Bell; Skrla, Linda; Scheurich, James Joseph; Rice, Delores; Hawes, Daniel P.

2011-01-01

Large, traditional urban high schools are among the most difficult education environments in the United States. These schools, which serve a high percentage of the Black and Latino students in the United States, often have low academic performance, high dropout rates, high teacher and school leader turnover, and inexperienced teachers. They often…

Analysis of the Approach to Parasitic Cycles in Brazilian Science Textbooks as a Tool for Education in Health and Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Simplicio, Nathan D. C. S.; Cordova, Bianca C.; Oliveira-Filho, Eduardo C.

2016-01-01

Modifying the environment is a characteristic of the human species. With deforestation and the expansion of urban centers, diseases known in animals have begun to be described in humans. Science textbooks constitute an instrument of great importance in understanding this issue. This study evaluated the main science textbooks, recommended by the…

The Decision Sciences in Vocational Education Leadership Development Programs. Project Monograph.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McNamara, James F.

This essay explores how the application of the decision sciences in the interdisciplinary training, research, and development activities of model graduate professional schools of management, urban and public affairs, business, government, and regional planning might be linked to current efforts to improve leadership development and training…

Manpower and the Minority Student. Regional Spotlight Vol. XI, No. 1.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Anderson, Laura

Market saturation and diminishing opportunities are imminent in fields heavily favored by blacks in college: the social sciences, home economics and education. Future opportunities will come in fields presently unpopular or unknown to blacks: engineering, accounting, library science, urban and regional planning, health professions, and computer…

Fostering K-12 Inquiry-based Lesson Development on Regional Water Resource Issues in Los Angeles Urban Schools through the NSF UCLA SEE-LA GK-12 program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hogue, T. S.; Burke, M. P.; Thulsirag, V.; Daniel, J.; Moldwin, M.; Nonacs, P.

2010-12-01

A National Science Foundation Graduate Teaching Fellows in K- 12 Education program at UCLA (SEE-LA; http://measure.igpp.ucla.edu/GK12-SEE-LA/ ) partners UCLA faculty and graduate students (fellows) with urban middle and high school science teachers and their students to foster programs of science and engineering exploration that bring the environment of Los Angeles into the classroom. UCLA graduate fellows serve as scientists-in-residence at four partner schools to integrate inquiry-based science lessons, facilitate advancements in science content teaching, and ultimately, to improve their own science communication skills. As part of their fellowship, graduate students are required to develop inquiry-based lessons in their partner classroom. During the first two years of the project, the SEE-LA fellows have developed a range of inquiry-based activities, from invertebrate observations in an urban stream system, to water and home energy consumption surveys, to a school biodiversity investigation, to a school-wide alternative energy fair, to engineering the cleanup of environmental disasters, such as the recent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Several of the current fellows have dissertation research in water resource related fields and are specifically integrating lessons specific to their research into their partner classrooms, including urban stream water quality, post-fire watershed behavior, beach water quality assessment and E. coli source tracking. This presentation will provide an overview of goals of the SEE-LA GK-12 program, development of inquiry-based water resource lessons and resulting engagement in the partner classrooms. University and local pre-college school partnerships provide an excellent opportunity to support the development of graduate student communication and teaching skills while also contributing significantly to the integration of science education into K-12 curriculum.

Learning to teach science for social justice in urban schools

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vora, Purvi

This study looks at how beginner teachers learn to teach science for social justice in urban schools. The research questions are: (1) what views do beginner teachers hold about teaching science for social justice in urban schools? (2) How do beginner teachers' views about teaching science for social justice develop as part of their learning? In looking at teacher learning, I take a situative perspective that defines learning as increased participation in a community of practice. I use the case study methodology with five teacher participants as the individual units of analysis. In measuring participation, I draw from mathematics education literature that offers three domains of professional practice: Content, pedagogy and professional identity. In addition, I focus on agency as an important component of increased participation from a social justice perspective. My findings reveal two main tensions that arose as teachers considered what it meant to teach science from a social justice perspective: (1) Culturally responsive teaching vs. "real" science and (2) Teaching science as a political act. In negotiating these tensions, teachers drew on a variety of pedagogical and conceptual tools offered in USE that focused on issues of equity, access, place-based pedagogy, student agency, ownership and culture as a toolkit. Further, in looking at how the five participants negotiated these tensions in practice, I describe four variables that either afforded or constrained teacher agency and consequently the development of their own identity and role as socially just educators. These four variables are: (1) Accessing and activating social, human and cultural capital, (2) reconceptualizing culturally responsive pedagogical tools, (3) views of urban youth and (4) context of participation. This study has implications for understanding the dialectical relationship between agency and social justice identity for beginner teachers who are learning how to teach for social justice. Also, it suggests teacher agency as an important domain of professional practice when measuring teacher learning from a situative perspective.

"That Evil Genius of the Negro Race": Thomas Jesse Jones and Educational Reform.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kliebard, Herbert M.

1994-01-01

Jones's ideas on education integrated two major turn-of-the-century reform thrusts: social gospel and the application of science to human affairs. Known for his urban immigrant studies, Jones combined humanitarian zeal with scientific certainty in a conception of education that would dominate reform efforts in the progressive era. Jones's brand of…

Differences between urban and rural hedges in England revealed by a citizen science project.

PubMed

Gosling, Laura; Sparks, Tim H; Araya, Yoseph; Harvey, Martin; Ansine, Janice

2016-07-22

Hedges are both ecologically and culturally important and are a distinctive feature of the British landscape. However the overall length of hedges across Great Britain is decreasing. Current challenges in studying hedges relate to the dominance of research on rural, as opposed to urban, hedges, and their variability and geographical breadth. To help address these challenges and to educate the public on the importance of hedge habitats for wildlife, in 2010 the Open Air Laboratories (OPAL) programme coordinated a hedge-focused citizen science survey. Results from 2891 surveys were analysed. Woody plant species differed significantly between urban and rural areas. Beech, Holly, Ivy, Laurel, Privet and Yew were more commonly recorded in urban hedges whereas Blackthorn, Bramble, Dog Rose, Elder and Hawthorn were recorded more often in rural hedges. Urban and rural differences were shown for some groups of invertebrates. Ants, earwigs and shieldbugs were recorded more frequently in urban hedges whereas blowflies, caterpillars, harvestmen, other beetles, spiders and weevils were recorded more frequently in rural hedges. Spiders were the most frequently recorded invertebrate across all surveys. The presence of hard surfaces adjacent to the hedge was influential on hedge structure, number and diversity of plant species, amount of food available for wildlife and invertebrate number and diversity. In urban hedges with one adjacent hard surface, the food available for wildlife was significantly reduced and in rural hedges, one adjacent hard surface affected the diversity of invertebrates. This research highlights that urban hedges may be important habitats for wildlife and that hard surfaces may have an impact on both the number and diversity of plant species and the number and diversity of invertebrates. This study demonstrates that citizen science programmes that focus on hedge surveillance can work and have the added benefit of educating the public on the importance of hedgerow habitats.

``It depends on what science teacher you got'': urban science self-efficacy from teacher and student voices

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bolshakova, Virginia L. J.; Johnson, Carla C.; Czerniak, Charlene M.

2011-12-01

In the United States today, urban schools serve the majority of high-poverty and high minority populations including large numbers of Hispanic students. While many Hispanic students perform below grade level in middle school science, the science teaching community as a whole is lacking elements of diversity as teachers struggle to meet the needs of all learners. Researchers have recognized that science teacher effectiveness, one consequence of self-efficacy among teachers, is associated with future science achievement and science-related careers of their students. This qualitative study explores how three science teachers' effectiveness in the classroom impacts students' science self-efficacy beliefs at one urban middle school. Hispanic students were the focus of this investigation due to demographics and history of underperformance within this district. Teachers' perspectives, as well as outside observer evaluations of instructional strategies and classroom climates were triangulated to explore dynamics that influence students' interests and motivation to learn science using a framework to link teachers' sense of efficacy (focusing on student outcomes). Findings suggest the impact teacher effectiveness can have on student outcomes, including strengthened student science self-efficacy and increased science achievement. Building awareness and support in teachers' sense of efficacy, as well as developing respectful and supportive relationships between educator/facilitator and pupil during the transition to middle school may construct permanence and accomplishment for all in science.

Transdisciplinary Learning and Teaching as Answers to Urban Sustainability Challenges

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Biberhofer, Petra; Rammel, Christian

2017-01-01

Purpose: This paper aims to explain the relevance of science-society interfaces and their potential for higher education institutions to engage stakeholders in supporting sustainable change in cities, via the transdisciplinary learning and teaching approach of the Regional Centre of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development Vienna.…

Opportunities to Learn in School and at Home: How Can They Predict Students' Understanding of Basic Science Concepts and Principles?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wang, Su; Liu, Xiufeng; Zhao, Yandong

2012-01-01

As the breadth and depth of economic reforms increase in China, growing attention is being paid to equalities in opportunities to learn science by students of various backgrounds. In early 2009, the Chinese Ministry of Education and Ministry of Science and Technology jointly sponsored a national survey of urban eighth-grade students' science…

Action Research Using Entomological Research to Promote Hands-On Science Inquiry in a High-Poverty, Midwest Urban High School

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stockmann, Dustin

The purpose of this mixed-methods action research study was to examine to what extent entomological research can promote students' hands-on learning in a high-poverty, urban, secondary setting. In reviewing the literature, the researcher was not able to find a specific study that investigated how entomological research could promote the hands-on learning of students. The researcher did find evidence that research on learning in a secondary setting was important to student growth. It should also be noted that support was established for the implementation of hands-on science inquiry in the classroom setting. The study's purpose was to aid educators in their instruction by combining research-based strategies and hands-on science inquiry. The surveys asked 30 students to rate their understanding of three basic ideas. These core ideas were entomological research, hands-on science inquiry, and urban studies. These core ideas provided the foundation for the study. The questionnaires were based on follow-up ideas from the surveys. Two interview sessions were used to facilitate this one-on-one focus. Because the study included only 30 student participants, its findings may not be totally replicable. Further study investigating the links between entomological research and hands-on science learning in an urban environment is needed.

Becoming-Teacher: The Negotiation of Teaching Practice of First-Year Secondary Science Teachers Prepared in a Hybrid Urban Teacher Education Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Strom, Kathryn Jill

2014-01-01

While research suggests that new teachers work to put into practice the pedagogy learned from their preservice preparation programs during their first year of teaching, they often resort to traditional, teacher-centered pedagogies even when prepared to use innovative practices, particularly in urban schools. Relatively little is known, however,…

Urban 5th Graders Conceptions during a Place-Based Inquiry Unit on Watersheds

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Endreny, Anna Henderson

2010-01-01

This study aimed to determine how 33 urban 5th grade students' science conceptions changed during a place-based inquiry unit on watersheds. Research on watershed and place-based education was used as a framework to guide the teaching of the unit as well as the research study. A teacher-researcher designed the curriculum, taught the unit and…

Early Urban Field Experiences for Prospective Teachers: A Case Study of Multicultural Field Placements through a University-Based Preservice STEM Teacher Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Segal, Eden H.

2011-01-01

Educational and political leaders have expressed concern about racial and ethnic disparities in students' readiness for postsecondary study and careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). A lack of preparedness of STEM teachers in high-need urban districts, which serve predominantly low-income minority students, is often…

A Webcast of Bird Nesting as a State-of-the-Art Citizen Science.

PubMed

Zárybnická, Markéta; Sklenicka, Petr; Tryjanowski, Piotr

2017-01-01

The quality of people's knowledge of nature has always had a significant influence on their approach to wildlife and nature conservation. However, direct interactions of people with nature are greatly limited nowadays, especially because of urbanization and modern lifestyles. As a result, our isolation from the natural world has been growing. Here, we present an example of a state-of-the-art Citizen Science project with its educational, scientific, and popularizing benefits. We conclude that modern media and new forms of education offer an effective opportunity for inspiring children and others to have fun learning to act like scientists. This approach provides broad opportunities for developing the hitherto neglected educational potential of Citizen Science.

A comparative study of self-efficacy, outcome expectancy, and retention of beginning urban science teachers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Klein, Nina

The purpose of the multi-tiered study presented is to compare the effect of credentialing route on the self-efficacy, outcome expectancy, and retention of beginning urban science teachers serving students in a large urban school district in Southern California. Candidates from one traditional, university-based teacher education program and from two alternative programs, the Teach for America and District Intern Programs, were surveyed and interviewed during the second semester of their first year of teaching. To determine the potential of a difference in self-efficacy and outcome expectancy, the study gave teachers a modified version of the Science Teachers' Efficacy Belief Instrument (STEBI), developed and validated by Riggs and Enochs (1989). Two representative candidates from each program were then interviewed in order to probe for deeper understanding of possible sources of their efficacy and outcome expectancy. The final part of the study is an evaluation of retention data from the three programs, each to triangulate this information with data collected from the surveys, and comparing these retention rates with published data. The study provides data on unresearched questions about traditionally and alternatively credentialed science teachers in urban settings in California.

Urban Elementary Students' Conceptions of Learning Goals for Agricultural Science and Technology

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Trexler, Cary J.; Hess, Alexander J.; Hayes, Kathryn N.

2013-01-01

Nationally, both science and agricultural education professional organizations have identified agriculture as a fundamental technology to be studied by students, with the goal of achieving an understanding of the agri-food system necessary for democratic participation. Benchmarks representing the content that K-12 children need to understand about…

The Retreat of the State and the Future of Social Science

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Baars, Sam

2014-01-01

Amidst deep cuts to public spending, the UK Coalition government announced in 2010 that it would be substantially reducing its subsidy of social science within higher education. As part of the same deficit reduction strategy, the government is cutting funding to local authorities, disproportionately hitting urban councils in the most deprived…

Improving Academic Outcomes in Poor Urban Schools through Nature-Based Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Camasso, Michael J.; Jagannathan, Radha

2018-01-01

This paper presents results from the evaluation of the Nurture thru Nature (NtN) programme, a natural science and environmental education intervention designed to help elementary school children from disadvantaged backgrounds increase their knowledge of science and strengthen overall academic performance. Using an experimental design the pilot NtN…

Becoming an Engineer in Public Universities: Pathways for Women and Minorities. Palgrave Studies in Urban Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Borman, Kathryn M., Ed.; Tyson, Will, Ed.; Halperin, Rhoda H., Ed.

2010-01-01

Based on research conducted in a three-year, mixed-method, multi-site National Science Foundation, Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Talent Expansion Program (STEP) Project, this book offers a comprehensive look into how engineering department culture and climate impacts the successful retention of female and under-represented…

Predicting Scientific Understanding of Prospective Elementary Teachers: Role of Gender, Education Level, Courses in Science, and Attitudes Toward Science and Mathematics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kumar, David D.; Morris, John D.

2005-12-01

A multiple regression analysis of the relationship between prospective teachers' scientific understanding and Gender, Education Level (High School, College), Courses in Science (Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Earth Science, Astronomy, and Agriculture), Attitude Towards Science, and Attitude Towards Mathematics is reported. Undergraduate elementary science students ( N = 176) in an urban doctoral-level university in the United States participated in this study. The results of this study showed Gender, completion of courses in High School Chemistry and Physics, College Chemistry and Physics, and Attitudes Toward Mathematics and Science significantly correlated with scientific understanding. Based on a regression model, Gender, and College Chemistry and Physics experiences added significant predictive accuracy to scientific understanding among prospective elementary teachers compared to the other variables.

Advocating for equitable science-learning opportunities for girls in an urban city youth club and the roadblocks faced by women science educators

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Davis, Kathleen S.

2002-02-01

This article reports on a study that examined the obstacles women science educators faced as they facilitated Explorers, an after-school science program for girls aged 6-12. The program aimed to provide girls with opportunities to legitimately participate in science activity. Explorers was one of several programs offered by the Foothills City Youth Club (FCYC) in a racially diverse urban center in the Southwestern United States. The youth club was meant to serve the needs of children and youth in that community. Through analysis of field notes, interviews, and documents, the social structures and forces that impeded the implementation of practices and the acquisition of capital are described. They include: (a) inadequate funding and community support, (b) conflicting beliefs between FCYC leaders and community leaders about the needs of boys and girls, and 3) inequitable decision-making structures of the community. Underlying beliefs, structures, and practices within the community weakened the FCYC in many ways, interrupted the leadership's attempts to meet their goals as they worked with the community's children, and brought to the surface issues of bias and oppression.

A Student and Teacher Watershed and Wetland Education Program: Extension to Promote Community Social-Ecological Resilience

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Myers, Monique R.

2012-01-01

A middle school student and teacher watershed education project supports a large wetland restoration effort. It provides community-based, science education for urban, low-income, multicultural 6th-9th grade students and their teachers. This is a bottom-up approach to extending information to the local community about the restoration. The project…

Urban special education policy and the lived experience of stigma in a high school science classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hale, Chris

2015-12-01

In this paper, I provide a window into the lived experience of a group of urban high school science students confronted with the stigma associated with special education, disability, and academic failure and present tools to understanding the ideological forces and institutional structures that undermine the ability of schools to create a culture of care and inclusion of children with disabilities. With the purpose of understanding the context of these students' tainted social status within the school community, I draw connections between the ideological bipolarity and ambiguity of federal and state special education law and the lack of moral commitment at the local level to including and protecting the rights of children with disabilities in New York City schools. An important element of this paper is an exploration of a decade of neoliberal reform in the New York City Department of Education and the meticulously documented failure of New York City's special education system to provide mandated services, adequately include special education students, and generally protect the rights of children with disabilities. I conclude that the ableism embedded in special education law and a lack of meaningful enforcement renders special education regulations intangible to administrators whereas neoliberal performance benchmarks are extremely salient due to the dire consequences for schools of not meeting them.

Listening to their voices: Exploring mathematics-science identity development of African American males in an urban school community

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wilson, Kimi Leemar

National data continues to show an underrepresentation of African American males pursuing science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) majors, careers and professions in the United States. Whites and Asian Americans are continuously positioned as the face of STEM education and participation. And while research has provided ways to support mathematics and science learning for African American males, there still remains a gap in understanding how their formed mathematics-science identities in K-12 public schooling influences STEM participation. The research undertaken in this study explores this gap, and uses an integrative identity framework to understand mathematics-science identity development which goes beyond personal identity, and explores the relational, collective and material components of identity. Specifically, this research seeks to answer the following research questions: What are the shared lived experiences that exist between a group of African American male students developing a mathematics-science identity, and how these shared lived experiences shape their mathematics-science identity development? Therefore, by analyzing African American males lived experiences employing an integrative identity framework fosters a greater understanding of how mathematics-science identity is formed in K-12 public schools, which impacts STEM education and participation. The high school aged youth featured in this study consist of four African American males, who live in a moderate size city in California. Data for this study consists of observations, phenomenological interviews, and policy document analysis that took place over six months. Data has been analyzed to describe and interpret the young men's mathematics and science experiences, as revealed in their K-12 public school education. This inquiry sought to make meaning of how African American males experience mathematics and science teaching and learning within K-12 public schooling and how these experiences impact mathematics-science identity development. The goal of the study seeks to inform educational, psychological and sociological theory about how urban adolescent African American males understand, develop and make use of their mathematics and science knowledge. Finally, this work seeks to inform mathematics and science educational research to include identity theory, beyond a personal or individual identity perspective, but also to include relational, collective, and material identity components to understand how the culture of mathematics and science within and outside of K-12 public schooling impacts African American males in an endeavor to become learners of mathematics and science.

The TRUST Project: A Formal-Informal Teacher Education Partnership for the Promotion of Earth Science Teacher Certification

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sloan, H.; Miele, E.; Powell, W.; MacDonald, M.

2004-12-01

The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in partnership with Lehman and Brooklyn Colleges of the City University of New York (CUNY) has initiated The Teacher Renewal for Urban Science Teaching (TRUST) project. TRUST combines informal and formal teacher education in a four-year initiative to enhance professional development and masters of science education programs, grades K-8 at Brooklyn College and 7-12 at Lehman College. This NSF-funded partnership brings together the resources of AMNH, CUNY, New York City school districts, New York City Department of Education-Museum Partnerships, and the expertise of scientists and teachers with research experiences. Following an initial planning year, TRUST will recruit and sustain 90 teachers over a period of 3 years as well as engage 30 school administrators in support of Earth science instruction. Program components include two new formal Earth systems science courses, intensive informal summer institutes, and a lecture and workshop series during which participants gain new Earth science content knowledge, develop action plans, and present their work on the local and national level. In addition, participants have access to ongoing resource and material support to enhance their learning and instruction. Continuous documentation and data collection by project investigators are being used to address questions regarding the impact various aspects of the TRUST participant experience on classroom instruction and learning, the acquisition of scientific knowledge in the new courses and institutes, and to examine the nature of the Museum experience in meeting certification goals. External formative and summative evaluation of the project is addressing issues surrounding the value of the program as a model for formal-informal partnership in urban Earth science teacher education and certification, analysis of policies that facilitate partnership arrangements, and how socialization of novices with experts affects retention and renewal. Details of the program's structure and preliminary results from the first two years will be presented.

Exploring and Understanding the Benefits of Tutoring Software on Urban Students' Science Achievement: What Are Baltimore City Practitioners' Perspectives?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Pinder, Patrice Juliet

2008-01-01

Historically, very little research that meets the scientifically based standards as defined by the No Child Left Behind Act has been conducted on the effectiveness of educational technology on student achievement. The purpose of this study was to explore and seek to understand urban city teachers' perspectives on the benefits or effects of…

Comparative Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA): Interplay of discourses (D/D1) as third grade urban and suburban science students engage in hypothesis formulation and observation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mendoza, Carmen Irene Reyes

This qualitative research project is a comparative analysis of Discourses (D/D1) while focused upon the science processes of hypothesis generation and observation in an urban versus suburban elementary science classroom. D designates the instructional and formal academic science Discourse and D1 represents the students' informal, social or home language D1iscourses. In particular, this research study is a critical discourse analysis that examines how the science processes of hypothesis formulation and observation are constituted through the interplay of classroom Discourses (D/D1) as two third grade science teachers teach the same kit-based, inquiry science lessons with their respective urban and suburban students. The research also considers ethnicity, social class, language, and the central role science teachers play mediating between children's everyday world and the world of science. Communicative approach and distinctive patterns of interaction between the European American teachers and their respective students are analyzed through a critical lens to examine underlying issues of equity and power embedded in the instructional Discourse of science. Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) provides both the theoretical framework and analytical lens. The research informs development of linguistic-based "best" practices to contribute toward promoting greater science teacher awareness in creating linguistic environments that support all students' learning science Discourse and to serve as a springboard for future educational science researchers' use of CDA.

Curriculum and Resources: Computer Provision in a CTC.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Denholm, Lawrence

The program for City Technical Colleges (CTCs) draws on ideas and resources from government, private industry, and education to focus on the educational needs of inner city and urban children. Mathematics, science, and technology are at the center of the CTCs' mission, in a context which includes economic awareness and a commitment to enterprise…

Urban Town and Gown: Increasing Minority Participation in the Geosciences Through a College-High School Partnership in Hartford, CT

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

OConnell, S.; OConnell, S.; OConnell, S.; Osborn, J. L.; Osborn, J. L.

2001-12-01

Urban public schools are often poor and have a tremendous need for educational assistance. In many cities the population is dominated by ethnic minorities. Hartford, CT, is one of these cities. Only about 50% of the students entering high school graduate and approximately 50% of those go on to higher education. Of those students taking the SAT's the average verbal and math scores are below 400. Despite these statistics, many students do succeed and therein lies an opportunity for earth scientists. As individuals and as institutions we can partner with schools and students to involve them in and excite them about the earth sciences. In 1995 Trinity College, located in Hartford, CT, undertook a \\$175 m.d. neighborhood revitalization project with funds from the college, neighboring institutions, foundations, and city, state and federal governments. Central to the revitalization is the "Learning Corridor," an educational complex that includes a magnet Montessori School, a Math and Science Middle School, and a Math and Science Magnet High School (GHAMAS). GHAMAS has a three-fold mission: teaching math and science to high school students, professional development for all math and science teachers from participating school districts, and community outreach. The Learning Corridor is adjacent to the Trinity College campus and Trinity faculty work with GHAMAS faculty to fulfill all three missions. Trinity faculty teach several high school classes. During the summer 3 Trinity and 1 GHAMAS faculty participated as a group in a week long-long NSF-sponsored Environmental Science workshop. This fall over ten teacher workshops were co-taught by Trinity and GHAMAS faculty. Recent NSF funding will allow us to develop a collaborative education and research program focused on the Connecticut River.

Hip-Hop Based Interventions as Pedagogy/Therapy in STEM: A Model from Urban Science Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Emdin, Christopher; Adjapong, Edmund; Levy, Ian

2016-01-01

Purpose: This paper aims to argue that providing youth of color with opportunities to explore content while reflecting on and sharing mental health concerns is an under-focused dimension of teaching and learning that has the potential to positively impact these students' academic achievement in science, technology, engineering and mathematics…

The American Welfare State and Future Challanges to Black Education in the Age of Science and Technology.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hayes, Floyd W., III

The emerging "Managerial Estate," based as it is on knowledge, services, science, and technology, with built-in theories of expendability for people considered obsolete, will increasingly force Afro-Americans and historically-black institutions of higher learning to emphasize self-reliance and self determination. Moreover, urban public schools…

A Model Program in Science, Mathematics, and Technology. Final Report TP87-9.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McDowell, Ceasar; And Others

Over the past 5 years parents, industry leaders, and policy makers have called repeatedly for the improvement of mathematics and science education in urban schools and for measures to insure that all students are "technologically literate." Various efforts at the national, state, and local levels have emerged in response to these calls, with…

Girls' Attitudes towards Science in Kenya

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chetcuti, Deborah A.; Kioko, Beriter

2012-01-01

This study investigated girls' attitudes towards science in Kenya. It was carried out with 120 girls from four secondary schools in the Eastern province of Kenya. These were an urban single-sex (SS) and co-educational (Co-Ed) school and a rural SS and Co-Ed school. Different schools were chosen in order to explore whether there are any differences…

Teacher Training in Urban Settings: Inquiry, Efficacy, and Culturally Diverse Field Placements

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McGlamery, Sheryl L.; Franks, Bridget A.; Shillingstad, Saundra L.

2016-01-01

This study describes two years of findings with a unique field experience (teaching science inquiry activities to African-American girls in a summer STEM camp) for preservice elementary education majors. It reports on the effects of the field experience, in conjunction with blocked science and mathematics methods courses, on preservice teachers'…

Teachers' Perceptions of Policy Influences on Science Instruction with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Elementary Students

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shaver, Annis; Cuevas, Peggy; Lee, Okhee; Avalos, Mary

2007-01-01

This study asked elementary school teachers how educational policies affected their science instruction with a majority of English language learners. The study employed a questionnaire followed by focus group interviews with 43 third and fourth grade teachers from six elementary schools in a large urban school district with high populations of…

Understanding the Influence of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Factors on Inquiry-Based Science Education at Township Schools in South Africa

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ramnarain, Umesh

2016-01-01

This mixed-methods research investigated teachers' perceptions of intrinsic factors (personal attributes of the teacher) and extrinsic factors (environmental) influencing the implementation of inquiry-based science learning at township (underdeveloped urban area) high schools in South Africa. Quantitative data were collected by means of an adapted…

Using Rain Gardens to Promote Service Learning and Climate Science Education with Urban Youth

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kinsey, Sharon B.; Haberland, Michael W.

2012-01-01

The Jersey Roots, Global Reach 4-H Climate Science Program conducted in Camden, New Jersey introduces middle school students to the evidence, impacts, and potential solutions to climate change. For their service learning project, students installed two rain gardens at the school. Rain gardens are shallow landscaped depressions in the soil that can…

An Examination of Black Science Teacher Educators' Experiences with Multicultural Education, Equity, and Social Justice

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Atwater, Mary M.; Butler, Malcolm B.; Freeman, Tonjua B.; Carlton Parsons, Eileen R.

2013-12-01

Diversity, multicultural education, equity, and social justice are dominant themes in cultural studies (Hall in Cultural dialogues in cultural studies. Routledge, New York, pp 261-274, 1996; Wallace 1994). Zeichner (Studying teacher education: The report of the AERA panel on research and teacher education. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, pp 737-759, 2005) called for research studies of teacher educators because little research exists on teacher educators since the late 1980s. Thomson et al. (2001) identified essential elements needed in order for critical multiculturalism to be infused in teacher education programs. However, little is known about the commitment and experiences of science teacher educators infusing multicultural education, equity, and social justice into science teacher education programs. This paper examines twenty (20) Black science teacher educators' teaching experiences as a result of their Blackness and the inclusion of multicultural education, equity, and social justice in their teaching. This qualitative case study of 20 Black science teacher educators found that some of them have attempted and stopped due to student evaluations and the need to gain promotion and tenure. Other participants were able to integrate diversity, multicultural education, equity and social justice in their courses because their colleagues were supportive. Still others continue to struggle with this infusion without the support of their colleagues, and others have stopped The investigators suggest that if science teacher educators are going to prepare science teachers for the twenty first century, then teacher candidates must be challenged to grapple with racial, ethnic, cultural, instructional, and curricular issues and what that must mean to teach science to US students in rural, urban, and suburban school contexts.

Communicating Climate Science: A Historic Look to the Future

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Byrne, James; Andronova, Natasha; Rasch, Philip

2014-06-01

The June 2013 Chapman Conference brought together a diverse group of researchers, educators, and media for 5 days in Colorado to explore how to better communicate climate science. Multidisciplinary thinking was a key theme of the meeting. Participant expertise included urban planning, science, psychology, philosophy, history, film and documentary production, communications, journalism, public relations, and business. All helped to create a stimulating and inspirational atmosphere. The meeting program accommodated almost 100 submitted abstracts.

Communicating Urban Climate Change

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Snyder, S.; Crowley, K.; Horton, R.; Bader, D.; Hoffstadt, R.; Labriole, M.; Shugart, E.; Steiner, M.; Climate; Urban Systems Partnership

2011-12-01

While cities cover only 2% of the Earth's surface, over 50% of the world's people live in urban environments. Precisely because of their population density, cities can play a large role in reducing or exacerbating the global impact of climate change. The actions of cities could hold the key to slowing down climate change. Urban dwellers are becoming more aware of the need to reduce their carbon usage and to implement adaptation strategies. However, messaging around these strategies has not been comprehensive and adaptation to climate change requires local knowledge, capacity and a high level of coordination. Unless urban populations understand climate change and its impacts it is unlikely that cities will be able to successfully implement policies that reduce anthropogenic climate change. Informal and formal educational institutions in urban environments can serve as catalysts when partnering with climate scientists, educational research groups, and public policy makers to disseminate information about climate change and its impacts on urban audiences. The Climate and Urban Systems Partnership (CUSP) is an interdisciplinary network designed to assess and meet the needs and challenges of educating urban audiences about climate change. CUSP brings together organizations in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Queens, NY and Washington, DC to forge links with informal and formal education partners, city government, and policy makers. Together this network will create and disseminate learner-focused climate education programs and resources for urban audiences that, while distinct, are thematically and temporally coordinated, resulting in the communication of clear and consistent information and learning experiences about climate science to a wide public audience. Working at a community level CUSP will bring coordinated programming directly into neighborhoods presenting the issues of global climate change in a highly local context. The project is currently exploring a number of models for community programming and this session will present early results of these efforts while engaging participants in exploring approaches to connecting urban communities and their local concerns to the issues of global climate change.

An analysis of factors that influence secondary science teachers in an urban school district in South Texas to remain in the teaching profession

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Montoya, Bonnie

This quantitative study is an examination of personal and professional factors that contribute to science teachers continuing to teach science in an urban area in South Texas despite the growing demands of the profession. This study examines why teachers in general leave the profession but focuses on what factors influenced these teachers to stay. Personal retention factors measured included being an effective teacher and positive rapport with students. Professional retention factors included administrative support and adequate time to meet professional obligations. There are 149 secondary science teachers in this large urban school district. Data was gathered from 109 of these educators to analyze factors personal and professional factors in regards to why these teachers remain in the field. For the purposes of this study a secondary science teacher will be any teacher who teaches science in grades 6-12, which is considered middle (6 through 8) and high school (9 through 12) in this area. The data for this quantitative study was collected by a paper survey (N=109) that was distributed at a professional learning session at the beginning of the school year. A Principal Component Analysis was run followed by three multiple regression analyses of the pertinent components to determine if there is any relationship between the demographics of the participants and personal and professional factors that cause these teachers to remain in the field. The results of this study will contribute to the literature regarding teacher education and theory that examines teacher practice affecting change. The results showed that professional factors like the amount of resources and the quality of those resources to assist teachers with job efficacy mattered as much as the personal factors such as positive teaching experience and an intrinsic sense of being an effective educator. Further implications of this study include an exploration of Generalist certifications at the middle grades compared to content specific requirements at the high school level. Also an inquiry into whether or not the Bachelor's degree and teacher certification area matter to their level of self-efficacy and job satisfaction in the field of science they have been assigned to teach.

Examining the social and scientific roles of invention in science education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Calabrese-Barton, Angela

1998-03-01

I have been drawn to the construct of “invention” and “inventive acts” because in my research involving how homeless children construct science and the self-in-science, an overwhelming theme has been the multiple ways in which self-identity in science has been described by the children through a language of invention. Using post-modern feminism and science and technologies studies, I examine the multiple uses and definitions of “invention” in science in order to develop a theory of invention and inventive acts around the themes: invention as a social act, invention as a recursive and socially linked process, and embodied agency. I use this framework to examine the construct of “invention” in two different case studies involving the science education of urban homeless children. Finally, I link this discussion of invention and inventive acts with current international reform initiatives revolving around constructivist science teaching and learning.

Between Local Culture and School Science: The Case of Provincial and Urban Students from Eastern Colombia

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Medina-Jerez, William

2008-03-01

A lack of congruency between the teaching and learning of science and the student’s personal worlds has long been recognised by the international science education community as an issue deserving space in the research agenda. The purpose of this study was to explore the diversity of student reactions when subcultures such as family, community peers, and personal worldviews are considered along side the subculture of school science. Two-hundred and fifty students from urban and provincial schools in the northeastern region of Colombia (South America) participated. From this group, 18 students were interviewed. It was observed that students adopt a compartmentalisation of knowledge that is evident as both an avoiding strategy in the classroom and as a mechanism to differentiate between the natural world of their everyday situations and the one portrayed by a Westernised science instruction in the classroom. The findings reflect how multiple worldviews correlate with student frameworks as implanted by school science.

Television and Educational Reform in El Salvador. Summary Report of the First Year of Research.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schramm, Wilbur; And Others

The impact of instructional television and educational reform in El Salvador was apparent in the 1969 school year. Large gains in learning were recorded for each of the three televised seventh-grade courses--science, mathematics and social studies. Baseline tests administered in four grades of school revealed that urban students developed…

An Exploration of "Hyper-Local" Community-University Engagement in the Development of Smart Cities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Leigh, Elaine W.

2017-01-01

The use of big data in smart cities poses new questions about higher education and community-university engagement practices in addressing longstanding social and economic exclusion in urban communities. Drawing on transdisciplinary ideas in higher education, cultural theory, and science and technology studies, primary concerns in the era of big…

Using Inquiry and Tenets of Multicultural Education to Engage Latino English-Language Learning Students in Learning about Geology and the Nature of Science

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Meyer, Xenia S.; Capps, Daniel K.; Crawford, Barbara A.; Ross, Robert

2012-01-01

Traditional school science instruction has been largely unsuccessful in reaching diverse student groups and students from, in particular, underrepresented backgrounds. This paper presents a case study of an urban, dual-language middle school classroom in which the teacher used an alternative instructional approach, involving her students in an…

STEM after School: How to Design and Run Great Programs and Activities. A Guidebook for Program Leaders, Second Edition

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

ExpandED Schools, 2014

2014-01-01

This guidebook was prepared by TASC (The After-School Corporation) and their Frontiers in Urban Science Education (FUSE) programs. FUSE is TASC's initiative to help more out-of-school-time programs and expanded learning time schools offer kids engaging, exciting and inspiring activities that promote science inquiry. The guidebook offers a a…

Exploring Identities to Deepen Understanding of Urban High School Students' Sexual Health Decision-Making

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brotman, Jennie S.; Mensah, Felicia Moore; Lesko, Nancy

2010-01-01

Sexual health is a controversial science topic that has received little attention in the field of science education, despite its direct relevance to students' lives and communities. Moreover, research from other fields indicates that a great deal remains to be learned about how to make school learning about sexual health influence the real-life…

The Corporation and the Campus; Corporate Support of Higher Education in the 1970's. Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science, Volume XXX, Number 1.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Connery, Robert H., Ed.

The purpose of the conference was to bring together educational leaders, corporation executives, and spokesmen for minority groups to examine problems in higher education. The papers include: "The Urban Crisis," by Robert C. Wood, and Harriet A. Zuckerman; "Minority Groups," by Charles V. Hamilton; "The Community and the Campus," by Franklin H.…

Summer in the City - Assessing and Communicating the Richmond, VA Urban Heat Island to the Public and Policymakers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hoffman, J. S.; Maurakis, E. G.; Shandas, V.

2017-12-01

The local impacts of global climate change are generally underestimated or misunderstood by the public and policymakers as far-off, future problems. However, differential and regional surface warming trends are exacerbated in urban areas due to the radiative properties of impervious surfaces like buildings and roads relative to natural landscapes. Decades of research illustrate that this unnatural radiative imbalance in the built environment gives rise to the well-studied urban heat island effect, whereby air temperatures in urban areas are several degrees warmer than in surrounding non-urbanized areas. In this way, the urban heat island effect presents a unique opportunity to highlight the human influence on Earth systems and at the same time mobilize local community-scale action to mitigate and become resilient to climate change impacts on tangible, experiential time scales. However, public stakeholders, city planners, and policymakers may view the urban heat island effect and its mitigation strategies through varying degrees of climatological, public health, and urban development knowledge and interest. This variation in stakeholder engagement highlights the need for individualized science communication strategies for each audience in order to maximize understanding of the scientific outcomes and tactics for mitigating the urban heat island effect. The City of Richmond, Virginia is currently developing a climate action plan as part of their greenhouse gas emission reduction initiative, RVAgreen 2050, and its recently announced "Richmond 300," a 20-year city development master plan. These initiatives provide the policy backdrop for a public and stakeholder education campaign centered on communicating urban heat island effects and resilience strategies. As such, the Science Museum of Virginia led the city's first urban heat island assessment using citizen science and leveraging a network of local university, non-profit, and city government stakeholders. Here, we will share our tactics for public- and policymaker-centered dissemination of urban heat island science, findings, and mitigation strategies using a variety of techniques including local news stations, 3D visualization technology, NOAA-funded museum media pieces, and policymaker/stakeholder engagement opportunities.

The Challenges and Success of Implementing Climate Studies Lessons for Pre-Professional Teachers at a Small Historically Black College to Engage Student Teaching of Science Pedagogy and Content Skill Based Learning.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arnold, J.; Wider-Lewis, F.; Miller-Jenkins, A.

2017-12-01

This poster is a description of the challenges and success of implementing climate studies lessons for pre-service teachers to engage student teaching pedagogy and content skill based learning. Edward Waters College is a historical black college with an elementary education teacher program focused on urban elementary school teaching and learning. Pre-Service Elementary Educator Students often have difficulty with science and mathematics content and pedagogy. This poster will highlight the barriers and successes of using climate studies lessons to develop and enhance pre-service teachers' knowledge of elementary science principles particularly related to climate studies, physical and earth space science.

Development of a replicable process for translating science into practical health education messages.

PubMed

Tyus, Nadra C; Freeman, Randall J; Gibbons, M Christopher

2006-09-01

There has been considerable discussion about translating science into practical messages, especially among urban minority and "hard-to-reach" populations. Unfortunately, many research findings rarely make it back in useful format to the general public. Few innovative techniques have been established that provide researchers with a systematic process for developing health awareness and prevention messages for priority populations. The purpose of this paper is to describe the early development and experience of a unique community-based participatory process used to develop health promotion messages for a predominantly low-income, black and African-American community in Baltimore, MD. Scientific research findings from peer-reviewed literature were identified by academic researchers. Researchers then taught the science to graphic design students and faculty. The graphic design students and faculty then worked with both community residents and researchers to transform this information into evidence-based public health education messages. The final products were culturally and educationally appropriate, health promotion messages reflecting urban imagery that were eagerly desired by the community. This early outcome is in contrast to many previously developed messages and materials created through processes with limited community involvement and by individuals with limited practical knowledge of local community culture or expertise in marketing or mass communication. This process may potentially be utilized as a community-based participatory approach to enhance the translation of scientific research into desirable and appropriate health education messages.

Producing "science/fictions" about the rural and urban poor: Community-based learning at a medical college in South India

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arur, Aditi Ashok

This dissertation is an ethnographic case study of a community-based teaching program (CBTP) in public health at a medical college in South India that explored how the CBTP produced particular ways of seeing and understanding rural and urban poor communities. Drawing from critical, feminist, and postcolonial scholars, I suggest that the knowledge produced in the CBTP can be understood as "science/fictions", that is, as cultural texts shaped by transnational development discourses as well as medical teachers' and students' sociospatial imaginations of the rural and urban poor. I explored how these science/fictions mediated medical students' performative actions and interactions with a rural and an urban poor community in the context of the CBTP. At the same time, I also examined how knowledge produced in students' encounters with these communities disrupted their naturalized understandings about these communities, and how it was taken up to renarrativize science/fictions anew. Data collection and analyses procedures were informed by critical ethnographic and critical discourse analysis approaches. Data sources includes field notes constructed from observations of the CBTP, interviews with medical teachers and students, and curricular texts including the standardized national textbook of public health. The findings of this study illustrate how the CBTP staged the government and technology as central actors in the production of healthy bodies, communities, and environments, and implicitly positioned medical teachers and students as productive citizens of a modern nation while rural and urban poor communities were characterized sometimes as empowered, and at other times as not-yet-modern and in need of reform. However, the community also constituted an alternate pedagogical site of engagement in that students' encounters with community members disrupted students' assumptions about these communities to an extent. Nevertheless, institutionalized practices of assessment, and epistemological and ontological understandings of the nature of science tended to privilege the standardized curriculum and popular cultural stereotypes as scientific knowledge thereby excluding the place-based narratives of local communities, medical students, and teachers. This study, therefore, argues that interactions with local communities in community-based education and development programs cannot democratize knowledge production in medical education without a simultaneous engagement with post-foundational epistemologies in the social sciences and humanities.

Doing Better: Illuminating a Framework of Equitable Science Pedagogy through a Cross- Case Analysis of Urban High School Science Teachers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sheth, Manali J.

Students of color are routinely asked to participate in science education that is less intellectually rich and self-affirming. Additionally, teachers have trouble embarking on professional growth related to issues of equity and diversity in science. The purpose of this dissertation research is to develop a multi-dimensional framework for equitable science pedagogy (ESP) through analyzing the efforts and struggles of high school science teachers. This study is grounded in a conceptual framework derived from scholarship in science education, multicultural education, critical science studies, and teacher learning. The following questions guide this research: 1) What visions and enactments emerge in teachers' practices towards equitable science pedagogy? 2) How are teachers' practice decisions towards ESP influenced by their personal theories of race/culture, science, and learning and sociocultural contexts? 3) Why are there consistencies and variances across teachers' practices? This study employs a qualitative multiple case study design with ethnographic data collection to explore the practices of three urban high school science teachers who were identified as being committed to nurturing the science learning of students of color. Data include over 120 hours of classroom observation, 60 hours of teacher interviews, and 500 teacher- and student-generated artifacts. Data analysis included coding teachers' practices using theory- and participant generated codes, construction of themes based on emergent patterns, and cross-case analysis. The affordances and limitations of the participants' pedagogical approaches inform the following framework for equitable science pedagogy: 1) Seeing race and culture and sharing responsibility for learning form foundational dimensions. Practices from the other three dimensions--- nurturing students' identities, re-centering students' epistemologies, and critiquing structural inequities---emerge from the foundation. As emergent practices, they are constituted by but not reduced to practices in the initial dimensions. 2) Ideas from the foundational dimensions are filtered through teachers' stances on science. Thus, teachers' practices in the emergent dimensions and the foundational dimensions are mediated by teachers' pedagogical ideas about science and school science. 3) Teachers' articulations of practice influence the possibility of on-going work towards equitable science pedagogy.

Connecting Research to Teaching: Professional Communities: Teachers Supporting Teachers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Adajian, Lisa Byrd

1996-01-01

Reviews research on importance of strong professional communities for supporting reform. National Center for Research in Mathematical Sciences Education (NCRMSE) found significant correlation between teachers' professional community and reformed mathematics instruction. Urban Mathematics Collaboratives (UMC), Quantitative Understanding: Amplifying…

A case study of urban student and teacher experiences surrounding an outdoor environmental science field trip

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Preusch, Peggy L.

2009-12-01

Field trips provide opportunities for students to experience many different contexts beyond the classroom, and are a popular choice of K-12 teachers in the US. Recent interest in learning that occurs at informal science education centers such as museums, zoos and aquariums has stimulated studies of the relationship between learning in and outside of schools. Although many studies focus on the teachers, the contexts, and/or the students during the field trip, only a few look at the entire process of learning by including the classroom setting before and after the field trip. This study was designed to develop understandings of the student process of learning during and surrounding an environmental science field trip to an outdoor setting. John Dewey's extensive writings on the relationship between experience and learning informed the analysis, creating a focus on active and passive elements of the experience, continuity within and across contexts, the interactive nature of the experience and the importance of subject matter. An exploration of environmental education (EE), environmental science (ES), and nature study as content revealed the complexities of the subject matter of the field trip that make its presentation problematic. An urban school was chosen to contribute to the research literature about urban student learning in outdoor environments. During the field trip, the students' active engagement with each other and the environment supported meaningful remembrances of the field trip experiences during interviews after the field trip. The students accurately described plants and animals they had observed in different habitats during the field trip. They also made connections with their home life and prior experiences in the outdoors as they discussed the field trip and drew pictures that represented their experiences. One student integrated his outdoor experience with a language arts assignment as he reflected deeply on the field trip. One implication of this study is that educational experiences in outdoor natural environments are complex in ways that contribute to lack of continuity between science lessons in an elementary classroom and environmental science field trip. Long term relationships between schools and informal settings that recognize the strengths of both contexts in terms of student learning processes surrounding field trip experiences are needed to strengthen the educative process for field trip participants.

Women and girls in science education: Female teachers' and students' perspectives on gender and science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Crotty, Ann

Science is a part of all students' education, PreK-12. Preparing students for a more scientifically and technologically complex world requires the best possible education including the deliberate inclusion and full contributions of all students, especially an underrepresented group: females in science. In the United States, as elsewhere in the world, the participation of girls and women in science education and professional careers in science is limited, particularly in the physical sciences (National Academy of Sciences [NAS], 2006). The goal of this research study is to gain a better understanding of the perspectives and perceptions of girls and women, both science educators and students, related to gender and participation in science at the time of an important course: high school chemistry. There is a rich body of research literature in science education that addresses gender studies post---high school, but less research that recognizes the affective voices of practicing female science teachers and students at the high school level (Bianchini, Cavazos, & Helms, 2000; Brown & Gilligan, 1992; Gilligan, 1982). Similarly, little is known with regard to how female students and teachers navigate their educational, personal, and professional experiences in science, or how they overcome impediments that pose limits on their participation in science, particularly the physical sciences. This exploratory study focuses on capturing voices (Brown & Gilligan, 1992; Gilligan, 1982) of high school chemistry students and teachers from selected urban and suburban learning communities in public schools in the Capital Region of New York State. Through surveys, interviews, and focus groups, this qualitative study explores the intersection of the students' and teachers' experiences with regard to the following questions: (1) How do female chemistry teachers view the role gender has played in their professional and personal lives as they have pursued education, degree status, and professional careers in science? (2) How do female chemistry students perceive their educational experiences in science? Implications of the study serve to inform and raise the awareness of science educators and other stakeholders about improving and enhancing the participation of females in science (National Science Foundation [NSF], 2002; National Research Council [NRC], 2006).

Urban High School Students' Perspectives about Sexual Health Decision-Making: The Role of School Culture and Identity

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brotman, Jennie S.; Mensah, Felicia Moore

2013-01-01

Studies across fields such as science education, health education, health behavior, and curriculum studies identify a persistent gap between the aims of the school curriculum and its impact on students' thinking and acting about the real-life decisions that affect their lives. The present study presents a different story from this predominant…

Seeds in the Window, Soil in the Sensory Table: Science Education through Gardening and Nature-Based Play

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hachey, Alyse C.; Butler, Deanna L.

2009-01-01

A growing body of evidence indicates that contact with nature is as important to children as good nutrition and adequate sleep, and therefore, educators need to address children's access to nature. This is particularly important in urban areas, where children have few opportunities to interact with nature. Gardening and nature-based curriculum…

Cases on Interdisciplinary Research Trends in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics: Studies on Urban Classrooms. Advances in Educational Technologies and Instructional Design

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lansiquot, Reneta D.

2013-01-01

Involving two or more academic subjects, interdisciplinary studies aim to blend together broad perspectives, knowledge, skills, and epistemology in an educational setting. By focusing on topics or questions too broad for a single discipline to cover, these studies strive to draw connections between seemingly different fields. Cases on…

Practical Application of Research in Science Education (PARSE) -- A New Collaboration for K-12 Science Teacher Professional Development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zwicker, Andrew; Lopez, Jose; Clayton, James

2008-11-01

A new collaboration between PPPL, St. Peter's College, the Liberty Science Center, and the Jersey City Public School District was formed in order to create a unique K-12 teacher professional development program. St. Peter's College, located in Jersey City, NJ, is a liberal arts college in an urban setting. The Liberty Science Center (LSC) is the largest education resource in the New Jersey-New York City region. The Jersey City School District has 28,000 students of which approximately 90% are from populations traditionally under-represented in science. The new program is centered upon topics surrounding energy and the environment. In the first year, beginning in 2009, 15-20 teachers will participate in a pilot course that includes hands-on research at PPPL and St. Peter's, the creation of new curricular materials, and pedagogical techniques. Scientists, master teachers, and education professors will teach the course. In subsequent years, the number of participants will be significantly expanded and the curricular material disseminated to other school districts. In addition, an outside evaluator will measure the educational outcome throughout the project.

Action Research Step-by-Step: A Tool for Educators to Change Their Worlds

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brighton, Catherine M.; Moon, Tonya R.

2007-01-01

Mr. Hartman is an honors-level and Advanced Placement science teacher in a diverse, urban high school where he has been teaching for the last 20 years. In recent years, Mr. Hartman has become increasingly more concerned with the lack of ethnic/cultural diversity in his advanced science classes. On the other hand, Mrs. Rodriguez is a principal in a…

Profiles of Urban, Low SES, African American Girls' Attitudes toward Science: A Sequential Explanatory Mixed Methods Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Buck, Gayle; Cook, Kristin; Quigley, Cassie; Eastwood, Jennifer; Lucas, Yvonne

2009-01-01

The purpose of this study was to increase the science education community's understanding of the experiences and needs of girls who cross the traditional categorical boundaries of gender, race and socioeconomic status in a manner that has left their needs and experience largely invisible. A first of several in a series, this study sought to…

Engaged Learning and Youth Interest in STEM Careers: A Science Museum Exhibit on Air Pollution and Urban Sustainability

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stuart, A. L.

2012-12-01

Enrollments in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) curricula currently lag workforce needs. Participation of women and minorities in STEM careers also remains low despite efforts to improve their representation in these fields. We discuss the development and evaluation of a science museum exhibit aimed at stimulating interest of middle school children (particularly girls) in STEM careers. The exhibit was designed to teach science, while addressing two factors identified as limiting the interest of girls in STEM fields — perceived lack of social relevance and lack of female role models. Further, it was designed to apply best practices in science education, including inquiry-based learning and interdisciplinary content. The exhibit was developed through collaboration between students and faculty researchers at the University of South Florida and science education and evaluation specialists at the Museum of Science and Industry of Tampa. A few stages of formative and summative assessment, including focus group discussions, visitor observation, and surveys were used to evaluate the effectiveness of the exhibit to educational project goals. The installed exhibit is focused on teaching content related to interactions between air pollution, urban design, and human health. The approximately 25 square foot exhibit space involves four different types of components. A three-dimensional model of a city, with underlying dynamic computer simulations, allows visitors to interactively explore relationships between city design, air pollution and exposures. A computer game, with quiz questions requiring user decisions on personal to community behavior, provides visual feedback regarding impacts on air pollution. Traditional panels with graphics and text, including results of current research, display integrative scientific content with open-ended questions to stimulate discussion. Finally, personal profiles highlight the diverse family, work, and social lives of a few STEM professionals from childhood to mid-career. Current results of the educational evaluation suggest that the quiz game and three-dimensional interactive model were particularly effective at engaging and interesting visitors in the science content. The personal profiles appear to have helped to interest visitors in STEM careers, regardless of gender or age. The methods and results demonstrated through this exhibit should inform improvements to informal science education toward increased engagement of the next generation in science content and STEM careers.

Improving Science Teacher Preparation through the APS PhysTEC and NSF Noyce Programs

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Williams, Tasha; Tyler, Micheal; van Duzor, Andrea; Sabella, Mel

2013-03-01

Central to the recruitment of students into science teaching at a school like CSU, is a focus on the professional nature of teaching. The purpose of this focus is twofold: it serves to change student perceptions about teaching and it prepares students to become teachers who value continued professional development and value the science education research literature. The Noyce and PhysTEC programs at CSU place the professional nature of teaching front and center by involving students in education research projects, paid internships, attendance at conferences, and participation in a new Teacher Immersion Institute and a Science Education Journal Reading Class. This poster will focus on specific components of our teacher preparation program that were developed through these two programs. In addition we will describe how these new components provide students with diverse experiences in the teaching of science to students in the urban school district. Supported by the NSF Noyce Program (0833251) and the APS PhysTEC Program.

75 FR 27544 - National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR)-Disability and...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-05-17

... science in research on employment for individuals with disabilities. Washington, DC: The Urban Institute... DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR)--Disability and Rehabilitation Research Projects and Centers Program--Disability Rehabilitation Research...

An evaluative study of the impact of the "Curriculum Alignment Toolbox" on middle school science achievement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jones, Carol L.

The number of computer-assisted education programs on the market is overwhelming science teachers all over the Michigan. Though the need is great, many teachers are reluctant to procure computer-assisted science education programs because they are unsure of the effectiveness of such programs. The Curriculum Alignment Toolbox (CAT) is a computer-based program, aligned to the Michigan Curriculum Framework's Benchmarks for Science Education and designed to supplement science instruction in Michigan middle schools. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of CAT in raising the standardized test scores of Michigan students. This study involved 419 students from one urban, one suburban and one rural middle school. Data on these students was collected from 4 sources: (1) the 8th grade Michigan Education Assessment Program (MEAP) test, (2) a 9 question, 5-point Likert-type scale student survey, (3) 4 open-response student survey questions and (4) classroom observations. Results of this study showed that the experimental group of 226 students who utilized the CAT program in addition to traditional instruction did significantly better on the Science MEAP test than the control group of 193 students who received only traditional instruction. The study also showed that the urban students from a "high needs" school seemed to benefit most from the program. Additionally, though both genders and all identified ethnic groups benefited from the program, males benefited more than females and whites, blacks and Asian/Pacific Islander students benefited more than Hispanic and multi-racial students. The CAT program's success helping raise the middle school MEAP scores may well be due to some of its components. CAT provided students with game-like experiences all based on the benchmarks required for science education and upon which the MEAP test is based. The program also provided visual and auditory stimulation as well as numerous references which students indicated they enjoyed. Additionally, as best-practice, the questioning in all the gaming within CAT did not allow a student to continue until he/she had given the correct answer, thus reinforcing the correct response.

Urban school leadership for elementary science education: Meeting the needs of English Language Learners

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alarcon, Maricela H.

Science education reform and state testing accountability call upon principals to become instructional leaders in science. Specifically, elementary school principals must take an active role in science instruction to effectively improve science education for all students including English Language Learners. As such, the research questioned posed in this study centered on How are elementary school principals addressing the academic needs of Latino Spanish-speaking English language learners within science education? This study employed a qualitative research design to identify the factors contributing to the exemplary performance in science, as measured by the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS), for English Language Learner students in three high poverty bilingual elementary schools based on a multiple case study. As part of the data collection process, interviews were conducted with three school principals, three science academic support teachers, and two 5th grade bilingual teachers. Additionally, observations were acquired through school principal shadowing. The findings revealed four attributes necessary for effective instructional leadership in science education. First, Positive School Culture was defined as the core that linked the other three instructional leadership attributes and thus increased their effectiveness. Second, Clear Goals and Expectations were set by making science a priority and ensuring that English language learners were transitioning from Spanish to English instruction by the fifth grade. Third, Critical Resourcing involved hiring a science academic support teacher, securing a science classroom on campus, and purchasing bilingual instructional materials. Fourth, principal led and supported Collaboration in which teachers met to discuss student performance based data in addition to curriculum and instruction. These research findings are vital because by implementing these best practices of elementary school principals, educators are positioned to lay the foundation for science needed for ELLs to continue their educational career with the tools needed to succeed in future science classes and in turn college, answering the call to effectively improve science within the educational system.

An educational ethnography of teacher-developed science curriculum implementation: Enacting conceptual change-based science inquiry with Hispanic students

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brunsell, Eric Steven

An achievement gap exists between White and Hispanic students in the United States. Research has shown that improving the quality of instruction for minority students is an effective way to narrow this gap. Science education reform movements emphasize that science should be taught using a science inquiry approach. Extensive research in teaching and learning science also shows that a conceptual change model of teaching is effective in helping students learn science. Finally, research into how Hispanic students learn best has provided a number of suggestions for science instruction. The Inquiry for Conceptual Change model merges these three research strands into a comprehensive yet accessible model for instruction. This study investigates two questions. First, what are teachers' perceptions of science inquiry and its implementation in the classroom? Second, how does the use of the Inquiry for Conceptual Change model affect the learning of students in a predominantly Hispanic, urban neighborhood. Five teachers participated in a professional development project where they developed and implemented a science unit based on the Inquiry for Conceptual Change model. Three units were developed and implemented for this study. This is a qualitative study that included data from interviews, participant reflections and journals, student pre- and post-assessments, and researcher observations. This study provides an in-depth description of the role of professional development in helping teachers understand how science inquiry can be used to improve instructional quality for students in a predominantly Hispanic, urban neighborhood. These teachers demonstrated that it is important for professional development to be collaborative and provide opportunities for teachers to enact and reflect on new teaching paradigms. This study also shows promising results for the ability of the Inquiry for Conceptual Change model to improve student learning.

Introducing Hands-on, Experiential Learning Experiences in an Urban Environmental Science Program at a Minority Serving Institution

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Duzgoren-Aydin, N. S.; Freile, D.

2013-12-01

STEM education at New Jersey City University increasingly focuses on experiential, student-centered learning. The Department of Geoscience/Geography plays a significant role in developing and implementing a new Urban Environmental Science Program. The program aims at graduating highly skilled, demographically diverse students (14 % African-American and 18% Hispanic) to be employed in high-growth Earth and Environmental Science career paths, both at a technical (e.g. B.S.) as well as an educational (K-12 grade) (e.g. B.A) level. The core program, including the Earth and Environmental Science curricula is guided by partners (e.g. USDA-NRCS). The program is highly interdisciplinary and 'hands-on', focusing upon the high-tech practical skills and knowledge demanded of science professionals in the 21st century. The focus of the curriculum is on improving environmental quality in northern NJ, centering upon our urban community in Jersey City and Hudson County. Our Department is moving towards a more earth system science approach to learning. Most of our courses (e.g., Earth Surface Processes, Sedimentology/Stratigraphy, Earth Materials, Essential Methods, Historical Geology) have hands-on laboratory and/or field components. Although some of our other courses do not have formal laboratory components, research modules of many such courses (Geochemistry, Urban Environmental Issues and Policy and Environmental Geology) involve strong field or laboratory studies. The department has a wide range of analytical and laboratory capacities including a portable XRF, bench-top XRD and ICP-MS. In spring 2013, Dr. Duzgoren-Aydin was awarded $277K in Higher Education Equipment Leasing Fund monies from the University in order to establish an Environmental Teaching and Research Laboratory. The addition of these funds will make it possible for the department to increase its instrumentation capacity by adding a mercury analyzer, Ion Chromatography and C-N-S analyzer, as well as updating several laboratory facilities. Furthermore, authors have applied to the NSF-TUES grant program to purchase a particle size analyzer. Currently, the grant is pending. We have defined 4 curricular goals to enhance student learning by providing hands-on, inquiry-based learning and research experiences. 1- Develop technical/analytical knowledge and skills by using advanced analytical instrumentation; 2- Improve quantitative reasoning skills to assess the quality of data; 3- Have comprehensive educational training to improve problem solving skills; and 4- use their quantitative reasoning (Goal # 2) and problem solving skills (Goal #3) to evaluate real-world geological and environmental problems. We also give special emphasis to expected measurable outcomes for individual courses. An external evaluator will assess the effectiveness of integrating advance instrumentation into the Earth and Environmental Science curricula. We will work closely with the evaluator to ensure successful implementation of the learning objectives. Examples from the impacted courses will be presented.

The Green Pages: Environmental Education Activities K-12.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Clearing, 1990

1990-01-01

Presented are 20 science activities for students K-12. Topics include role playing, similarities between urban and forest communities, ecosystems, garbage, recycling, food production, habitats, insects, tidal zone, animals, diversity, interest groups, rivers, spaceship earth, ecological interactions, and the cost of recreation. (KR)

Fundred Dollar Bill Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rubin, Mary

2009-01-01

This article describes the Fundred Dollar Bill Project which is an innovative artwork made of millions of drawings. This creative collective action is intended to support Operation Paydirt, an extraordinary art/science project uniting three million children with educators, scientists, healthcare professionals, designers, urban planners, engineers,…

Engaging a middle school teacher and students in formal-informal science education: Contexts of science standards-based curriculum and an urban science center

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grace, Shamarion Gladys

This is a three-article five chapter doctoral dissertation. The overall purpose of this three-pronged study is to engage a middle school science teacher and students in formal-informal science education within the context of a science standards-based curriculum and Urban Science Center. The goals of the study were: (1) to characterize the conversations of formal and informal science educators as they attempted to implement a standards-based curriculum augmented with science center exhibits; (2) to study the classroom discourse between the teacher and students that foster the development of common knowledge in science and student understanding of the concept of energy before observing science center exhibits on energy; (3) to investigate whether or not a standards-driven, project-based Investigating and Questioning our World through Science and Technology (IQWST) curriculum unit on forms and transformation of energy augmented with science center exhibits had a significant effect on urban African-American seventh grade students' achievement and learning. Overall, the study consisted of a mixed-method approach. Article one consists of a case study featuring semi-structured interviews and field notes. Article two consists of documenting and interpreting teacher-students' classroom discourse. Article three consists of qualitative methods (classroom discussion, focus group interviews, student video creation) and quantitative methods (multiple choice and open-ended questions). Oral discourses in all three studies were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. In article one, the community of educators' conversations were critically analyzed to discern the challenges educators encountered when they attempted to connect school curriculum to energy exhibits at the Urban Science Center. The five challenges that characterize the emergence of a third space were as follows: (a) science terminology for lesson focus, (b) "dumb-down" of science exhibits, (c) exploration distracts lesson structure, (d) meaning of model/modeling, and (e) Which comes first?--science content learning or science exhibit exploration. These challenges were considered and discussed as opportunities for personal growth. The third space allowed for participant reflection and transformation in formal-informal collaboration and communication. In article two, teacher-students' classroom discourse transcripts corresponding to the workbook lessons from the IQWST Physics Unit were analyzed. Four instructional events were selected for discourse analysis: focusing on the inquiry process; understanding about kinetic energy; formulating scientific explanations; and translating energy transformation. The discourse-excerpts representing the aforementioned instructional events revealed four teacher behaviors: teacher-posed questions, teacher-explanations, teacher responses, and teacher reference to past learning. Of these teacher behaviors, teacher-posed questions dominated and these consist of fill-in-the-blank, affirmation, second-order, descriptive, and explanatory. Article three represented the results of the IQWST Unit Achievement Test (IUAT) and students' understanding of the concepts of energy and energy transformation. The IUAT indicated that students (N=37) in the experimental group taught with the science center exhibits augmented IQWST curriculum unit achieved scores (p<0.001) about the same as students in the control group (N=31) taught only with the IQWST curriculum unit. However, the experimental (Deltapost-pre = 4.78) and control (Deltapost-pre = 4.04) groups revealed significant gains (p<0.001) from pre-test scores to post-test scores. These findings confirm that underserved urban students' learning can be enhanced with an augmented standards-based curriculum unit. The students also can realize significant achievement gains when professionally developed and administration supported teachers use standards-driven science curriculum whether or not augmented with science exhibits. The three qualitative analyses of data in article three indicated that students had reasonable understandings of the forms and transformation of energy. They were also able to explain the working of science exhibits using their understandings of the energy concepts developed in class. The first study (article 1) implies that a third space allows for participant reflection and transformation in formal-informal collaboration and communication. The second study (article 1) implies the following: (a) the teacher's struggle with dialogic discourse, a communicative approach that fosters common knowledge through a social process; and (b) the need for professional development that fosters dialogic discourse. The third study (article three) implies an integrated curriculum with both formal and informal components can be successfully enacted to achieve content mastery when teachers are given professional development on how to develop students' knowledge using science exhibits, time to develop concepts with students using exhibits, and support from administration to modify the time required to cover certain topics in the curriculum with more time spent on those topics such as energy that require creative teaching methods to assist students' science learning. Overall, the study implies that the science center exhibits can provide a context to observe whether students are able to translate classroom constructed knowledge at the intersection of formal-informal instruction.

Integration of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy Into the Science Learning Progression Framework

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bernardo, Cyntra

This study integrated elements of culturally relevant pedagogy into a science learning progression framework, with the goal of enhancing teachers' cultural knowledge and thereby creating better teaching practices in an urban public high school science classroom. The study was conducted using teachers, an administrator, a science coach, and students involved in science courses in public high school. Through a qualitative intrinsic case study, data were collected and analyzed using traditional methods. Data from primary participants (educators) were analyzed through identification of big ideas, open coding, and themes. Through this process, patterns and emergent ideas were reported. Outcomes of this study demonstrated that educators lack knowledge about research-based academic frameworks and multicultural education strategies, but benefit through institutionally-based professional development. Students from diverse cultures responded positively to culturally-based instruction. Their progress was further manifested in better communication and discourse with their teacher and peers, and increased academic outcomes. This study has postulated and provided an exemplar for science teachers to expand and improve multicultural knowledge, ultimately transferring these skills to their pedagogical practice.

Delivering Academic Excellence to Culturally Diverse Populations (Language Development through Math/Science Activities). Conference Proceedings (Saddle Brook, New Jersey, December 7-8, 1984).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bilotta, Cynthia, Ed.

This document includes the proceedings of a conference that made the following points about American society now and in the future: (1) racial changes in demographics require preparing urban minority students for entrance into scientific and technological fields; (2) the science/mathematics education movement of the late 1950s into the 1970s has…

An Evaluation of a Museum Science Education Project with Social Integration and Urban Environmental Problems as a Focus.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Allen, David W.

The Paired School Science Project (PSSP) conducted between public and parochial schools was evaluated over a period from 1968-71. A pilot program was carried out among fifth and sixth grade students of 30 schools in the 1967-68 school year. During the study period, these classes of the paired schools were bused to the Franklin Institute for…

The "T" in STEM: How Elementary Science Teachers' Beliefs of Technology Integration Translate to Practice during a Co-Developed STEM Unit

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Constantine, Angelina; Rózowa, Paula; Szostkowski, Alaina; Ellis, Joshua; Roehrig, Gillian

2017-01-01

In the age of STEM education, teachers consistently struggle to understand the nature of technology and how to integrate it. This multiple-case study uses the TPACK framework to explore the beliefs and practices of three elementary science and engineering teachers from an urban school district with a recently implemented 1:1 iPad policy. All three…

The Impact of the GE Foundation "Developing Futures"™ in Education Program on Mathematics Performance Trends in Four Districts. Research Report # RR-74

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sirinides, Philip; Supovitz, Jonathan; Tognatta, Namrata; May, Henry

2013-01-01

Beginning in 2005, the GE Foundation initiated a commitment of expertise and financial resources to a set of urban school districts to improve public education and enhance student achievement in mathematics and science. This report analyzes the impacts of the GE Foundation commitment to the partner districts by examining trends in student…

Moving the School and Dancing Education: Case Study Research of K-5 Students' Experiences in a Dance Residency

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Leonard, Alison E.

2012-01-01

This dissertation chronicles the qualitative case study of a dance artist-in-residence at a diverse and inclusive K-5 school in an urban district, integrating science, social studies, physical education, music, and visual arts school curriculum and culminating in two public performances. This study focused on how students made meaning through this…

Struggles of agency and structure as cultural worlds collide as urban African American youth learn physics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Elmesky, Rowhea

This critical ethnography focused on five urban African American students, coming from economically disadvantaged homes in Philadelphia, who were considered at risk with regard to their position within society as well as within the small learning community of their low-academically performing school. As participants in the study, they were employed from June 11, 2001 from 9:00 AM until 1:00 PM and continuing until September 7, 2001 at $7.50 per hour under research grants from the Spencer Foundation and the National Science Foundation. Through this study, these five youth were provided with traditional and nontraditional opportunities to build understandings of some of the most essential concepts of physics as learners. Moreover, they also had the chance to work as research assistants, teacher educators and curriculum developers. The findings of the research conclusively reveal that African American, urban youth from some of the most challenging situations are capable of learning physics concepts. Moreover, the most success resulted when students' strategies of action were directed towards the objective of learning although, in the process of meaning-making, their personal goals unrelated to science were also met. In addition, the research results show that urban African American students come to school with strategies of action replete with cultural practices, symbols and their underlying meanings from fields outside of school including both the home and the neighborhood. These cultural resources, when triggered, then become apparent within learning environments and can powerfully assist learning when the desired outcomes of the student(s) are in tune with the objective of learning physics. Through the physics teaching and learning that occurred within this study, as well as their work as researchers, teacher educators and curriculum developers, April, Ebony, Markist, Pierre and Ya-Meer had opportunities to utilize their cultural capital to build new knowledge schemas and to develop access to new resources. Consequently, evidence of agency on multiple levels was found to arise as they have shown demonstrated that poverty stricken African American urban youth can be changed by science and science too can be changed by them.

NASA and the United States educational system - Outreach programs in aeronautics, space science, and technology

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Owens, Frank C.

1990-01-01

The role of NASA in developing a well-educated American work force is addressed. NASA educational programs aimed at precollege students are examined, including the NASA Spacemobile, Urban Community Enrichment Program, and Summer High School Apprenticeship Program. NASA workshops and programs aimed at helping teachers develop classroom curriculum materials are described. Programs aimed at college and graduate-level students are considered along with coordination efforts with other federal agencies and with corporations.

Fostering Science Club: Creating a Welcoming Extra-Curricular Science Inquiry Space for ALL Learners that Seeks to Close the Science Experience Gap in a Predominantly Minority Urban Community

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mayfield, K. K.

2017-12-01

BackgroundTo minority adolescents in urban centers science inquiry seems like an engagement completed by others with specialized skills (Alkon & Agyeman, 2012). When scientists teach science classes those spaces and pedagogy are underwritten by the science teachers' beliefs about how science happens (Southerland, Gess-Newsome & Johnston, 2002). Further, scientific inquiry is often presented as the realm of upperclass whiteness (Alkon & Agyeman, 2012; Mayfield, 2014). When science educators talk about the achievement gaps between raced and classed learners, accompanying that gap is also a gap in science experience. My high school students in a postindustrial school district: attend a school under state takeover (the lowest 5/5 rating (MA Executive Office of Education, 2017)); have a student body that is 70% Latinx; and 96% of whom receive Free and Reduced Lunch (a Federal marker of a family below the poverty line). Annual Yearly Progress is a goal set by state and federal governments for school populations by race, ability, and language. In 2016, the site has failed to make its goals for special education, black, hispanic, white, and English as a Second Language populations. As a high poverty district there is a paucity of extracurricular science experiences. This lack of science extensions make closing standardized test gaps difficult. Geoscience Skills & FindingsThis after school program does not replicate deficit narratives that keep certain bodies of students away from science inquiry (Mayfield, 2015; Ogbu, 1987). Instead, Science Club uses an array of student-centered science (physics, math, arts, chemistry, biology) projects to help students see themselves as citizen scientists who lead explorations of their world. We meet 1.5 hours a week in a 30 week school year. Science club helps students feel like powerful and capable science inquirers with 80% girls in attendance, and uses science experiments to cultivate essential inquiry skills like: Observation, Analysis, Reflection, and Laboratory Work in order to understand the phenomena we are exploring. This presentation discusses: the development of Science cCub as a student-centered inquiry space; how Sci Club addresses the inequities of the science experience gap; and student responses to pre and post test surveys about their growing science skills.

"But I Grew Up Here!" Science Inquiry, Pedagogy and Technology Through a Sociocultural Lens

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Meyer, Brian R.

The majority of students in the urban setting are considered underrepresented. These students frequently perform below their proficiency level on standardized tests locally and nationally. If we treat education as the ticket out of the culture of poverty that underrepresented students find themselves, it is incumbent upon us to find pedagogical, content, and cultural methods that allow for these students to achieve at a high level. The purpose behind this case study was to determine the pedagogical, content and cultural knowledge of two urban junior high school science teachers with the specific intention of drawing on the mitigating factors in the use, or non-use, of technology by these respective classroom teachers. Participants in this case study included two teachers both of whom teach 7th and 8th grade science in the urban setting. Their students are deemed to be underachieving by local and state measures of assessment, and the schools in which they teach are both considered low on measures of socioeconomic status. Data were collected over an academic year and included: teacher and student interviews, classroom video recordings, student work, teacher plans, and researcher field notes. These data were analyzed using an inductive approach and a constant-comparative method. The teachers shared their beliefs about the schools and district in which they teach, about the students they teach, and about their own upbringing. These female teachers had many demographics in common, including the duration of their teaching careers, their age, their content area, their time teaching in the district, and their professed caring for their students and their students' success. Where they contrasted, however, was in their own educational background at the grade school level - one teacher grew up in a middle class suburban home while the other was raised in the urban setting. Another difference was in their early choice of career, as the suburban teacher knew she wanted to teach science while the urban teacher chose science from a marketability standpoint. Results from this study indicate that both teachers and students have established belief sets of what good teaching looks like, and both are able to know when those practices do not match the professed beliefs. Results from this study could play a significant role in the types of teachers that are hired in the urban setting. These results may also speak to the importance level that a school district places on professional development versus technological implementation.

Effectiveness of place-based science curriculum projects situated in Hawaiian and Western cultural institutions at an urban high school in Hawai'i

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kuwahara, Jennifer Leslie Hoof

Place-based education is a multidisciplinary and experiential approach to learning that utilizes a local environment or community. This study examined the influences of place attachment and cultural affiliation in the school on student experience and learning in a place-based science course, as well as the course's potential influence on environmentally responsible behaviors. The participants attended an urban high school on O'ahu, Hawai'i. By understanding student reaction to experience in both Western- and Hawaiian-centered classes, this study contributes to the literature on place-based education in relation to how differences in cultural affiliation in a school setting can have varying impacts on place attachment, science literacy, and environmental responsibility. A comparative case study was conducted with students enrolled in the Hawaiian Academy and non-academy students. Analysis of a pre- and post-survey and science content assessments, student documents, field notes, and interview transcripts suggested place-based science has both similar and different impacts on students depending on cultural affiliation within the school. Students in the Hawaiian Academy, as a whole, showed stronger science literacy and environmental responsibility than students in the non-Hawaiian Academy class. However, non-Hawaiian Academy students showed increased place attachment in a spiritual sense. Reactions from both groups suggest a need for smaller learning communities that promote a unity of knowledge rather than distinct courses and disciplines.

A Science Centre as a Geoturism promoter - the Lagos Ciência Viva examples (Portugal).

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Azevedo Rodrigues, Luis; Leote, Catarina

2017-04-01

Science outreach and engagement are crucial core objectives of the Lagos Ciência Viva Science Centre (CCVL). By engaging audiences in the real world a link is made between their science centre experience and the environment in which they live. Therefore, it has been an option of the CCVL to offer geological outdoor activities, both in the natural environment and urban context. Dinosaurs are an appealing science subject for both students and tourists. Thus, the CCVL has a long tradition in organizing and guiding field trips to two dinosaur track sites - Salema and Santa beaches (Vila do Bispo, southwest Algarve). These sites, both from the Lower Cretaceous reveal at least two types of tracks - theropod and iguanodontian footprints. Often in combination with the paleontology field trips, the CCVL also offers different geological field trips both for formal (school) and informal (tourism) education. This allows students and tourists to be introduced to dinosaur paleobiology and ichnology and to the structural geology and stratigraphy of the area. Our science outreach is being further developed by contractual agreement with a regional tour operator, in which the CCVL is responsible for the scientific content and guidance of the visits. Aiming at an urban context, the CCVL produced three Urban Geology and Paleontology Guide Books for three Algarve cities (Lagos, Faro and Tavira), which can be acquired in the three Ciência Viva Science Centres shops as well as in the tourist information offices serving this way as a basis for guided urban tours also offered by the CCVL. Based on our experience, we review and contextualise these geoscience activities and their potential for science outreach, communication and tourism. We discuss and propose a classification of different possibilities in geoscience communication and outreach based on three vertices: Science, Heritage and Geotourism. Some particularities of these visits, such as the merge between geosciences and other areas of knowledge namely history, art and architecture, are presented.

Community Garden: A Bridging Program between Formal and Informal Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Datta, Ranjan

2016-01-01

Community garden activities can play a significant role in bridging formal and informal learning, particularly in urban children's science and environmental education. It promotes relational methods of learning, discussing, and practicing that will integrate food security, social interactions, community development, environmental activism, and…

Educator's Guide for Mission to Earth: LANDSAT Views the World

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tindal, M. A.

1978-01-01

This teacher's guide is specifically designed to provide information and suggestions for using LANDSAT imagery to teach basic concepts in several content areas. Content areas include: (1) Earth science and geology; (2) environmental studies; (3) geography; and (4) social and urban studies.

Rap as a roadway: creating creolized forms of science in an era of cultural globalization

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Elmesky, Rowhea

2011-03-01

Even during an era of cultural globalization where diversity, hybridity, and heterogeneity prevail, educational institutions remain unchanged and economically and racially marginalized students continue to experience a sense of exclusion in school. Whereas the science education community often addresses such exclusion in terms of the achievement gap or the lack of materials and qualified teachers in urban schools, there are also more subtle ways in which these students remain as outsiders to the culture of science. The study highlights how the acceptance and affordance of students' cultural capital can encourage a sense of belonging with school science. Specifically, this paper contributes to the literature by sharing longitudinal findings that reveal students' skills of orality, in the form of rap practices, can be rich resources for developing creolized forms of school science, and how rap creates entryways for students to form and reform hybridized identities in which canonical science discourse and lyrics about non-science subjects can begin to emerge in integrated, fluid and seamless manners.

Science education for empowerment and social change: a case study of a teacher educator in urban Pakistan

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zahur, Rubina; Calabrese Barton, Angela; Upadhyay, Bhaskar Raj

2002-09-01

In this manuscript we focus on the question, 'What should be the purpose of science education for children of the very poor class in caste-oriented developing countries such as Pakistan?' In other words, in a country where the literacy rate hovers around 10 per cent for the poorest segment of society and where there is no expectation that children will complete primary school, of what importance is primary science education and to what end should it be offered in schools? We begin a conversation around this question by presenting, in this manuscript, a case study of one teacher educator whose beliefs and practices sharply deviate from the norm - she believes science education ought to be about empowering students to make physical and political changes in their community. In particular, using the rich, contextual interview and observational data generated through case study, we show how Haleema's (pseudonym) orientation to science teacher education are buttressed by three fundamental beliefs: that low levels of literacy and school achievement among poor children have as much to do with poor families' lack of power/influence on the purposes and processes of schooling as it has to do with opportunities and resources; that school science can begin to address inequalities in power by fostering a kind of scientific literacy among children that leads to individual and community empowerment around health and environmental issues, the very science-related issues that divide quality of life and opportunity for poor families; and that teacher education programmes can play a role in transforming a society's views about how science and scientific practices might play a role in bringing communities together to effect change for the better.

Language experience narratives and the role of autobiographical reasoning in becoming an urban science teacher

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rivera Maulucci, Maria S.

2011-06-01

One of the central challenges globalization and immigration present to education is how to construct school language policies, procedures, and curricula to support academic success of immigrant youth. This case-study compares and contrasts language experience narratives along Elena's developmental trajectory of becoming an urban science teacher. Elena reflects upon her early language experiences and her more recent experiences as a preservice science teacher in elementary dual language classrooms. The findings from Elena's early schooling experiences provide an analysis of the linkages between Elena's developing English proficiency, her Spanish proficiency, and her autobiographical reasoning. Elena's experiences as a preservice teacher in two elementary dual language classrooms indicates ways in which those experiences helped to reframe her views about the intersections between language learning and science learning. I propose the language experience narrative, as a subset of the life story, as a way to understand how preservice teachers reconstruct past language experiences, connect to the present, and anticipate future language practices.

From Global Sustainability to Inclusive Education: Understanding urban children's ideas about the food system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Calabrese Barton, Angela; Koch, Pamela D.; Contento, Isobel R.; Hagiwara, Sumi

2005-08-01

The purpose of this paper is to report our findings from a qualitative study intended to develop our understandings of: what high-poverty urban children understand and believe about food and food systems; and how such children transform and use that knowledge in their everyday lives (i.e. how do they express their scientific literacies including content understandings, process understandings, habits of mind in these content areas). This qualitative study is part of a larger study focused on understanding and developing science and nutritional literacies among high-poverty urban fourth-grade through sixth-grade students and their teachers and caregivers.

NASA's Global Climate Change Education (GCCE) Program: New modules

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Witiw, M. R.; Myers, R. J.; Schwerin, T. G.

2010-12-01

In existence for over 10 years, the Earth System Science Educational Alliance (ESSEA) through the Institute of Global Environmental Strategies (IGES) has developed a series of modules on Earth system science topics. To date, over 80 educational modules have been developed. The primary purpose of these modules is to provide graduate courses for teacher education. A typical course designed for teachers typically consists of from three to five content modules and a primer on problem-based learning. Each module is designed to take three weeks in a normal university semester. Course delivery methods vary. Some courses are completed totally online. Others are presented in the classroom. Still others are delivered using a hybrid method which combines classroom meetings with online delivery of content. Although originally designed for teachers and education students, recent changes, provide a format for general education students to use these module. In 2009, under NASA’s Global Climate Change Education (GCCE) initiative, IGES was tasked to develop 16 new modules addressing the topic of climate change. Two of the modules recently developed under this program address the topics of sunspots and thermal islands. Sunspots is a problem-based learning module where students are provided resources and sample investigations related to sunspots. The history of sunspot observations, the structure of sunspots and the possible role sunspots may have in Earth’s climate are explored. Students are then asked to determine what effects a continued minimum in sunspot activity may have on the climate system. In Thermal Islands, the topic of urban heat islands is addressed. How heat islands are produced and the role of urban heat islands in exacerbating heat waves are two of the topics covered in the resources. In this problem-based learning module, students are asked to think of mitigating strategies for these thermal islands as Earth’s urban population grows over the next 50 years. These modules were successfully piloted with undergraduate students at Seattle Pacific University.

'Sometimes They Are Fun and Sometimes They Are Not': Concept Mapping with English Language Acquisition (ELA) and Gifted/Talented (GT) Elementary Students Learning Science and Sustainability

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Marzetta, Katrina; Mason, Hillary; Wee, Bryan

2018-01-01

This study presents an 'education for sustainability' curricular model which promotes science learning in an elementary classroom through equity pedagogy. A total of 25 fourth-grade students from an urban, public school in Denver, Colorado participated in this mixed-methods study where concept maps were used as a tool for describing and assessing…

Mathematics and Science Education Attrition, Retention, and Migration: A Study of Three Urban School Districts in the State of Texas

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Davis, Margaret Cheri

2013-01-01

Teacher attrition has far-reaching implications that contribute to the success of student performance at many different educational levels. Research indicates as many as 50% of public school teachers leave the profession within the first 5 years, and some suggest that as many as 20% to 30% leave teaching after the first year. Attrition is a…

Effects of Web based inquiry on physical science teachers and students in an urban school district

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stephens, Joanne

An inquiry approach in teaching science has been advocated by many science educators for the past few decades. Due to insufficient district funding for science teaching, inadequate science laboratory facilities, and outdated science materials, inquiry teaching has been difficult for many science teachers, particularly science teachers in urban settings. However, research shows that the availability of computers with high speed Internet access has increased in all school districts. This study focused on the effects of inservice training on teachers and using web based science inquiry activities with ninth grade physical science students. Participants were 16 science teachers and 474 physical science students in an urban school district of a large southern U.S. city. Students were divided into control and experimental groups. The students in the experimental group participated in web based inquiry activities. Students in the control group were taught using similar methods, but not web based science activities. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected over a nine-week period using instruments and focus group interviews of students' and teachers' perceptions of the classroom learning environment, students' achievement, lesson design and classroom implementation, science content of lesson, and classroom culture. The findings reported that there were no significant differences in teachers' perception of the learning environment before and after implementing web based inquiry activities. The findings also reported that there were no overall significant differences in students' perceptions of the learning environment and achievement, pre-survey to post-survey, pre-test to post-test, between the control group and experimental group. Additional findings disclosed that students in the experimental group learned in a collaborative environment. The students confirmed that collaborating with others contributed to a deeper understanding of the science content. This study provides insights about utilizing technology to promote science inquiry teaching and learning. This study describes students' and teachers' perceptions of using web based inquiry to support scientific inquiry.

The influence of extracurricular activities on middle school students' science learning in China

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Danhui; Tang, Xing

2017-07-01

Informal science learning has been found to have effects on students' science learning. Through the use of secondary data from a national assessment of 7410 middle school students in China, this study explores the relationship among five types of extracurricular science activities, learning interests, academic self-concept, and science achievement. Structural equation modelling was used to investigate the influence of students' self-chosen and school-organised extracurricular activities on science achievement through mediating interests and the academic self-concept. Chi-square tests were used to determine whether there was an opportunity gap in the student's engagement in extracurricular activities. The students' volunteer and school-organised participation in extracurricular science activities had a positive and indirect influence on their science achievement through the mediating variables of their learning interests and academic self-concept. However, there were opportunity gaps between different groups of students in terms of school location, family background, and especially the mother's education level. Students from urban areas with better-educated mothers or higher socioeconomic status are more likely to access diverse science-related extracurricular activities.

Parks, Place and Pedagogy - Education Partnerships with the National Park Service

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vye, E. C.; Rose, W. I.; Nash, B.; Klawiter, M.; Huntoon, J. E.; Engelmann, C. A.; Gochis, E. E.; MiTEP

2011-12-01

The Michigan Teaching Excellence Program (MITEP) is a multi-year program of teacher leadership development that empowers science teachers in Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Jackson to lead their schools and districts through the process of improving science teaching and learning. A component of this program is facilitated through partnership between academia, K-12 educators, and the National Park Service (NPS) that aims to develop place-based education strategies that improve diversity and Earth Science literacy. This tangible education method draws upon both the sense of place that National Parks offer and the art of interpretation employed by the park service. Combined, these deepen cognitive process and provide a more diverse reflection of what place means and the processes behind shaping what we see. Our partnerships present participants the opportunity to intern in a Midwest national park for 3-8 weeks during their third year in the program. In summer 2011, eleven teachers from the Grand Rapids school district participated in this innovative way of learning and teaching Earth Science. One goal was to develop geological interpretive materials desired and needed for the parks. Secondly, and important to place-based educational methodologies, these deliverables will be used as a way of bringing the parks to urban classrooms. Participants lived in the parks and worked directly with both national park and Michigan Tech staff to create lesson plans, podcasts, media clips, video, and photographic documentation of their experiences. These lesson plans will be hosted in the Views of the National Park website in an effort to provide innovative teaching resources nationally for teachers or free-choice learners wishing to access information on Midwest national parks. To the benefit of park staff, working with teachers from urban areas offered an opportunity for park staff to access diverse learners in urban settings unable to visit the park. The foundation has been laid for future work in this program aiming to develop a stronger appreciation of environment and geological processes and connections between what K-12 students do and their impact on Earth systems. This paper presents preliminary results of the following evaluation methods: 1) pre-post surveys administered to examine depth and breadth of geological knowledge, awareness of cultural significance, and emotional meanings and attachments toward the park, and 2) semi-structured interviews with participants, park staff, and academic faculty to determine how these programs can be best implemented and improved in both parks and classrooms alike. Learning about Earth system processes can be fostered by employing different ways of knowing, or the art of interpretation. It is hoped that this engagement between teachers, parks, and academia will increase diversity in Earth Science, enrich Earth Science curriculum, and help develop a sense of place for students

Emotions and Positional Identity in Becoming a Social Justice Science Teacher: Nicole's Story

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rivera Maulucci, Maria S.

2013-01-01

Becoming a social justice teacher, for high-poverty urban settings, is fraught with emotional ambivalence related to personal, professional, relational, political, and cultural social justice issues. Prospective teachers must navigate their sense of justice, grapple with issues of educational disparity, engage with theories of critical,…

Placement of Students into First-Year Writing Courses

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Elliot, Norbert; Deess, Perry; Rudniy, Alex; Joshi, Kamal

2012-01-01

The purpose of the present study is to examine concurrent and predictive evidence used in the validation of ACCUPLACER, a purchased test used to place first-year students into writing courses at an urban, public research university devoted to science and technology education. Concurrent evidence was determined by correlations between ACCUPLACER…

Children Go Bonkers about Bugs

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fielding, Sue; Jones, Meriel

2014-01-01

Learning outside the classroom is an objective in primary education in the UK and an ideal way to introduce science. School grounds, allotments, community farms and sports areas, parks, nature reserves and community woodlands can be accessed in both urban and rural areas. These provide accessible spaces that can be used inexpensively throughout…

The Urban Tree Project

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barnett, Michael; Houle, Meredith; Hufnagel, Elizabeth; Pancic, Alexander; Lehman, Mike; Hoffman, Emily

2010-01-01

Geospatial technologies have emerged over the last 15 years as one of the key tools used by environmental scientists (NRC 2006). In fact, educators have recognized that coupling geospatial technologies with environmental science topics and scientific data sets opens the door to local and regional scientific investigations (McInerney 2006). In this…

Comparing Students' Individual Written and Collaborative Oral Socioscientific Arguments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Knight, Amanda M.; McNeill, Katherine L.

2015-01-01

Constructing and critiquing scientific arguments has become an increasingly important goal for science education. Yet, the differences in the ways students construct collaborative oral and individual written socioscientific arguments are not well established. Our research with one middle school class in an urban New England school district…

Advancing Alternate Tools: Why Science Education Needs CRP and CRT

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dodo Seriki, Vanessa

2018-01-01

Ridgeway and Yerrick's paper, "Whose banner are we waving?: exploring STEM partnerships for marginalized urban youth," unearthed the tensions that existed between a local community "expert" and a group of students and their facilitator in an afterschool program. Those of us who work with youth who are traditionally…

Denver Audubon Society's Urban Education Project: Volunteers Teaching Children.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hollweg, Karen S.

This project was designed to give children opportunities to discover and to investigate plants, animals, and ecological relationships in their own neighborhoods. Through hands-on, natural science investigations, children have opportunities to find and observe a variety of plants and animals, look at them closely, sort them to analyze their…

Exploring Ivorian perspectives on the effectiveness of the current Ivorian science curriculum in addressing issues related to HIV/AIDS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ado, Gustave Firmin

School-based HIV/AIDS science education has the potential to impact students when integrated into the science curriculum. However, this mixed method study shows that school-based HIV/AIDS science education is often not infused into career subjects such as science education but integrated into civics education and taught by teachers who lack the skills, knowledge, and the training in the delivery of effective school HIV/AIDS education. Since science is where biological events take place, it is suggested that HIV/AIDS science merits being taught in the science education classroom. This study took place in nine public middle schools within two school districts in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, one major urban city in the southern region. The study utilized triangulation of multiple data sources---both qualitative and quantitative. To substantiate the claims made in this study, a range of qualitative methods such as field notes and individual interviews with 39 teachers, 63 sixth grade students, 8 school administrators, and 20 community elders were used. For the quantitative portion 140 teachers and 3510 sixth grade students were surveyed. The findings from the study prioritize science education that includes HIV/AIDS science education for all, with emphasis on HIV/AIDS prevention in Ivory Coast. The factors that influence the implementation of HIV/AIDS curricula within the Ivorian sixth grade classrooms are discussed. Interview and survey data from students, teachers, school administrators, and community elders indicate that in the Ivorian school setting, "gerontocratic" cultural influences, religious beliefs, personal cultural beliefs, and time spent toward the discourse on HIV/AIDS have led to HIV/AIDS education that is often insufficient to change either misconceptions about HIV/AIDS or risky practices. It was also found that approaches to teaching HIV/AIDS does not connect with youth cultures. By reframing and integrating current HIV/AIDS curricula into the science classroom, providing teachers with adequate HIV/AIDS teaching resources that are more responsive to and inclusive of youth cultural beliefs, and by aligning teaching practices to Ivorian youth cultural and academics interests, there is a chance that HIV/AIDS education could lead to safer sexual behaviors amongst Ivorian youth.

Leadership that promotes teacher empowerment among urban middle school science teachers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Howard-Skipper, Joni

In this study, the focus was on determining leadership strategies that promote teacher empowerment among urban middle school science teachers. The purpose of the paper was to determine if leadership strategies are related to teacher empowerment. The emphasis was on various forms of leadership and the empowerment of teachers in context in restructuring the democratic structure. An effective leadership in science education entails empowering others, especially science teachers. In this regard, no published studies had examined this perspective on empowering teachers and school leadership. Therefore, this study determined if a relationship exists between leadership strategy actions and teacher empowerment. The significance of the study is to determine a relationship between leadership strategies and teacher empowerment as a positive approach toward developing successful schools. Empowerment is essential for implementing serious improvements. Empowering others in schools must form a major component of an effective principal's agenda. It is becoming clearer in research literature that complex changes in education sometimes require active initiation. For this study, a quantitative methodology was used. Primary data enabled the research questions to be answered. The reliability and validity of the research were ensured. The results of this study showed that 40% of the administrators establish program policies with teachers, and 53% of teachers make decisions about new programs in schools. Furthermore, the findings, their implications, and recommendations are discussed.

The ethics of smart cities and urban science.

PubMed

Kitchin, Rob

2016-12-28

Software-enabled technologies and urban big data have become essential to the functioning of cities. Consequently, urban operational governance and city services are becoming highly responsive to a form of data-driven urbanism that is the key mode of production for smart cities. At the heart of data-driven urbanism is a computational understanding of city systems that reduces urban life to logic and calculative rules and procedures, which is underpinned by an instrumental rationality and realist epistemology. This rationality and epistemology are informed by and sustains urban science and urban informatics, which seek to make cities more knowable and controllable. This paper examines the forms, practices and ethics of smart cities and urban science, paying particular attention to: instrumental rationality and realist epistemology; privacy, datafication, dataveillance and geosurveillance; and data uses, such as social sorting and anticipatory governance. It argues that smart city initiatives and urban science need to be re-cast in three ways: a re-orientation in how cities are conceived; a reconfiguring of the underlying epistemology to openly recognize the contingent and relational nature of urban systems, processes and science; and the adoption of ethical principles designed to realize benefits of smart cities and urban science while reducing pernicious effects.This article is part of the themed issue 'The ethical impact of data science'. © 2016 The Author(s).

Supporting new science teachers in pursuing socially just science education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ruggirello, Rachel; Flohr, Linda

2017-10-01

This forum explores contradictions that arose within the partnership between Teach for America (TFA) and a university teacher education program. TFA is an alternate route teacher preparation program that places individuals into K-12 classrooms in low-income school districts after participating in an intense summer training program and provides them with ongoing support. This forum is a conversation about the challenges we faced as new science teachers in the TFA program and in the Peace Corps program. We both entered the teaching field with science degrees and very little formal education in science education. In these programs we worked in a community very different from the one we had experienced as students. These experiences allow us to address many of the issues that were discussed in the original paper, namely teaching in an unfamiliar community amid challenges that many teachers face in the first few years of teaching. We consider how these challenges may be amplified for teachers who come to teaching through an alternate route and may not have as much pedagogical training as a more traditional teacher education program provides. The forum expands on the ideas presented in the original paper to consider the importance of perspectives on socially just science education. There is often a disconnect between what is taught in teacher education programs and what teachers actually experience in urban classrooms and this can be amplified when the training received through alternate route provides a different framework as well. This forum urges universities and alternate route programs to continue to find ways to authentically partner using practical strategies that bring together the philosophies and goals of all stakeholders in order to better prepare teachers to partner with their students to achieve their science learning goals.

Mixed-ability secondary science in one urban school district: A multiple case study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tworek, Francis A.

The standards and accountability movements demand that all students be given the opportunity to learn more science than ever before. However, there is much uncertainty about how educators should proceed with this task. Issues of concern include achievement gaps, tracking, and graduation requirements. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore the challenges identified by four secondary science teachers in one urban public school district as they taught classes that included students representing a wide range of abilities and prior academic success. These mixed-ability science classes were generally defined as science classes which are required for high school graduation but which have no academic prerequisites. The central research questions in this qualitative study were: (1) How do secondary science teachers describe the challenges they face while teaching a mixed-ability science course required for graduation when the course has no prerequisites; and (2) What strategies do they use to deal with these challenges? Data collection was confined to four cases within one Midwest urban school district during the 2004-2005 school year. Each case involved one class taught by an individual teacher. One case was an 8th grade science class at a middle school. The other three cases represented three district-required courses in three different high schools: 9th grade biology, 10th grade chemistry, and 11th grade physics. Data sources included interviews with the teachers, observations in their classrooms, district achievement and demographic data, and school documents. Three themes emerged from the cross-case analysis: (1) a sense of belonging; (2) the teacher's focus; and (3) successful learning. The final chapter discusses the implications of these themes and makes recommendations for further study.

Gateway to understanding: Indigenous ecological activism and education in urban, rural, and remote contexts

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lowan-Trudeau, Gregory

2017-03-01

This article is a response to Kassam, Avery, and Ruelle's insights as presented in this forum on rural science education. Topics considered include troubling the urban/rural divide in the context of Indigenous knowledge and expanding to include the common Canadian notion of the "remote", a designation rooted in our national colonial narrative for the mythic, typically northern, wilderness sparsely inhabited by primarily Indigenous peoples. These concepts are further considered through exploration of Indigenous and allied ecological activism in Canada and the United States related to the proposed Northern Gateway and Keystone XL pipelines. This discussion concludes with an argument for the inherent pedagogical opportunity presented by such cases for contemporary educators to engage students in consideration of wicked problems, geographically rooted cognitive diversity, and the legal, economic, ecological, and cultural underpinnings and ramifications of the current events prominent in their home communities and abroad.

Not Driven by High-Stakes Tests: Exploring Science Assessment and College Readiness of Students from an Urban Portfolio Community High School

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fleshman, Robin Earle

This case study seeks to explore three research questions: (1) What science teaching and learning processes, perspectives, and cultures exist within the science classroom of an urban portfolio community high school? (2) In what ways does the portfolio-based approach prepare high school students of color for college level science coursework, laboratory work, and assessment? (3) Are portfolio community high school students of color college ready? Is there a relationship between students' science and mathematics performance and college readiness? The overarching objectives of the study are to learn, understand, and describe an urban portfolio community high school as it relates to science assessment and college readiness; to understand how the administration, teachers, and alumni perceive the use of portfolios in science learning and assessment; and to understand how alumni view their preparation and readiness for college and college science coursework, laboratory work, and assessments. The theoretical framework of this study encompasses four theories: critical theory, contextual assessment, self-regulated learning, and ethic of care. Because the urban high school studied partnered with a community-based organization (CBO), it identifies as a community school. Therefore, I provide context regarding the concept, culture, and services of community schools. Case study is the research design I used to explore in-depth this urban portfolio community high school, which involved mixed methods for data collection and analysis. In total, six alumni/current college students, five school members (administrators and teachers), and three CBO members (administrators, including myself) participated in the study. In addition to school artefacts and student portfolios collected, classroom and portfolio panel presentation observations and 13 semi-structured interviews were conducted to understand the portfolio-based approach as it pertains to science learning and assessment and college science readiness. Data from the transcripts of two graduating classes were analyzed and the interview transcripts were coded and analyzed as well. Analysis of qualitative data revealed key findings: (1) the school's Habits of Mind, authentic scientific inquiry, self-regulated learning triggers and strategies, and teacher feedback practices driven by an ethic of care supported students' science learning and portfolio assessment; and (2) the cyclical and extensive portfolio processes of writing, revision, and submission well prepared alumni for college science laboratory work and coursework, to a certain extent, but not for the traditional assessments administered in college science courses. Analysis of quantitative data revealed that, if based solely on the City University of New York's Regents score criteria for college readiness, the majority of students from these two graduating classes studied would not have been considered college ready even though all participants, including interviewed alumni, believed the school prepared them for college. The majority of these students, however, were transitioning to college readiness based on their Regents-level science and mathematics coursework. Findings of this study have implications for science assessment, professional development in science, education policy reform, and high school partnerships with CBOs and postsecondary institutions as they pertain to college and college science readiness for students of color in urban portfolio community high schools.

Potentialities beyond deficit perspectives: globalization, culture and urban science education in the Bronx

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pitts, Wesley

2011-03-01

The major focus of this ethnographic study is devoted to exploring the confluence of global and local referents of science education in the context of an urban chemistry laboratory classroom taught by a first-generation Filipino-American male teacher. This study investigates encounters between the teacher and four second-generation immigrant female students of color, as well as encounters among the four students. The pervasive spread of neoliberal ideology of accountability and sanctions both globally and locally, particularly in public high schools in the Bronx, New York City fuel situations for teaching and learning science that are encoded with the referents of top-down control. In the face of theses challenges, classroom participants must become aware of productive ways to build solidarity and interstitial culture across salient social boundaries, such as age, gender, ethnicity and role, to create and sustain successful teaching and learning of chemistry. Empirical evidence for solidarity was guided by physical and verbal displays of synchrony, mutual focus, entrainment, and emotional energy, body gestures, and prosody markers. This study shows that classroom participants used a combination of prosody markers to appropriate resources to decrease breaches in face-to-face encounters and, at the same time, create and sustain participation and solidarity to successfully complete an acid-base experiment.

The Hippocratic need for adequate supports while merging programs: at first do no harm

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sipple, John W.

2017-03-01

In response to a paper calling for the re-engagement of agricultural education with the sciences and science education, this essay is supportive but argues to proceed with caution: one that at first does no harm. I offer a supplementary lens and story of change at Cornell University as a cautionary and motivational tale. I concur with the authors who want to redirect faculty, departments, and societies of agricultural educators to become more tightly aligned with the sciences. The need for and ability to better contribute to the critical discussions on contemporary agriculture issues (e.g., urban farming, GMOs, sustainability, local economies) is timely and important. The trick, however, is to do this without weakening the agricultural education community to the point of extinction. Drawing on Institutional Theory, I offer an enhanced perspective highlighting the importance of resource, conformity, and legitimacy. I explore the nature of competing pressures: the strong and restrictive ties to isolated communities and the pressure to reengage a community with a more socially and intellectually central world. I want to emphasize how these strong ties are typically beneficial to the organizations of interest, despite what it may look like to others outside that sector. It is argued that agricultural education will become increasingly "vulnerable and isolated" should it not cross the street and at least partially connect with contemporary science, social science, and new policy and ethical concerns.

Time and Temporality as Mediators of Science Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Roth, Wolff-Michael; Tobin, Kenneth; Ritchie, Stephen M.

2008-01-01

Few studies have focused on understanding how teaching and learning in classrooms are mediated by other dimensions of the organizational systems of which education is an integral part. Our 7-year ethnographic study of an urban high school shows how time and temporality constitute key practical and theoretical resources to the actors in the…

Envisioning a Career in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics: Some Challenges and Possibilities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sharkawy, Azza

2015-01-01

In "How High School Students Envision Their STEM Career Pathways", Lin Zhang and Michael Barnett attempt to shed light on the problem of underrepresented students (e.g., Aboriginals, Hispanics, African Americans, urban, females) in STEM higher education and related careers by exploring, in general terms, five high school students' career…

Bridging Mental Health and Education in Urban Elementary Schools: Participatory Research to Inform Intervention Development

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cappella, Elise; Jackson, Daisy R.; Bilal, Caroline; Hamre, Bridget K.; Soule, Carles

2011-01-01

Guided by participatory research and implementation science, we conducted a two-phase study to contextualize a school mental health intervention for its implementation settings. Drawing from research and existing programs, we created a teacher consultation and coaching intervention delivered by indigenous school and community mental health…

Hopes and Goals Survey for Use in STEM Elementary Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Douglas, K. Anna; Strobel, Johannes

2015-01-01

This study reports the development and validation studies of the Hopes and Goals Survey, an assessment designed to measure the level of hope of elementary students from diverse backgrounds, and its relation to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) studies and career. Data collected from students attending urban elementary schools were…

A Qualitative Study: Integrating Art and Science in the Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mills, Deborah N.

2013-01-01

The study was used to develop an understanding of the nature of a creative learning experience that incorporated the foundational elements of Reggio Emilia, place-based education, and experience design. The study took place in an urban high school with eight students in an advanced placement art class. The qualitative research project revolved…

An Interactive and Contextual Model of Community-University Collaborations for Research and Action

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Suarez-Balcazar, Yolanda; Harper, Gary W.; Lewis, Rhonda

2005-01-01

Community-university partnerships for research and action are at the heart of many fields in the social sciences including public health, urban planning, education, and community psychology. These partnerships involve individuals from different backgrounds and disciplines working together to address social issues of importance to the community.…

POPs monitoring in Australia and New Zealand using plastic resin pellets, and International Pellet Watch as a tool for education and raising public awareness on plastic debris and POPs.

PubMed

Yeo, Bee Geok; Takada, Hideshige; Taylor, Heidi; Ito, Maki; Hosoda, Junki; Allinson, Mayumi; Connell, Sharnie; Greaves, Laura; McGrath, John

2015-12-15

Persistent organic pollutants (i.e. PCBs, DDTs, and HCHs) were analyzed along Australia and New Zealand North Island coastlines. PCB concentrations were high in urban areas (107-294 ng/g-pellet), with Sydney Harbour the most polluted. Hepta-chlorinated PCB was abundant, with ~30% in urban areas suggesting legacy pollution. DDT concentrations showed similar pattern except in rural agricultural sites, Taupo Bay and Ahipara, New Zealand (23 and 47 ng/g-pellet). p,p'-DDE predominance at these 2 sites suggested historical input; they also had high HCH concentrations (17 and 29 ng/g-pellet). The role of International Pellet Watch (IPW) in science communication was studied through feedbacks from IPW volunteers, case studies and examples. IPW data were categorized into understandable terms and tailored reports based on volunteers' backgrounds complemented with pollution maps. The effectiveness of IPW science communication has led to its use in awareness and education activities focusing on both POPs and plastic debris issues. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Using sunshine for elementary space science education: A model for IHY scientist teacher partnerships

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Moldwin, M. B.; Fiello, D.; Harter, E.; Holman, G.; Nagumo, N.; Pryharski, A.; Takunaga, C.

2008-12-01

An elementary science education professional development partnership between Culver City Unified School District teachers and UCLA has been formed. The project was designed to assist teachers to comfortably present introductory space science concepts, to support them in their efforts, and to aid them in encouraging their students to develop inquiry skills related to space sciences. The project encourages teacher use of observational science techniques in their classrooms, the use of NASA solar mission images and enhanced use of astronomical observation to facilitate discovery learning. The integrated approach of the project has fostered collegial learning activities among the participating teachers and offered them opportunities for continued renewal and professional development of teacher competencies in astronomy and space science. The activities used in the classroom were developed by others, classroom tested, and specifically address National Science Education and California Science Content Standards. These activities have been sustained through on-going collaboration between the scientist and the teachers, a summer Research Experience for Teachers program, and on-going, grade-specific, district-sponsored workshops. Assessment of the value of the program is done by the school district and is used to continuously improve each workshop and program component. Culver City (California) Unified School District is a small urban school district located on the Westside of Los Angeles. This paper describes the program and the plans for incorporating IHY-themed science into the classroom.

Utilizing Urban Environments for Effective Field Experiences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

MacAvoy, S. E.; Knee, K.

2014-12-01

Research surveys suggest that students are demanding more applied field experiences from their undergraduate environmental science programs. For geoscience educators at liberal arts colleges without field camps, university vehicles, or even geology departments, getting students into the field is especially rewarding - and especially challenging. Here, we present strategies that we have used in courses ranging from introductory environmental science for non-majors, to upper level environmental methods and geology classes. Urban locations provide an opportunity for a different type of local "field-work" than would otherwise be available. In the upper-level undergraduate Environmental Methods class, we relied on a National Park area located a 10-minute walk from campus for most field exercises. Activities included soil analysis, measuring stream flow and water quality parameters, dendrochronology, and aquatic microbe metabolism. In the non-majors class, we make use of our urban location to contrast water quality in parks and highly channelized urban streams. Here we share detailed lesson plans and budgets for field activities that can be completed during a class period of 2.5 hours with a $75 course fee, show how these activities help students gain quantitative competency, and provide student feedback about the classes and activities.

Teachers' perceptions of the effectiveness of an urban health sciences curriculum in closing the Black-White test score gap: A participatory case study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Prince, Joan Marie

1999-12-01

Over the past years, progress in Black academic achievement, particularly in the area of science, has generally slowed or ceased. According to the 1994 NAEP assessment, twelfth-grade Black students are performing at the level of White eighth-grade students in the discipline of science (Department of Education, 1996). These students, in their last year of required schooling, are about to graduate, yet they lag at least four years behind their white counterparts in science achievement. Despite the establishment and implementation of numerous science intervention programs, Black students still suffer from a disparate gap in standardized test score achievement. The purpose of this research is to investigate teachers' perceptions of the effectiveness of an urban sciences intervention tool that was designed to assist in narrowing the Black-White science academic achievement gap. Specifically, what factors affect teachers' personal sense of instructional efficacy, and how does this translate into their outcome expectancy for student academic success? A multiple-case, replicative design, grounded in descriptive theory, was selected for the study. Multiple sources of evidence were queried to provide robust findings. These sources included a validated health sciences self-efficacy instrument, an interview protocol, a classroom observation, and a review of archival material that included case study participants' personnel files and meeting minutes. A cross-comparative analytic approach was selected for interpretation (Yin, 1994). Findings indicate that teachers attribute the success or failure of educational intervention tools in closing the Black-White test score gap to a variety of internal and external factors. These factors included a perceived lack of both monetary and personal support by the school leadership, as well as a perceived lack of parental involvement which impacted negatively on student achievement patterns. The case study participants displayed a depressed outcome expectancy effect for successful student achievement, which they directly attributed to the barriers stated above. If educational reforms are to be successful, the issues of teachers' perceptions of factors that inhibit their personal ability to instruct, and how that translates to student academic achievement must be addressed.

The ethics of smart cities and urban science

PubMed Central

2016-01-01

Software-enabled technologies and urban big data have become essential to the functioning of cities. Consequently, urban operational governance and city services are becoming highly responsive to a form of data-driven urbanism that is the key mode of production for smart cities. At the heart of data-driven urbanism is a computational understanding of city systems that reduces urban life to logic and calculative rules and procedures, which is underpinned by an instrumental rationality and realist epistemology. This rationality and epistemology are informed by and sustains urban science and urban informatics, which seek to make cities more knowable and controllable. This paper examines the forms, practices and ethics of smart cities and urban science, paying particular attention to: instrumental rationality and realist epistemology; privacy, datafication, dataveillance and geosurveillance; and data uses, such as social sorting and anticipatory governance. It argues that smart city initiatives and urban science need to be re-cast in three ways: a re-orientation in how cities are conceived; a reconfiguring of the underlying epistemology to openly recognize the contingent and relational nature of urban systems, processes and science; and the adoption of ethical principles designed to realize benefits of smart cities and urban science while reducing pernicious effects. This article is part of the themed issue ‘The ethical impact of data science’. PMID:28336794

From "sit and listen" to "shake it out yourself": Helping urban middle school students to bridge personal knowledge to scientific knowledge through a collaborative environmental justice curriculum

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sadeh, Shamu Fenyvesi

Science education and environmental education are not meeting the needs of marginalized communities such as urban, minority, and poor communities (Seller, 2001; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency [EPA], 1996). There exists an equity gap characterized by the racial and socioeconomic disparities in: levels of participation in scientific and environmental careers and environmental organizations (Lewis & James, 1995; Sheppard, 1995), access to appropriate environmental education programs (U.S. EPA, 1996), exposure to environmental toxins (Bullard, 1993), access to environmental amenities and legal protections (Bullard, 1993), and in grades and standardized test scores in K-12 science (Jencks & Phillips, 1998; Johnston & Viadero, 2000). Researchers point to the cultural divide between home and school culture as one of the reasons for the equity gap in science education (Barton, 2003; Delpit, 1995; Seiler, 2001). This study is designed to address the equity gap by helping students connect personal/cultural knowledge to scientific knowledge. A collaborative action research study was conducted in 8th-grade science classrooms of low-income African American and Latino students. The participating teacher and the researcher developed, enacted and evaluated a curriculum that elicited students' personal and cultural knowledge in the investigation of local community issues. Using qualitative methods, data were collected through student and teacher interviews, observation, and written documents. Data were analyzed to answer questions on student participation and learning, bridging between personal and scientific knowledge, and student empowerment. The most compelling themes from the data were described as parts of three stories: tensions between the empire of school and the small student nation, bridging between the two nations, and students gaining empowerment. This study found that the bridging the curriculum intended was successful in that many students brought personal knowledge to class and started to bring scientific knowledge into their personal worlds. Students translated between scientific language and their own language, displayed an understanding of community environmental health issues, and expressed a sense of empowerment as students and community members. Recommendations to science educators and researchers included: eliciting students' personal and cultural knowledge in the classroom, helping students to create new ways of participating in science, and engaging in collaborative research efforts.

Predictors of cultural capital on science academic achievement at the 8th grade level

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Misner, Johnathan Scott

The purpose of the study was to determine if students' cultural capital is a significant predictor of 8th grade science achievement test scores in urban locales. Cultural capital refers to the knowledge used and gained by the dominant class, which allows social and economic mobility. Cultural capital variables include magazines at home and parental education level. Other variables analyzed include socioeconomic status (SES), gender, and English language learners (ELL). This non-experimental study analyzed the results of the 2011 Eighth Grade Science National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The researcher analyzed the data using a multivariate stepwise regression analysis. The researcher concluded that the addition of cultural capital factors significantly increased the predictive power of the model where magazines in home, gender, student classified as ELL, parental education level, and SES were the independent variables and science achievement was the dependent variable. For alpha=0.05, the overall test for the model produced a R2 value of 0.232; therefore the model predicted 23.2% of variance in science achievement results. Other major findings include: higher measures of home resources predicted higher 2011 NAEP eighth grade science achievement; males were predicted to have higher 2011 NAEP 8 th grade science achievement; classified ELL students were predicted to score lower on the NAEP eight grade science achievement; higher parent education predicted higher NAEP eighth grade science achievement; lower measures of SES predicted lower 2011 NAEP eighth grade science achievement. This study contributed to the research in this field by identifying cultural capital factors that have been found to have statistical significance on predicting eighth grade science achievement results, which can lead to strategies to help improve science academic achievement among underserved populations.

Everyday science & science every day: Science-related talk & activities across settings

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zimmerman, Heather

To understand the development of science-related thinking, acting, and learning in middle childhood, I studied youth in schools, homes, and other neighborhood settings over a three-year period. The research goal was to analyze how multiple everyday experiences influence children's participation in science-related practices and their thinking about science and scientists. Ethnographic and interaction analysis methodologies were to study the cognition and social interactions of the children as they participated in activities with peers, family, and teachers (n=128). Interviews and participant self-documentation protocols elucidated the participants' understandings of science. An Everyday Expertise (Bell et al., 2006) theoretical framework was employed to study the development of science understandings on three analytical planes: individual learner, social groups, and societal/community resources. Findings came from a cross-case analysis of urban science learners and from two within-case analyses of girls' science-related practices as they transitioned from elementary to middle school. Results included: (1) children participated actively in science across settings---including in their homes as well as in schools, (2) children's interests in science were not always aligned to the school science content, pedagogy, or school structures for participation, yet children found ways to engage with science despite these differences through crafting multiple pathways into science, (3) urban parents were active supporters of STEM-related learning environments through brokering access to social and material resources, (4) the youth often found science in their daily activities that formal education did not make use of, and (5) children's involvement with science-related practices can be developed into design principles to reach youth in culturally relevant ways.

Investigating the role of educative curriculum materials in supporting teacher enactment of a field-based urban ecology investigation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Houle, Meredith

2008-10-01

This multiple case study examined how three urban science teachers used curriculum materials designed educatively. Educative curriculum materials have been suggested as one way to support science teacher learning, particularly around new innovations and new pedagogies and to support teachers in evaluating and modifying materials to meet the needs of their students (Davis & Krajcik, 2005). While not a substitute for professional development, educative curriculum materials may provide an opportunity to support teachers' enactment and learning in the classroom context (Davis & Krajcik, 2005; Remillard, 2005; Schneider & Krajcik, 2002). However, little work has examined how science teachers interact with written curriculum materials to design classroom instruction. Grounded in sociocultural analysis, this study takes the theoretical stance that teachers and curriculum materials are engaged in a dynamic and participatory relationship from which the planned and enacted curriculum emerges (Remillard, 2005). Teaching is therefore a design activity where teachers rely on their personal resources and the curricular resources to construct and shape their students' learning experiences (Brown, 2002). Specifically this study examines how teacher beliefs influence their reading and use of curriculum and how educative features in the written curriculum inform teachers' pedagogical decisions. Data sources included classroom observation and video, teacher interviews, and classroom artifacts. To make sense how teachers' make curricular decisions, video were analyzed using Brown's (2002) Pedagogical Design for Enactment Framework. These coded units were examined in light of the teacher interviews, classroom notes and artifacts to examine how teachers' beliefs influenced these decisions. Data sources were then reexamined for evidence of teachers' use of specific educative features. My analyses revealed that teachers' beliefs about curriculum influenced the degree to which teachers relied on their own personal resources or the curricular resources in designing the taught curriculum. Teacher experience was also found to influence the degree to which teachers relied on their personal resources. Implications for teacher learning, professional development and curriculum development are discussed.

Urban high school students' perspectives about sexual health decision-making: the role of school culture and identity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brotman, Jennie S.; Mensah, Felicia Moore

2013-06-01

Studies across fields such as science education, health education, health behavior, and curriculum studies identify a persistent gap between the aims of the school curriculum and its impact on students' thinking and acting about the real-life decisions that affect their lives. The present study presents a different story from this predominant pattern in the literature. Through a year-long ethnographic investigation of a health-focused New York City public high school's HIV/AIDS and sex education program, this study illustrates a case in which 20 12th grade students respond positively to their education on these topics and largely assert that school significantly influences their perspectives and actions related to sexual health decision-making. This paper presents the following interpretation of this positive influence: school culture influences these students' perspectives and decisions around sexual health by contributing to the formation of students' identities. This paper further shows how science learning in particular becomes important for students in relation to decision-making when it is linked to issues of identity. These findings suggest that, in addition to attending to the design of classroom curriculum, HIV/AIDS and sex education researchers and curriculum developers (as well as those in science education focusing on other controversial science topics) might also explore the kinds of relational and school-wide factors that potentially influence students' identities, decisions, and responses to school learning.

Young African American children constructing identities in an urban integrated science-literacy classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kane, Justine M.

This is a qualitative study of identities constructed and enacted by four 3rd-grade African American children (two girls and two boys) in an urban classroom that engaged in a year-long, integrated science-literacy project. Juxtaposing narrative and discursive identity lenses, coupled with race and gender perspectives, I examined the ways in which the four children saw and performed themselves as students and as science students in their classroom. Interview data were used for the narrative analysis and classroom Discourse and artifacts were used for the discursive analysis. A constructivist grounded theory framework was adopted for both analyses. The findings highlight the diversity and richness of perspectives and forms of engagement these young children shared and enacted, and help us see African American children as knowers, doers, and talkers of science individually and collectively. In their stories about themselves, all the children identified themselves as smart but they associated with smartness different characteristics and practices depending on their strengths and preferences. Drawing on the children's social, cultural, and ethnolinguistic resources, the dialogic and multimodal learning spaces facilitated by their teacher allowed the children to explore, negotiate, question, and learn science ideas. The children in this study brought their understandings and ways of being into the "lived-in" spaces co-created with classmates and teacher and influenced how these spaces were created. At the same time, each child's ways of being and understandings were shaped by the words, actions, behaviors, and feelings of peers and teacher. Moreover, as these four children engaged with science-literacy activities, they came to see themselves as competent, creative, active participants in science learning. Although their stories of "studenting" seemed dominated by following rules and being well-behaved, their stories of "sciencing" were filled with exploration, ingenuity, risk taking, and thinking. The study calls for (a) research that is positioned within children's perspectives and give voice to the experiences of African American children in urban schools, (b) teacher education that supports teachers' efforts to help urban school students become academically successful, and (c) policy that foregrounds identity development along with subject-matter learning.

A Bridge to the Stars: A Model High School-to-College Pipeline to Improve Diversity in STEM

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McIntosh, Daniel H.; Jennings, Derrick H.

2017-01-01

Increasing participation by historically underrepresented Americans in the STEM workforce remains a national priority. Existing strategies have failed to increase diversity especially in the physical sciences despite federal mandates. To meet this urgent challenge, it is imperative to immediately identify and support the expansion of effective high school-to-college STEM pipelines. A Bridge to the Stars (ABttS) is a creative and tested pipeline designed to steadily increase the numbers of disadvantaged 15-21 year-olds pursuing and completing 4-year STEM degrees. This unique program offers extended engagement in astronomy, arguably the most accessible window to science, through a 3-tier STEM immersion program of innovative learning (in a freshman science course), authentic research training (in a freshman science lab), and supportive near-peer mentoring at U.Missouri-Kansas City, an urban research university. Each tier of the ABttS pipeline by itself has the potential to broaden student aspirations for careers as technological innovators or STEM educators. Students who elect to transition through multiple tiers will substantially reinforce their successes with STEM activities, and significantly bolster their self-esteem necessary to personally manifest STEM aspirations. We will summarize the impact of this program after 5 years, and share our latest improvements. The long-term mission of ABttS is to see urban educational institutions across the U.S. adopt similar pipelines in all STEM disciplines built on the ABttS model.

What to Teach and How to Teach It: Elementary Teachers' Views on Teaching Inquiry-Based, Interdisciplinary Science and Social Studies in Urban Settings

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Santau, Alexandra O.; Ritter, Jason K.

2013-01-01

Inquiry-based and interdisciplinary teaching practices exemplify constructivist approaches to education capable of facilitating authentic student learning; however, their implementation has proven particularly challenging within certain contexts in the United States. This qualitative study considers one such context via an investigation of…

How Service and Learning Came Together to Promote "Cura Personalis"

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wright, Ann; Calabrese, Nicki; Henry, Julie

2009-01-01

"Cura personalis" (care of the individual) represents one of the core ideals of all Jesuit colleges and universities. At one urban Jesuit college, faculty members of The School of Education and Human Services and The College of Arts and Sciences initiated a service-learning project in a freshman level pedagogical core course. One goal of the…

Students in Rural Schools Have Limited Access to Advanced Mathematics Courses. Issue Brief No. 7

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Graham, Suzanne E.

2009-01-01

This Carsey brief reveals that students in rural areas and small towns have less access to higher-level mathematics courses than students in urban settings, which results in serious educational consequences, including lower scores on assessment tests and fewer qualified students entering science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) job…

A Qualitative Study of Urban and Suburban Elementary Student Understandings of Pest-Related Science and Agricultural Education Benchmarks.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Trexler, Cary J.

2000-01-01

Clinical interviews with nine fifth graders revealed that experiences play a pivotal role in their understanding of pests. They lack well-developed schema and language to discuss pest management. A foundation of core biological concepts was necessary for understanding pests and pest management. (Conatains 34 references.) (SK)

A Qualitative Study of Prospective Elementary Teachers' Grasp of Agricultural and Science Educational Benchmarks for Agricultural Technology.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Trexler, Cary J.; Meischen, Deanna

2002-01-01

Interviews with eight preservice elementary teachers regarding benchmarks related to agricultural technology for food and fiber showed that those from rural areas had more complex understanding of the trade-offs in technology use; urban residents were more concerned with ethical dilemmas. Pesticide pollution was most understood, genetic…

"But I Grew up Here!" Science Inquiry, Pedagogy and Technology through a Sociocultural Lens

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Meyer, Brian R.

2017-01-01

The majority of students in the urban setting are considered underrepresented. These students frequently perform below their proficiency level on standardized tests locally and nationally. If we treat education as the ticket out of the culture of poverty that underrepresented students find themselves, it is incumbent upon us to find pedagogical,…

Physics teachers' perspectives on factors that affect urban physics participation and accessibility

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kelly, Angela M.

2013-06-01

The accessibility of secondary physics in U.S. urban school districts is a complex issue. Many schools do not offer a physics option, and for those that do, access is often restricted by various school policies and priorities that do not promote physics participation for all. To analyze this problem in greater depth, I adopted a qualitative phenomenological methodology to explore urban physics teachers’ views on school- and district-based conditions that may marginalize traditionally underrepresented students. Teachers from three large urban districts shared concerns and suggestions regarding administrative commitment, student preparedness for physics, reform initiatives and testing mandates, promoting physics enrollments, and implementing high quality instruction. Data from interviews and focus groups provided contextual insights into ways in which physics study may be improved and encouraged for urban youth. Teachers believed expanding access could be facilitated with differentiated levels of physics, incorporating mathematical applications with multiple representations, educating students and counselors on the ramifications of choosing or not choosing elective sciences, well-designed grant-funded initiatives, and flexibility with prerequisites and science course sequencing. Teachers experienced frustration with standardized testing, lack of curricular autonomy, shifting administrative directives, and top-down reforms that did not incorporate their feedback in the decision-making processes. Data from this study revealed that physics teacher networks, often housed at local universities, have been a key resource for establishing supportive professional communities to share best practices that may influence school-based reforms that promote physics participation in urban schools.

Teacher Educators' Understanding of Diversity Painting a Picture through Narrative Portraits

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stenhouse, Vera L.

2012-01-01

Education research literature is rife with images of pre- and in-service teachers in urban settings. Entire publications are grounded in the study of this population (see Journal of Urban Education, Education and Urban Society, The Urban Review, Perspectives on Urban Education, The National Journal of Urban Education, and Rethinking Schools). In…

Urban High School Teachers' Beliefs Concerning Essential Science Teaching Dispositions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Miranda, Rommel

2012-01-01

This qualitative study addresses the link between urban high school science teachers' beliefs about essential teaching dispositions and student learning outcomes. The findings suggest that in order to help students to do well in science in urban school settings, science teachers should possess essential teaching dispositions which include…

The Pedotopia Project: A Transdisciplinary Experiment in Soil Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Toland, A.; Wessolek, G.

2012-04-01

In the absence of every-day interactions with the land, a hands-on, comprehensive soil education across disciplines and ages is necessary. Soil education is usually integrated into earth science and geography curricula and only rarely into social science, arts and humanities programs. Furthermore, an emphasis on measurement and modeling in conventional classroom science often neglects aesthetic, moral and other non-quantifiable values, precluding a broader cultural context in which soil education could take place. The arts play a vital role in communicating environmental issues to the greater public and represent a dynamic approach to help students discover soil complexity in new and unexpected ways. Artistic methods have recently been introduced as pedagogical tools in soil awareness-raising programs for children and youth. Painting with soil has become an interesting new approach to soil education from Kindergarten to University levels (SZLEZAK 2008). And a growing amount of literature describes artists who have undertaken different soil issues, suggesting that such artistic focus may improve wider understanding and appreciation of soil conservation issues (FELLER et al 2010, TOLAND & WESSOLEK 2010, WAGNER 2002). How can art contribute to soil science, policy and education - both with the aim of generating greater public understanding, but also by honing creative methods to confront problems such as contamination, erosion, and urban sprawl? What artistic approaches exist to protect and restore soils as well as our relationship to the land? And how can these approaches support current soil education goals? These questions were addressed in the transdisciplinary soil seminar, "Pedotopia - Re-sourcing Urban Soils" from September 2010 to September 2011 in Berlin. A cooperation between the Technical University of Berlin's Department of Soil Protection and the Berlin University of Arts' Institute for Art in Context, the project served as a teaching experiment as well as a platform for the production of new soil-oriented artworks. An exhibition of the resulting works as well as a symposium on the cultural values of soil conservation was held at the annual meeting of the German Soil Science Society (DBG) in 2011 in Berlin. In the following paper we will present the Pedotopia project as a case study in transdisciplinary soil education. We will highlight main points of the curriculum, present the results of the project and address challenges and future considerations of transdisciplinary soil education. SOURCES FELLER, LARDY and UGOLINI (2010): The Representation of Soil in the Western Art: From Genesis to Pedogenesis. In: Feller and Landa (Hrsg.) Soil and Culture. Dordrecht, Heidelberg, London and New York: Springer Science + Business Media B.V.: 3-21 SZLEZAK, E. (2009) "Soilart with the Colours of the Earth". In: Amt der NÖ LandesregierungAbteilung Landentwicklung. Stand 2009. http://www.soilart.eu/1-0-Home.htm (abgerufen am 20. Dezember 2011) TOLAND, A. & WESSOLEK, G. (2010): Merging Horizons - Soil Science and Soil Art. In: Feller and Landa (Hrsg.) Soil and Culture. Dordrecht, Heidelberg, London and New York: Springer Science + Business Media B.V.: 45-66 WAGNER, M. (2002): Erde als Material künstlerische Gestaltung. In: BUSCH, B. (2002) (Hrsg.): Erde. Schriftenreihe Forum, Bd. 11, Elemente des Naturhaushalts III. Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland GmbH, Köln, 246-260

Proceeding Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; Initial Decision in the Matter of Chicago Public School District #299 and Illinois Office of Education and City of Chicago, Illinois; Docket No. S-120. Administrative Proceedings in the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, National Science Foundation, Department of Housing and Urban Development.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Office for Civil Rights (DHEW), Washington, DC.

This document presents the initial decision concerning a federal compliance review of the Chicago Public School District #299, the Illinois Office of Education, and the City of Chicago, Illinois. These proceedings try to determine if the school district under consideration was complying with Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Violations of…

Equitable research: a bridge too far?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Walls, Leon

2017-06-01

This paper is written in response to Angela Chapman and Allan Feldman's research study, "Cultivation of science identity through authentic science in an urban high school". I utilize this forum piece to extend the call for "awakening a dialogue" that critically assesses the effectiveness of current K-12 science education research in addressing the needs of populations of color. I take the opportunity to first discuss elements of what an equitable research focus might look like. I finish by critiquing and ultimately commending the authors on the degree to which they succeed in demonstrating an equitable approach to the design and carrying out of their study.

Soil in the City: Sustainably Improving Urban Soils.

PubMed

Kumar, Kuldip; Hundal, Lakhwinder S

2016-01-01

Large tracts of abandoned urban land, resulting from the deindustrialization of metropolitan areas, are generating a renewed interest among city planners and community organizations envisioning the productive use of this land not only to produce fresh food but to effectively manage stormwater and mitigate the impact of urban heat islands. Healthy and productive soils are paramount to meet these objectives. However, these urban lands are often severely degraded due to anthropogenic activities and are generally contaminated with priority pollutants, especially heavy metals and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Characterizing these degraded and contaminated soils and making them productive again to restore the required ecosystem services was the theme of the "Soil in the City- 2014" conference organized by W-2170 Committee (USDA's Sponsored Multi-State Research Project: Soil-Based Use of Residuals, Wastewater, & Reclaimed Water). This special section of comprises 12 targeted papers authored by conference participants to make available much needed information about the characteristics of urban soils. Innovative ways to mitigate the risks from pollutants and to improve the soil quality using local resources are discussed. Such practices include the use of composts and biosolids to grow healthy foods, reclaim brownfields, manage stormwater, and improve the overall ecosystem functioning of urban soils. These papers provide a needed resource for educating policymakers, practitioners, and the general public about using locally available resources to restore fertility, productivity, and ecosystem functioning of degraded urban land to revitalize metropolitan areas for improving the overall quality of life for a large segment of a rapidly growing urban population. Copyright © by the American Society of Agronomy, Crop Science Society of America, and Soil Science Society of America, Inc.

Opportunities to Learn in School and at Home: How can they predict students' understanding of basic science concepts and principles?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Su; Liu, Xiufeng; Zhao, Yandong

2012-09-01

As the breadth and depth of economic reforms increase in China, growing attention is being paid to equalities in opportunities to learn science by students of various backgrounds. In early 2009, the Chinese Ministry of Education and Ministry of Science and Technology jointly sponsored a national survey of urban eighth-grade students' science literacy along with their family and school backgrounds. The present study focused on students' understanding of basic science concepts and principles (BSCP), a subset of science literacy. The sample analyzed included 3,031 students from 109 randomly selected classes/schools. Correlation analysis, one-way analysis of variance, and two-level linear regression were conducted. The results showed that having a refrigerator, internet, more books, parents purchasing books and magazines related to school work, higher father's education level, and parents' higher expectation of the education level of their child significantly predicted higher BSCP scores; having siblings at home, owning an apartment, and frequently contacting teachers about the child significantly predicted lower BSCP scores. At the school level, the results showed that being in the first-tier or key schools, having school libraries, science popularization galleries, computer labs, adequate equipment for teaching, special budget for teacher training, special budget for science equipment, and mutual trust between teachers and students significantly predicated higher BSCP scores; and having science and technology rooms, offering science and technology interest clubs, special budget for science curriculum development, and special budget for science social practice activities significantly predicted lower BSCP scores. The implications of the above findings are discussed.

Success of Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) Education & Public Outreach (E/PO) in Montana

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Freed, M. S.; Lowder, S. C.; McKenzie, D. E.

2013-03-01

The Space Public Outreach Team (SPOT) program at Montana State University (MSU) is the main component of SDO E/PO efforts in Montana. SPOT brings energetic presentations of recent science & NASA missions to students in primary & secondary schools. Presenters are university undergraduates that visit a diverse group of K-12 students from both rural & urban areas of Montana. This program is extremely cost effective, a valuable service-learning experience for undergraduates at MSU and has repeatedly received praise from both teachers and students. A complementary effort for training schoolteachers entitled NASA Education Activity Training (NEAT) is also employed. NEAT illustrates to teachers inexpensive and highly effective methods for demonstrating difficult science concepts to their students. We will highlight the successes and lessons learned from SPOT & NEAT, so that other E/PO programs can use it as a template to further science literacy in our nation's schools.

Ecological science and transformation to the sustainable city

Treesearch

S.T.A. Pickett; Christopher G. Boone; Brian P. McGrath; M.L. Cadenasso; Daniel L. Childers; Laura A. Ogden; Melissa McHale; J. Morgan Grove

2013-01-01

There is growing urgency to enhance the sustainability of existing and emerging cities. The science of ecology, especially as it interacts with disciplines in the social sciences and urban design, has contributions to make to the sustainable transformation of urban systems. Not all possible urban transformations may lead toward sustainability. Ecological science helps...

Citizen Science and the Urban Ecology of Birds and Butterflies — A Systematic Review

PubMed Central

Wang Wei, James; Lee, Benjamin P. Y-H.; Bing Wen, Low

2016-01-01

Citizen science has gained widespread currency as a tool for ecological research over the past decade. However, in the discipline of urban ecology, the existing contributions and future potential of citizen science engagement, specifically in terms of knowledge gain, have not yet been comprehensively explored. Here, we present a systematic review of published work on the urban ecology of birds and butterflies in relation to their use of citizen science data between 2005 and 2014. We compared the number of studies that used citizen science data to the number of studies that could potentially have employed data derived from citizen science. The take-up rates of citizen science data were 21% and 26% for birds and butterflies respectively. Most studies that employed citizen science used volunteer-derived data as primary data, and adopted Collegial, Collaborative and Contributional engagement modes to the exclusion of Contractual and Co-created arrangements. There was no evidence that citizen science studies investigated a different organismal scale (community vs. species) compared to the urban ecology literature. For both taxa, citizen science contributions were lower than expected compared to their representation in the urban ecology literature for studies on species-environment relationships at landscape and micro-environment scales, as well as behavioural ecology in general. Other research topics that could benefit from further citizen science involvement include breeding studies and guild analyses for birds, and multi-taxa studies for butterflies. Promising models of citizen science engagement for urban ecology are highlighted in relation to their thematic foci and methodological detail, and a number of research questions that could be productively addressed using citizen science are identified. The dynamics of contemporary engagement between citizen science and urban ecology described by this review could inform the design and refinement of urban ecology–citizen science programmes in order to optimise their scientific contributions. PMID:27285581

Citizen Science and the Urban Ecology of Birds and Butterflies - A Systematic Review.

PubMed

Wang Wei, James; Lee, Benjamin P Y-H; Bing Wen, Low

2016-01-01

Citizen science has gained widespread currency as a tool for ecological research over the past decade. However, in the discipline of urban ecology, the existing contributions and future potential of citizen science engagement, specifically in terms of knowledge gain, have not yet been comprehensively explored. Here, we present a systematic review of published work on the urban ecology of birds and butterflies in relation to their use of citizen science data between 2005 and 2014. We compared the number of studies that used citizen science data to the number of studies that could potentially have employed data derived from citizen science. The take-up rates of citizen science data were 21% and 26% for birds and butterflies respectively. Most studies that employed citizen science used volunteer-derived data as primary data, and adopted Collegial, Collaborative and Contributional engagement modes to the exclusion of Contractual and Co-created arrangements. There was no evidence that citizen science studies investigated a different organismal scale (community vs. species) compared to the urban ecology literature. For both taxa, citizen science contributions were lower than expected compared to their representation in the urban ecology literature for studies on species-environment relationships at landscape and micro-environment scales, as well as behavioural ecology in general. Other research topics that could benefit from further citizen science involvement include breeding studies and guild analyses for birds, and multi-taxa studies for butterflies. Promising models of citizen science engagement for urban ecology are highlighted in relation to their thematic foci and methodological detail, and a number of research questions that could be productively addressed using citizen science are identified. The dynamics of contemporary engagement between citizen science and urban ecology described by this review could inform the design and refinement of urban ecology-citizen science programmes in order to optimise their scientific contributions.

Successful White teachers of Black students: Teaching across racial lines in urban middle school science classrooms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Coleman, Bobbie

The majority of urban minority students, particularly Black students, continue to perform below proficiency on standardized state and national testing in all areas that seriously impact economically advanced career options, especially in areas involving science. If education is viewed as a way out of poverty, there is a need to identify pedagogical methodologies that assist Black students in achieving higher levels of success in science, and in school in general. The purpose of this study was to explore White teachers' and Black students' perceptions about the teaching strategies used in their low socioeconomic status (LSES) urban science classrooms, that led to academic success for Black students. Participants included three urban middle school White teachers thought to be the best science teachers in the school, and five randomly selected Black students from each of their classrooms. Methods of inquiry involving tenets of grounded theory were used to examine strategies teachers used to inspire Black students into academic success. Data collection included teacher and student interviews, field notes from classroom observations, group discussions, and questionaires. Data were analyzed using open, axial, and selective coding. The teachers' perceptions indicated that their prior belief systems, effective academic and personal communication, caring and nurturing strategies, using relevant and meaningful hands-on activities in small learner-centered groups, enhanced the learning capabilities of all students in their classrooms, especially the Black students. Black students' perceptions indicated that their academic success was attributable to what teachers personally thought about them, demonstrated that they cared, communicated with them on a personal and academic level, gave affirmative feedback, simplified, and explained content matter. Black students labeled teachers who had these attributes as "nice" teachers. The nurturing and caring behaviors of "nice" teachers caused Black students to feel a sense of community and a sense of belonging in their classrooms. Black students demonstrated that they respected and always "had the back" of these "nice" teachers. Results from this study could play a significant role in teacher retention and in informing best practices for preservice and other teachers who are struggling to meet the needs of LSES urban students.

Gender by ethnic equity issues as they pertain to success in science education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Snyder, Jan David

Science is traditionally a white-male dominated field. This trend has foundations in beliefs and practices accepted before the Enlightenment period. Sixteenth and seventeenth century writers further promoted perceptions that women lacked intellectual capacity to indulge in science. A similar viewpoint was applied to non-white ethnic groups during the 19th and 20th centuries. Questions over Eurocentric and androcentric aspects of science were first raised publicly in 1869, yet significant change in the proportions of women and minorities in science-related fields remains disproportionately low. Public awareness of this situation extends to education where students demonstrate beliefs that opportunities in science are primarily for white males. This commonly shared belief typically produces negative effects on success rates in science education for females and minorities. The purpose of this study was to determine if gender-by-ethnic factors are culturally specific. Do members of one gender/ethnic subgroup experience deterrents to success in science education not common in other ethnic groups? Contrariwise, are negative factors shared across ethnic groups? An effort is made to identify potential gender/ethnic-related barriers that serve to reduce success rates and potentially generate negative attitudes for students about science. A 74-item Likert scale was developed to reveal students' perceptions of issues relative to science education. This instrument was administered to 30 female and 30 male high school students in each of four ethnic groups (African American, Mexican American, American Indian, and Euro American) from public or tribal schools in a large southwestern (United States) urban community. Randomly selected participants from each subgroup were then interviewed to expound upon relevant issues. A reoccurring pattern of reduced interest and experiences in science activities was noted among male American Indians. These participants most often differed with one or more of the other gender/ethnic subgroups in expectations and opportunities for academic success. Most students anticipated support from parents and educators if they were to choose a science related career; however, few expected like consideration from peers. Historical and current issues of cultural relevance are considered as potential sources for outcome patterns noted from the study. Possible areas for future studies are offered.

Taking an active stance: How urban elementary students connect sociocultural experiences in learning science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Upadhyay, Bhaskar; Maruyama, Geoffrey; Albrecht, Nancy

2017-12-01

In this interpretive case study, we draw from sociocultural theory of learning and culturally relevant pedagogy to understand how urban students from nondominant groups leverage their sociocultural experiences. These experiences allow them to gain an empowering voice in influencing science content and activities and to work towards self-determining the sciences that are personally meaningful. Furthermore, tying sociocultural experiences with science learning helps generate sociopolitical awareness among students. We collected interview and observation data in an urban elementary classroom over one academic year to understand the value of urban students' sociocultural experiences in learning science and choosing science activities.

The NSF-RCN Urban Heat Island Network

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Twine, T. E.; Snyder, P. K.; Hamilton, P.; Shepherd, M.; Stone, B., Jr.

2015-12-01

In much of the world cities are warming at twice the rate of outlying rural areas. The frequency of urban heat waves is projected to increase with climate change through the 21st century. Addressing the economic, environmental, and human costs of urban heat islands requires a better understanding of their behavior from many disciplinary perspectives. The goal of this four-year Urban Heat Island Network is to (1) bring together scientists studying the causes and impacts of urban warming, (2) advance multidisciplinary understanding of urban heat islands, (3) examine how they can be ameliorated through engineering and design practices, and (4) share these new insights with a wide array of stakeholders responsible for managing urban warming to reduce their health, economic, and environmental impacts. The NSF-RCN Urban Heat Island Network involves atmospheric scientists, engineers, architects, landscape designers, urban planners, public health experts, and education and outreach experts, who will share knowledge, evaluate research directions, and communicate knowledge and research recommendations to the larger research community as well as stakeholders engaged in developing strategies to adapt to and mitigate urban warming. The first Urban Climate Institute was held in Saint Paul, MN in July 2013 and focused on the characteristics of urban heat islands. Scientists engaged with local practitioners to improve communication pathways surrounding issues of understanding, adapting to, and mitigating urban warming. The second Urban Climate Institute was held in Atlanta, Georgia in July 2014 and focused on urban warming and public health. The third Urban Climate Institute was held in Athens, GA in July 2015 and focused on urban warming and the role of the built environment. Scientists and practitioners discussed strategies for mitigation and adaptation. Evaluation experts at the Science Museum of Minnesota have extensively evaluated the Institutes to inform other research coordination networks and to identify effective ways that researchers and practitioners can share knowledge and communicate more effectively. A final Institute is planned for July of 2016 in Saint Paul, MN. This institute will focus on synthesizing findings from the first three workshops and discuss education and outreach efforts.

Two-Year Community: Using Formative Assessment to Improve Microscope Skills among Urban Community College General Biology I Lab Students

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Keller, Charles

2017-01-01

Community colleges serve the noble mission of making higher education accessible to a broader spectrum of society than traditional 4-year institutions. A side effect of this broad access is a lower level of student preparedness for success in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses. This work describes our efforts to…

High School Biology Evolution Learning Experiences in a Rural Context: A Case of and for Cultural Border Crossing

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Borgerding, Lisa A.

2017-01-01

Although the concept of "rural" is difficult to define, rural science education provides the possibility for learning centered upon a strong connection to the local community. Rural American adolescents tend to be more religious than their urban counterparts and less accepting of evolution than their non-rural peers. Because the status…

Educating Tomorrow's Men: Perceived School Support, Negative Youth Experiences, and Bravado Attitudes in African American Adolescent Males

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Corprew, Charles S., III; Cunningham, Michael

2012-01-01

The purpose of this study was to explore the association between negative youth experiences and bravado attitudes in African American urban males. In addition, an examination of positive factors, such as school social support, was examined to understand potential resilient pathways. Data were collected at two sites, a science and math center (n =…

Aligning Academic Offerings with Industry Needs and Facility Construction, While Making Space for Relevant Public Private Partnerships (P3s)

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Golich, Vicki L.; Haynes, Sandra; Hillhouse, Erin; Pfeifer, David

2018-01-01

Metropolitan State University of Denver (MSU Denver) has been educating students for Colorado's urban workforce for over fifty years. The following case study of MSU Denver's new Aerospace Engineering Sciences (AES) Building reveals the roles played by partnerships among universities, faculty, and local civic and industry leaders in creating new…

The Role of Outdoor Art in Urban Environmental Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Filippelli, G. M.; Kesling, M.; Ryan, T.; Fraser, J.; McDonald, F.; Rollings, A.; Miss, M.; Kanpetch, B.; Trueblood, M.

2015-12-01

Finding ways to engage youth in inadvertent learning about nature and the environment is challenging, particularly in urban areas where environmental literacy is profoundly limited by access to safe and representative spaces. Termed the Nature Deficit Disorder, the lack of contact and connection between people and their environment leads to a less than holistic approach to environmental management at the personal and governmental levels. One of the challenges is developing ways to engage youth in science learning not by bringing them indoors to a science museum but rather by taking the science museum outdoors. Funded by the NSF Informal Science Learning program, we launched a collaborative between scientists and artists to understand the nature and impact of environmental learning through outdoor art and science programming, called StreamLines. Launched in 2014 and now near full deployment, the program is part of a bigger initiative in Indianapolis (Reconnecting to Our Waterways) to embrace the multiple waterways that traverse the city as a valuable community and health resource. This collaborative is designed to function on multiple levels. An Artist and Scientists Roundtable engages practitioners in regular conversations supplemented by external readings to share how practitioners use concepts and tools from the "opposite" side to inform their work and scholarship. Physical installations of iconic art at individual sites reflect the environmental conditions at individual sites are designed as tools for explicit and implicit learning and exploration about the environment. Music, poetry, and dance programming developed for individual sites portray cogent characteristics of place and are meant to allow visitors to see how artists engage with and draw from the environment for inspiration. A research approach unpins all of these efforts, utilizing a set of different sample populations to explore environmental education and potential advocacy after interactions with components of StreamLines.

The journey of a science teacher: Preparing female students in the Training Future Scientists after school program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Robinson-Hill, Rona M.

What affect does female participation in the Training Future Scientist (TFS) program based on Vygotsky's sociocultural theory and Maslow's Hierarchies of Needs have on female adolescents' achievement levels in science and their attitude toward science and interest in science-based careers? The theoretical framework for this study was developed through a constructivist perspective, using dialogic engagement, coinciding with Lev Vygotsky's sociocultural learning theory. This action research project used mixed methods research design, targeted urban adolescent females who were members of Boys & Girls Club of Greater St. Louis (BGCGSTL) after-school program. The data collection measures were three qualitative instruments (semi-structured interviews, reflective journal entries and attitudinal survey open-ended responses) and two quantitative instruments (pre-test and posttests over the content from the Buckle-down Curriculum and attitudinal survey scaled responses). The goal was to describe the impact the Training Future Scientist (TFS) after-school program has on the girls' scientific content knowledge, attitude toward choosing a science career, and self-perception in science. Through the TFS after-school program participants had access to a secondary science teacher-researcher, peer leaders that were in the 9th--12th grade, and Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) role models from Washington University Medical School Young Scientist Program (YSP) graduate and medical students and fellows as volunteers. The program utilized the Buckle-down Curriculum as guided, peer-led cooperative learning groups, hands-on labs and demonstrations facilitated by the researcher, trained peer leaders and/or role models that used constructivist science pedagogy to improve test-taking strategies. The outcomes for the TFS study were an increase in science content knowledge, a positive trend in attitude change, and a negative trend in choosing a science career. Keywords: informal science programs, urban girls, self-efficacy, cooperative learning, peer learning, female adolescents, and after-school urban education This dissertation study was funded by two grants, the 2013 spring dissertation grant from the University of Missouri St. Louis and a philanthropic grant from Dr. Courtney Crim.

Science is for me: Meeting the needs of English language learners in an urban, middle school science classroom through an instructional intervention

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Johnson, Joseph A.

2011-12-01

This study involved an intervention in which I explored how the multimodal, inquiry-based teaching strategies from a professional development model could be used to meet the educational needs of a group of middle school students, who were refugees, newly arrived in the United States, now residing in a large urban school district in the northeastern United States, and learning English as a second language. This group remains unmentioned throughout the research literature despite the fact that English Language Learners (ELLs) represent the fastest growing group of K-12 students in the United States. The specific needs of this particular group were explored as I attempted daily to confront a variety of obstacles to their science achievement and help to facilitate the development of a scientific discourse. This research was done in an effort to better address the needs of ELLs in general and to inform best practices for teachers to apply across a variety of different cultural and linguistic subgroups. This study is an autoethnographic case study analysis of the practices of the researcher, working in a science classroom, teaching the described group of students.

Preparing new Earth Science teachers via a collaborative program between Research Scientists and Educators

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grcevich, Jana; Pagnotta, Ashley; Mac Low, Mordecai-Mark; Shara, Michael; Flores, Kennet; Nadeau, Patricia A.; Sessa, Jocelyn; Ustunisik, Gokce; Zirakparvar, Nasser; Ebel, Denton; Harlow, George; Webster, James D.; Kinzler, Rosamond; MacDonald, Maritza B.; Contino, Julie; Cooke-Nieves, Natasha; Howes, Elaine; Zachowski, Marion

2015-01-01

The Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) Program at the American Museum of Natural History is a innovative program designed to prepare participants to be world-class Earth Science teachers. New York State is experiencing a lack of qualified Earth Science teachers, leading in the short term to a reduction in students who successfully complete the Earth Science Regents examination, and in the long term potential reductions in the number of students who go on to pursue college degrees in Earth Science related disciplines. The MAT program addresses this problem via a collaboration between practicing research scientists and education faculty. The faculty consists of curators and postdoctoral researchers from the Departments of Astrophysics, Earth and Planetary Sciences, and the Division of Paleontology, as well as doctoral-level education experts. During the 15-month, full-time program, students participate in a residency program at local urban classrooms as well as taking courses and completing field work in astrophysics, geology, earth science, and paleontology. The program targets high-needs schools with diverse populations. We seek to encourage, stimulate interest, and inform the students impacted by our program, most of whom are from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds, about the rich possibilities for careers in Earth Science related disciplines and the intrinsic value of the subject. We report on the experience of the first and second cohorts, all of whom are now employed in full time teaching positions, and the majority in high needs schools in New York State.

Enhancing STEM Education at Minority and Underrepresented Institutions through the Center for Applied Atmospheric Research and Education (CAARE)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Estes, M. G., Jr.; Griffin, R.; Al-Hamdan, M. Z.; Estes, S. M.; Crosson, W. L.; Chiao, S.

2016-12-01

Funding from The NASA MUREP Institutional Research Opportunity (MIRO) Program established the Center for Applied Atmospheric Research and Education (CAARE) to promote STEM literacy and enhance the capability to support NASA's Earth Science Mission Directorate. Through CAARE opportunities for STEM students at minority and underserved institutions were provided to enhance their undergraduate education with summer internship experiences at NASA Centers. The University of Alabama in Huntsville and the Universities Space Research Association scientists developed internship opportunities for students in applied atmospheric research at the National Space Science and Technology Center near the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. Project opportunities focused on the use of NASA remotely sensed data, geospatial technologies and statistical analyses to evaluate problems related to urban heat islands and air quality. Students received training in the fundamentals of remote sensing and geospatial analysis to establish a foundation from which to pursue research projects. An approach was designed for the students to work initially in groups and then focus on individual projects in the latter part of the ten week internship. Working in groups benefitted the transition of the students from their respective academic institutions to the NASA work environment and provided the students with useful professional experience in a collegial environment. As knowledge was gained through the group project and areas of interest identified the students were able to explore further research questions of interest, evaluate research applications and determine the benefits of using NASA remotely sensed data. Students found that urban heat islands (UHI) did exist in both San Jose, CA and Huntsville, AL and methods to evaluate the magnitude of the UHI seasonally, diurnally and spatially were explored. Regression models of PM 2.5 based on remotely-sensed aerosol optical depth and meteorological data were also developed for selected urban areas and public health implications evaluated.

Underprivileged urban mothers' perspectives on science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Calabrese Barton, Angela; Hindin, Toby J.; Contento, Isobel R.; Trudeau, Michelle; Yang, Kimberley; Hagiwara, Sumi; Koch, Pamela D.

2001-08-01

The purpose of this article is to report our findings from a qualitative study intended to develop our understandings of how inner-city mothers perceive science. Using qualitative methodologies, our analysis reveals that the mothers' perceptions can be grouped into four categories: perceptions of science as (a) schoolwork/knowledge, (b) fun projects, (c) a tool for maintaining the home and family, and (d) an untouchable domain. After we present these categories we compare our findings across categories to argue that those mothers who had spent time doing science with their children were more likely to have a more personal, dynamic, and inquiry-based view of science. We also argue that mothers' perceptions of science were more dynamic when they spoke about situations and contexts that were familiar to them, such as food, nutrition, and child care. We conclude the article with a discussion of the implications our findings have for science education reform.

Application of the instructional congruence framework: Developing supplemental materials for English language learners

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Drews, Tina Skjerping

2009-12-01

This dissertation is a study of the instructional congruence framework as it was used to develop and pilot a supplemental science unit on energy and the environment for sixth grade students in Arizona. With the growing linguistic and cultural diversity of children in American schools, congruent materials are more important now than ever before. The supplemental materials were designed by the researcher and underwent a six person, three educator and three engineer, panel review. The revised materials were then piloted in two sixth grade classrooms in the Southwest with high numbers of English language learners. Classroom observation, teacher interviews, and the classroom observation protocol were utilized to understand the fidelity to the instructional congruence framework. The fidelity of implementation of materials was subject to the realities of varied educational contexts. Piloting materials in urban contexts with diverse students involved additional challenges. The results of the study explore the challenges in creating instructionally congruent materials for diverse students in urban contexts. Recommendations are provided for curriculum developers that undertake the task of creating instructionally congruent materials and emphasize the need to devise innovative methods of creation, while understanding that there is no perfect solution. The education community as a whole could benefit from incorporating and synthesizing the instructional congruence framework in order to provide maximum opportunities in science for all students.

An Ecological Examination of an Urban Sixth Grade Physical Education Class

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

James, Alisa R.; Collier, Douglas

2011-01-01

Background: There are several factors that influence teaching urban physical education. Violence, poverty and irrelevant curricula influence the teaching-learning environment in urban physical education. One approach to urban physical education is to look carefully at the ecology that exists within an urban physical education class. This ecology…

The problem is education not ``special education''

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fellner, Gene

2015-12-01

In his article, Urban special education policy and the lived experience of stigma in a high school science classroom, Chris Hale persuasively argues that the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and subsequent special education policies have largely failed to serve special education students who are stigmatized by their deficit classification. Though classified students may be doubly stigmatized, research suggests that students of color who live in economically stressed communities are also subject to systemic educational policies that produce stigma; special education should be understood within the larger context of educational policy in the inner city. Though we cannot immediately dismantle the macro level structures that nurture stigma, I suggest pedagogies based on facilitating phenomenological awareness enacted through individual-collectively based methodologies to challenge the stigma that classified as well as non-classified students in the inner city often carry with them.

An Alternative Curriculum Model for Urban Education and Community Affairs Programs in Higher Education. Working Paper No. 103.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Simmons, Ron

This document describes the urban education program at William Paterson College of New Jersey. Urban education is defined as educating people for living and in coping with an urban environment, including politics, crime and drug prevention, and delivery of services to cities. Some problems in urban education are identified as weak…

Ivestigating Earth Science in Urban Schoolyards

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Endreny, Anna; Siegel, Donald I.

2009-01-01

The Urban Schoolyards project is a two year partnership with a university Earth Science Department and the surrounding urban elementary schools. The goal of the project was to develop the capacity of elementary teachers to teach earth science lessons using their schoolyards and local parks as field sites. The university personnel developed lessons…

Citizen Science as a Tool for Mosquito Control.

PubMed

Jordan, Rebecca C; Sorensen, Amanda E; Ladeau, Shannon

2017-09-01

In this paper, we share our findings from a 2-year citizen science program called Mosquito Stoppers. This pest-oriented citizen science project is part of a larger coupled natural-human systems project seeking to understand the fundamental drivers of mosquito population density and spatial variability in potential exposure to mosquito-borne pathogens in a matrix of human construction, urban renewal, and individual behaviors. Focusing on residents in West Baltimore, participants were recruited through neighborhood workshops and festivals. Citizen scientists participated in yard surveys of potential mosquito habitat and in evaluating mosquito nuisance. We found that citizen scientists, with minimal education and training, were able to accurately collect data that reflect trends found in a comparable researcher-generated database.

Investigation of urban science teachers' pedagogical engagements: Are urban science teachers culturally responsive?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Udokwu, Chukwudi John

This study utilized mixed methodology of quantitative and qualitative research approach to explore the current pedagogical engagements of twenty middle school urban science teachers in the Midwest region of the United States. It qualitatively examined twelve of these teachers' knowledge of culturally responsive pedagogy. The study investigated the following questions: What are the current pedagogical practices of urban middle school science teachers? To what extent are middle school science teachers' pedagogical practices in urban schools culturally responsive? What are urban students' perspectives of their teachers' current pedagogical engagements? The design of the study was qualitative and quantitative methods in order to investigate these teachers' pedagogical practices. Data collections were drawn from multiple sources such as lesson plans, students' sample works, district curriculum, surveys, observational and interview notes. Analysis of collected data was a mixed methodology that involved qualitative and quantitative methods using descriptive, interpretative, pattern codes, and statistical procedures respectively. Purposeful sampling was selected for this study. Thus, demographically there were twenty participants who quantitatively took part in this study. Among them were seven (35%) males and thirteen (65%) females, three (15%) African Americans and seventeen (85%) Caucasians. In determining to what extent urban science teachers' pedagogical practices were culturally responsive, eight questions were analyzed based on four cluster themes: (a) teachers' social disposition, (b) culturally responsive curriculum, (c) classroom interactions, and (d) power pedagogy. Study result revealed that only five (25%) of the participants were engaged in culturally responsive pedagogy while fifteen (75%) were engaged in what Haberman (1991) called the pedagogy of poverty. The goal was to investigate urban science teachers' pedagogical engagements and to examine urban students' perspective of their science teachers' pedagogical practices, and ensure that all students have a sense of ownership of their knowledge, a sense that is empowering and liberating. The implications of these findings were to promote urban students' achievements in science and see them employed in science and engineering. I hope this study helps in developing better professional development that will be culturally responsive and to ensure that all students have a sense of ownership of their knowledge.

The Use of Photographs to Portray Urban Ecosystems in Six Introductory Environmental Science Textbooks

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sullivan, John P.

2008-01-01

This study examined how photographs in six introductory environmental science texts portrayed the urban environments in which most U.S. students lived. All photographs from all texts were coded to determine whether they depicted urban areas. The urban photographs were then coded to determine what they communicated about the urban environment. The…

3D Visualization in Elementary Education Astronomy: Teaching Urban Second Graders about the Sun, Earth, and Moon

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Isik-Ercan, Zeynep; Kim, Beomjin; Nowak, Jeffrey

This research-in-progress hypothesizes that urban second graders can have an early understanding about the shape of Sun, Moon, and Earth, how day and night happens, and how Moon appears to change its shape by using three dimensional stereoscopic vision. The 3D stereoscopic vision system might be an effective way to teach subjects like astronomy that explains relationships among objects in space. Currently, Indiana state standards for science teaching do not suggest the teaching of these astronomical concepts explicitly before fourth grade. Yet, we expect our findings to indicate that students can learn these concepts earlier in their educational lives with the implementation of such technologies. We also project that these technologies could revolutionize when these concepts could be taught to children and expand the ways we think about children's cognitive capacities in understanding scientific concepts.

The Measurement of the Transfer and Retention Abilities of Junior High School Students in Performing the Scientific Processes of Observation and Comparison.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Tomera, Audrey N.

Investigated were two problems in science education, the retention and positive lateral transfer of the scientific processes of observation and comparison. Data for this study were collected from two junior high school settings, urban and rural. A total sample of 172 seventh- and eighth-grade students were instructed in the skills of observation…

Perceptions of Clinical Education Preparedness at a Large Urban US University: Is There a Difference between US-Born and Non-US Born Students?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cohen, Timmerie; Justice, M. Ferell; Dempsey, Melanie C.

2014-01-01

This research compared three clinical preparedness domains, communication ability, social comfort, and clinical confidence, between US-born and non-US born radiation sciences students. The aim of the study was to determine if there were perceived differences in clinical preparedness between them. Student's place of birth was found to be an…

On Food, Farming and Land Management: Towards a Research Agenda to Reconnect Urban and Rural Lives

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dillon, Justin; Rickinson, Mark; Sanders, Dawn; Teamey, Kelly

2005-01-01

Science education has a key role to play in helping people to develop their understanding of the local and global dimensions of food, farming and land management. Based on a review of the literature on what is known about young people's (3-19) views towards and learning about these topics, a research agenda is outlined for consideration by the…

A Report to the President: Analytic Perspectives on the Science and Technology Issues Facing the Nation

DTIC Science & Technology

2001-01-01

Human Participants. National Bioethics Advisory Commission. (Forthcoming.) Research Involving Human Biological Materials: Ethical Issues and Policy...and security • Advised the president’s National Bioethics Advisory Commission on technical, ethical, and legal issues • Developed the data for the...Centers for Disease Control Department of Education Department of Housing and Urban Development NASA National Bioethics Advisory Commission Office of

"WordSift": Supporting Instruction and Learning through Technology in San Francisco. The Senior Urban Education Research Fellowship Series. Volume IV

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hakuta, Kenji

2011-01-01

In developing a tool to help address academic language development, the author and his team began by identifying the challenges of presenting science text to English Language Learners and students who struggle with reading. The goal was to balance the practical and logistical challenges of identifying, teaching, and learning academic and content…

A Comparison of Single-Gender Classes and Traditional, Coeducational Classes on Student Academic Achievement, Discipline Referrals, and Attitudes toward Subjects

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smith, Debra Messenger

2010-01-01

In recent years, there has been a resurgence of interest in single gender education. Emerging science has proven that boys and girls learn differently. This study compared fifth grade single-gender classes to fifth grade traditional, coeducational classes in the same urban middle school. The following were compared: students' academic achievement;…

Advancing alternate tools: why science education needs CRP and CRT

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dodo Seriki, Vanessa

2018-03-01

Ridgeway and Yerrick's paper, Whose banner are we waving?: exploring STEM partnerships for marginalized urban youth, unearthed the tensions that existed between a local community "expert" and a group of students and their facilitator in an afterschool program. Those of us who work with youth who are traditionally marginalized, understand the importance of teaching in culturally relevant ways, but far too often—as Ridgeway and Yerrick shared—community partners have beliefs, motives, and ideologies that are incompatible to the program's mission and goals. Nevertheless, we often enter partnerships assuming that the other party understands the needs of the students or community; understands how in U.S. society White is normative while all others are deficient; and understands how to engage with students in culturally relevant ways. This forum addresses the underlying assumption, described in the Ridgeway and Yerrick article, that educators—despite their background and experiences—are able to teach in culturally relevant ways. Additionally, I assert based on the finding in the article that just as Ladson-Billings and Tate (Teach Coll Rec 97(1):47-68, 1995) asserted, race in the U.S. society, as a scholarly pursuit, was under theorized. The same is true of science education; race in science education is under theorized and the use of culturally relevant pedagogy and critical race theory as a pedagogical model and analytical tool, respectively, in science education is minimal. The increased use of both would impact our understanding of who does science, and how to broaden participation among people of color.

Preparing the Successful Urban Music Educator: The Need for Preservice and In-Service Development

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Anderson, Steven Armon; Denson, Gregory Lamar

2015-01-01

The January 1970 Music Educators Journal's "Special Report: Facing the Music in Urban Education" included the article "Recommendations for Teacher Education Programs." This article contained seven recommendations to prepare successful future urban music educators. As two urban music educators, we examine how "MEJ"…

Exploring Climate Science with WV Educators: A Regional Model for Teacher Professional Development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ruberg, L. F.; Calinger, M.

2014-12-01

The National Research Council Framework for K-12 Science Literacy reports that children reared in rural agricultural communities, who experience regular interactions with plants and animals, develop more sophisticated understanding of ecology and biological systems than do urban and suburban children of the same age. West Virginia (WV) is a rural state. The majority of its residents live in communities of fewer than 2,500 people. Based on the features of the population being served and their unique strengths, this presentation focuses on a regional model for teacher professional development that addresses agricultural and energy vulnerabilities and adaptations to climate change in WV. The professional development model outlined shows how to guide teachers to use a problem-based learning approach to introduce climate data and analysis techniques within a scenario context that is locally meaningful. This strategy engages student interest by focusing on regional and community concerns. Climate science standards are emphasized in the Next Generation Science Standards, but WV has not provided its teachers with appropriate instructional resources to meet those standards. The authors addressed this need by offering a series of climate science education workshops followed by online webinars offered to WV science educators free of charge with funding by the West Virginia Space Grant Consortium. The authors report on findings from this series of professional development workshops conducted in partnership with the West Virginia Science Teachers Association. The goal was to enhance grades 5-12 teaching and learning about climate change through problem-based learning. Prior to offering the climate workshops, all WV science educators were asked to complete a short questionnaire. As Figure 1 shows, over 40% of the teacher respondents reported being confident in teaching climate science content. For comparison post workshops surveys measure teacher confidence in climate science instruction after the professional development sessions. In summary, this report describes how this professional approach can serve as a regional model to address the need for climate science literacy throughout Appalachia.

Moving Towards a New Urban Systems Science

Treesearch

Peter M. Groffman; Mary L. Cadenasso; Jeannine Cavender-Bares; Daniel L. Childers; Nancy B. Grimm; Morgan Grove; Sarah E. Hobbie; Lucy R. Hutyra; G. Darrel Jenerette; Timon McPhearson; Diane E. Pataki; Steward T. A. Pickett; Richard V. Pouyat; Emma Rosi-Marshall; Benjamin L. Ruddell

2016-01-01

Research on urban ecosystems rapidly expanded in the 1990s and is now a central topic in ecosystem science. In this paper, we argue that there are two critical challenges for ecosystem science that are rooted in urban ecosystems: (1) predicting or explaining the assembly and function of novel communities and ecosystems under altered environmental conditions and (2)...

The perception of science teachers on the role of student relationships in the classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mattison, Cheryl Ann

With the increased accountability of educators comes the responsibility of the entire educational community to find ways in which we can help our students succeed in the classroom. In addition, it is important to discover what it takes to keep those students in school Many science teachers enter the profession unprepared to handle the regular classroom routine. Classroom management, grading, lesson planning, setting up labs, and the myriad of other obligations, can leave teachers overwhelmed and sometimes can get in the way of actually helping students be successful. This study investigated how science teachers viewed the importance of developing strong teacher/student relationships to the increase of student success in a science classroom. I attempted to answer 4 major questions: · How do science teachers in a select high school community view the role of interactive relationships in their classrooms and how that might impact their students? · How do science teachers in a select high school community believe they establish successful interactive relationships with their students? · What do science teachers in a select high school community believe are some of the outcomes of those relationships? · What do science teachers suggest to increase the teacher's ability to form good relationships with their students? A qualitative research method was used including observations, interviews and group discussions of 5 high school science teachers in a small urban school.

The Galileoscope project: community-based technology education in Arizona

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pompea, Stephen M.; Fine, Leonard W.; Sparks, Robert T.; Walker, Constance E.; Dugan, Charles L.; Dokter, Erin F. C.

2014-07-01

A program model has been developed and implemented over the last three years to provide a robust optical technologybased science education program to students aged 9-11 years (5th grade), a formative time in the development of a student's interest in science and engineering. We have created well-tested and evaluated teaching kits for the classroom to teach about the basics of image formation and telescopes. In addition we provide professional development to the teachers of these students on principles of optics and on using the teaching kits. The program model is to reach every teacher and every student in a number of mid-sized rural communities across the state of Arizona. The Galileoscope telescope kit is a key part of this program to explore optics and the nature of science. The program grew out of Module 3 of the NSF-Supported Hands-On Optics project (SPIE, OSA, and NOAO) and from the Science Foundation Arizona-supported Hands-On Optics Arizona program. NOAO has conducted this program in Flagstaff, Yuma, Globe, and Safford, Arizona and is being expanded to sites across the entire state of Arizona (295,254 square kilometers). We describe the educational goals, evaluations, and logistical issues connected to the program. In particular, we proposed that this model can be adapted for any rural or urban locations in order to encourage interest in science, astronomy and optics.-

Advancing an Urban Mission: The West Baltimore Pre-K to 16 Urban Education Corridor

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Arrington, Pamela Gray

2006-01-01

Coppin State University is committed to meeting the educational needs of its urban population and improving the quality of life in its urban community. An institutional pioneer in urban education, Coppin State University is the first higher education institution in the state to assume responsibility for the restructuring and administration of a…

The achievement impact of the inclusion model on the standardized test scores of general education students

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Garrett-Rainey, Syrena

The purpose of this study was to compare the achievement of general education students within regular education classes to the achievement of general education students in inclusion/co-teach classes to determine whether there was a significant difference in the achievement between the two groups. The school district's inclusion/co-teach model included ongoing professional development support for teachers and administrators. General education teachers, special education teachers, and teacher assistants collaborated to develop instructional strategies to provide additional remediation to help students to acquire the skills needed to master course content. This quantitative study reviewed the end-of course test (EoCT) scores of Grade 10 physical science and math students within an urban school district. It is not known whether general education students in an inclusive/co-teach science or math course will demonstrate a higher achievement on the EoCT in math or science than students not in an inclusive/co-teach classroom setting. In addition, this study sought to determine if students classified as low socioeconomic status benefited from participating in co-teaching classrooms as evidenced by standardized tests. Inferential statistics were used to determine whether there was a significant difference between the achievements of the treatment group (inclusion/co-teach) and the control group (non-inclusion/co-teach). The findings can be used to provide school districts with optional instructional strategies to implement in the diverse classroom setting in the modern classroom to increase academic performance on state standardized tests.

Science in the city: Urban trees, forests, and people

Treesearch

Kathleen L. Wolf

2016-01-01

The article, intended for professional and manager audiences, is an overview of current research in urban forestry. Topics include tree science, forest risks, forest management and assessment, ecosystem services, and urban socio-ecological systems (including governance and stewardship).

Academic achievement and career choice in science: Perceptions of African American urban high school students

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jones, Sheila Kay

2007-12-01

Low test scores in science and fewer career choices in science among African American high school students than their White counterparts has resulted in lower interest during high school and an underrepresentation of African Americans in science and engineering fields. Reasons for this underachievement are not known. This qualitative study used a grounded theory methodology to examine what influence parental involvement, ethnic identity, and early mentoring had on the academic achievement in science and career choice in science of African American urban high school 10th grade students. Using semi-structured open-ended questions in individual interviews and focus groups, twenty participants responded to questions about African American urban high school student achievement in science and their career choice in science. The median age of participants was 15 years; 85% had passed either high school biology or physical science. The findings of the study revealed influences and interactions of selected factors on African American urban high school achievement in science. Sensing potential emerged as the overarching theme with six subthemes; A Taste of Knowledge, Sounds I Hear, Aromatic Barriers, What Others See, The Touch of Others, and The Sixth Sense. These themes correlate to the natural senses of the human body. A disconnect between what science is, their own individual learning and success, and what their participation in science could mean for them and the future of the larger society. Insight into appropriate intervention strategies to improve African American urban high school achievement in science was gained.

An analysis of four ways of assessing student beliefs about sts topics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Aikenhead, Glen S.

The study investigated the degree of ambiguity harbored by four different response modes used to monitor student beliefs about science-technology-society topics: Likert-type, written paragraph, semistrue tured interview, and empirically developed multiple choice. The study also explored the sources of those beliefs. Grade-12 students in a Canadian urban setting responded, in each of the four modes, to statements from Views on Science-Technology-Society. It was discovered that TV had far more influence on what students believed about science and its social, technological context than did numerous science courses. The challenge to science educators is to use the media effectively in combating naive views about science. Regarding ambiguity in student assessment, the Likert-type responses were the most inaccurate, offering only a guess at student beliefs. Such guesswork calls into question the use of Likert-type standardized tests that claim to assess student views about science. Student paragraph responses contained significant ambiguities in about 50% of the cases. The empirically developed multiple choices, however, reduced the ambiguity to the 20% level. Predictably, the semistructured interview was the least ambiguous of all four response modes, but it required the most time to administer. These findings encourage researchers to develop instruments grounded in the empirical data of student viewpoints, rather than relying solely on instruments structured by the philosophical stances of science educators.

The emergence of pioneering public health education programs in the United States.

PubMed Central

Viseltear, A. J.

1988-01-01

This paper considers the social forces leading to the establishment of pioneering public health education programs in the United States. Schools of Public Health emerged in the United States as the result of a confluence of factors, including the changing nature of higher education, the development of commerce and industry, the rise to prominence of the science of bacteriology, and the urbanization of the nation, all coupled with a pervasive spirit of utility and a desire to be, in a word, useful. Each line leading to the establishment of five public health institutions at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard-M.I.T., Yale, Michigan, and Pennsylvania is explored. PMID:3071923

Smart Mobility Stakeholders - Curating Urban Data & Models

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sperling, Joshua

This presentation provides an overview of the curation of urban data and models through engaging SMART mobility stakeholders. SMART Mobility Urban Science Efforts are helping to expose key data sets, models, and roles for the U.S. Department of Energy in engaging across stakeholders to ensure useful insights. This will help to support other Urban Science and broader SMART initiatives.

Dynamic heterogeneity: a framework to promote ecological integration and hypothesis generation in urban systems

Treesearch

S. T. A. Pickett; M. L. Cadenasso; E. J. Rosi-Marshall; Ken Belt; P. M. Groffman; Morgan Grove; E. G. Irwin; S. S. Kaushal; S. L. LaDeau; C. H. Nilon; C. M. Swan; P. S. Warren

2016-01-01

Urban areas are understood to be extraordinarily spatially heterogeneous. Spatial heterogeneity, and its causes, consequences, and changes, are central to ecological science. The social sciences and urban design and planning professions also include spatial heterogeneity as a key concern. However, urban ecology, as a pursuit that integrates across these disciplines,...

Conceptual change in pre-service science teachers' views on nature of science when learning a unit on the physics of waves

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kattoula, Ehsan Habib

Recent reform efforts in science education have culminated in National Science Education Standards (NSES), which include the nature of science and science inquiry themes across all grade levels. Consideration must be given to pre-service science teachers' nature of science conceptions and their perceived roles in implementing the nature of science in the science classroom. This qualitative study investigates how pre-service science teachers' views about the nature of science develop and change when learning a college physics unit on waves in an urban university. The study uses case study methodology with four pre-service science teachers as individual units of analysis. Data regarding the participants' views about the nature of science were collected before and after the instruction on the physics of waves unit. The research design used 'The Views of Nature of Science/Views of Scientific Inquiry-Physics Questionnaire' followed by structured interviews throughout the wave unit. In addition, the participants responded to daily questions that incorporated nature of science themes and constructed concept maps regarding the physics content and their nature of science understanding. After completing the VNOS/VOSI-PHYS questionnaire the pre-service science teachers' views of the nature of science were found to be mainly naive and transitional before the instruction. At the end of the wave unit instruction, the data indicated that conceptual change occurred in participants' nature of science views, shifting toward informed views. The findings of this study provide evidence that using explicit instruction with specific activities, such as experiments and concept mapping, shifted the pre-service science teachers' views away from naive and toward informed.

Integrated Modelling in CRUCIAL Science Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mahura, Alexander; Nuterman, Roman; Mukhamedzhanova, Elena; Nerobelov, Georgiy; Sedeeva, Margarita; Suhodskiy, Alexander; Mostamandy, Suleiman; Smyshlyaev, Sergey

2017-04-01

The NordForsk CRUCIAL project (2016-2017) "Critical steps in understanding land surface - atmosphere interactions: from improved knowledge to socioeconomic solutions" as a part of the Pan-Eurasian EXperiment (PEEX; https://www.atm.helsinki.fi/peex) programme activities, is looking for a deeper collaboration between Nordic-Russian science communities. In particular, following collaboration between Danish and Russian partners, several topics were selected for joint research and are focused on evaluation of: (1) urbanization processes impact on changes in urban weather and climate on urban-subregional-regional scales and at contribution to assessment studies for population and environment; (2) effects of various feedback mechanisms on aerosol and cloud formation and radiative forcing on urban-regional scales for better predicting extreme weather events and at contribution to early warning systems, (3) environmental contamination from continues emissions and industrial accidents for better assessment and decision making for sustainable social and economic development, and (4) climatology of atmospheric boundary layer in northern latitudes to improve understanding of processes, revising parameterizations, and better weather forecasting. These research topics are realized employing the online integrated Enviro-HIRLAM (Environment - High Resolution Limited Area Model) model within students' research projects: (1) "Online integrated high-resolution modelling of Saint-Petersburg metropolitan area influence on weather and air pollution forecasting"; (2) "Modeling of aerosol impact on regional-urban scales: case study of Saint-Petersburg metropolitan area"; (3) "Regional modeling and GIS evaluation of environmental pollution from Kola Peninsula sources"; and (4) "Climatology of the High-Latitude Planetary Boundary Layer". The students' projects achieved results and planned young scientists research training on online integrated modelling (Jun 2017) will be presented and discussed.

Collaboration between research scientists and educators to prepare new Earth Science teachers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pagnotta, Ashley; Grcevich, J.; Shara, M.; Mac Low, M.; Flores, K.; Nadeau, P. A.; Sessa, J.; Ustunisik, G.; Zirakparvar, N.; Ebel, D.; Harlow, G.; Webster, J. D.; Kinzler, R.; MacDonald, M. B.; Contino, J.; Cooke-Nieves, N.; Howes, E.; Zachowski, M.

2014-01-01

The Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) Program at the American Museum of Natural History is a first-of-its-kind program designed to prepare participants to be world-class Earth Science teachers. The lack of Earth Science teachers in New York State has resulted in fewer students taking the statewide Earth Science Regents Exam, which negatively affects graduation rates and reduces the number of students who pursue related college degrees. The MAT program was designed to address this problem, and is the result of a collaboration between research scientists and educators at the Museum, with faculty comprised of curators and postdoctoral researchers from the Departments of Astrophysics, Earth and Planetary Sciences, and the Division of Paleontology, as well as doctoral-level Education faculty. The full-time, 15-month program combines courses and field work in astrophysics, geology, earth science, and paleontology at the Museum with pedagogical coursework and a teaching residency in local urban classrooms. The MAT program targets high-needs schools with diverse student populations and therefore has the potential to stimulate interest and achievement in a variety of STEM fields among thousands of students from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds. The first cohort of candidates entered the MAT program in June of 2012 and finished in August of 2013. Nineteen new Regents-qualified Earth Science teachers are now in full-time teaching positions at high-needs schools in New York State. We report on the experience of the first cohort as well as the continuation of the program for current and future cohorts of teacher candidates.

Science-policy challenges for biodiversity, public health and urbanization: examples from Belgium

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Keune, H.; Kretsch, C.; De Blust, G.; Gilbert, M.; Flandroy, L.; Van den Berge, K.; Versteirt, V.; Hartig, T.; De Keersmaecker, L.; Eggermont, H.; Brosens, D.; Dessein, J.; Vanwambeke, S.; Prieur-Richard, A. H.; Wittmer, H.; Van Herzele, A.; Linard, C.; Martens, P.; Mathijs, E.; Simoens, I.; Van Damme, P.; Volckaert, F.; Heyman, P.; Bauler, T.

2013-06-01

Internationally, the importance of a coordinated effort to protect both biodiversity and public health is more and more recognized. These issues are often concentrated or particularly challenging in urban areas, and therefore on-going urbanization worldwide raises particular issues both for the conservation of living natural resources and for population health strategies. These challenges include significant difficulties associated with sustainable management of urban ecosystems, urban development planning, social cohesion and public health. An important element of the challenge is the need to interface between different forms of knowledge and different actors from science and policy. We illustrate this with examples from Belgium, showcasing concrete cases of human-nature interaction. To better tackle these challenges, since 2011, actors in science, policy and the broader Belgian society have launched a number of initiatives to deal in a more integrated manner with combined biodiversity and public health challenges in the face of ongoing urbanization. This emerging community of practice in Belgium exemplifies the importance of interfacing at different levels. (1) Bridges must be built between science and the complex biodiversity/ecosystem-human/public health-urbanization phenomena. (2) Bridges between different professional communities and disciplines are urgently needed. (3) Closer collaboration between science and policy, and between science and societal practice is needed. Moreover, within each of these communities closer collaboration between specialized sections is needed.

The Journey Begins: First Year Activities of the MUSI Mathematics/Science Resource Teachers. A Report on the Milwaukee Urban Systemic Initiative.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Huinker, DeAnn; Pearson, Gretchen

The Urban Systemic Initiatives (USI) program is an effort sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that targets large urban school systems with the goal of sustainable implementation of high-quality, standards-based teaching for the purpose of attaining system-wide increases in students' learning of challenging mathematics and science.…

Urban Elementary Teachers' Perspectives on Teaching Science to English Language Learners

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lee, Okhee; Maerten-Rivera, Jaime; Buxton, Cory; Penfield, Randall; Secada, Walter G.

2009-01-01

This descriptive study examined urban elementary school teachers' perceptions of their science content knowledge, science teaching practices, and support for language development of English language learners. Also examined were teachers' perceptions of organizational supports and barriers associated with teaching science to nonmainstream students.…

The Production of Urban Educational Space

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Morgan, John

2012-01-01

It is widely recognised that large urban centres exhibit significant and enduring patterns of educational inequality. This paper explores the social production of urban educational space. In particular, it argues that since these patterns are geographical, it will be useful to revisit the emergence of an "urban crisis" in education and…

Urban Is Floating Face down in the Mainstream: Using Hip-Hop-Based Education Research to Resurrect "The Urban" in Urban Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Irby, Decoteau J.

2015-01-01

Throughout this article, I argue that within the mainstream field of urban education, "the urban" is floating face down, lifeless, and devoid of significant meaning. "City" and "urban" function as taken-for-granted variables that stand in the rightful place of rich explanations, based in theory and evidence, of the…

Integrating Engineering into an Urban Science Classroom

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Meyer, Helen

2017-01-01

This article presents a single case study of an experienced physical science teacher (Janet) integrating engineering practices into her urban science classroom over a two-year time frame. The article traces how Janet's understanding of the role engineering in her teaching expanded beyond engineering as an application of science and mathematics to…

The Iowa K-12 Climate Science Education Initiative: a comprehensive approach to meeting in-service teachers' stated needs for teaching climate literacy with NGSS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stanier, C. O.; Spak, S.; Neal, T. A.; Herder, S.; Malek, A.; Miller, Z.

2017-12-01

The Iowa Board of Education voted unanimously in 2015 to adopt NGSS performance standards. The CGRER - College of Education Iowa K-12 Climate Science Education Initiative was established in 2016 to work directly with Iowa inservice teachers to provide what teachers need most to teach climate literacy and climate science content through investigational learning aligned with NGSS. Here we present teachers' requests for teaching climate with NGSS, and an approach to provide resources for place-based authentic inquiry on climate, developed, tested, and refined in partnership with inservice and preservice teachers. A survey of inservice middle school and high school science teachers was conducted at the 2016 Iowa Council of Teachers of Mathematics/Iowa Academy of Sciences - Iowa Science Teaching Section Fall Conference and online in fall 2016. Participants (n=383) were asked about their prior experience and education, the resources they use and need, their level of comfort in teaching climate science, perceived barriers, and how they address potential controversy. Teachers indicated preference for professional development on climate content and complete curricula packaged with lessons and interactive models aligned to Iowa standards, as well as training on instructional strategies to enhance students' ability to interpret scientific evidence. We identify trends in responses by teaching experience, climate content knowledge and its source, grade level, and urban and rural districts. Less than 20% of respondents reported controversy or negativity in teaching climate to date, and a majority were comfortable teaching climate science and climate change, with equal confidence in teaching climate and other STEM content through investigational activities. We present an approach and materials to meet these stated needs, created and tested in collaboration with Iowa teachers. We combine professional development and modular curricula with bundled standards, concepts, models, data, field activities, and sequences of individual and group investigational and student-driven inquiry prompts on climate science, climate change, and climate impacts. We identify key resource availability needed to teach place-based climate literacy aligned with NGSS as a standalone curriculum and through local impacts.

78 FR 40746 - Urban Indian Education and Research Organization Cooperative Agreement Program; Office of Urban...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-07-08

... Training and Technical Assistance for UIOs, Education, Public Relations, and Marketing of UIOs This section... assistance for urban Indian organizations, and (4) education, public relations and marketing of urban Indian... and Marketing of Urban Indian Organizations A. Applicants should summarize the need to market the...

The nanny in the schoolhouse: the role of femme-Caribbean identity in attaining success in urban science classrooms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grimes, Nicole K.

2013-06-01

A growing body of teacher identity-based research has begun to embrace that the development of self-understanding about being a teacher is critical to learning how to teach. Construction of a professional teacher identity requires much more beyond mere content, skills and a foundational pedagogy. It also includes an intersection of the personal and professional self, which gives way to the emergence of multiple identities in the classroom. An educator's gender, nationality, language and interests among other tenets all permeate the classroom field and coexist alongside the professional role identity. This paper aims to use narrative as a way to discuss how science educators can mediate holding several identities in the classroom in order to create an environment characterized by successful teaching and learning. Drawing from an array of sociocultural theoretical perspectives, complementary constructs of identity by Jonathan Turner (Face to face: toward a sociological theory of interpersonal behavior. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 2002) and Amartya Sen (Identity and violence: the illusion of destiny. W. W. Norton, New York, 2006), George Lakoff's (Metaphors we live by. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1980) work on metonymy, and David Bloome's (2005) theorization of the power of caring relationships, I explore the ways in which my Black female Caribbean identity has transformed the science classroom field and created positive resonance for some of my privileged White students who have Caribbean caretakers at home. To begin, I unpack how Afro-Caribbean immigration to urban centers in the United States continues to produce childcare occupational opportunities in places like New York City. Being a first generation Trinidadian immigrant, my many identities have structured my science teaching praxis and consequently transformed the way my students learn science. A significant part of this paper is a reflexive account of experiences (primarily dialogue) with science students situated both within and outside the science classroom. Conversations with students who were raised through the hired help of Caribbean nannies have revealed that there is a strong resemblance to the way they perceive their caretakers as they do me—their instructor. These conversations serve as a backdrop to illuminate the dynamic nature of identity construction and its relationship to the development of ongoing dialogue. The hope is that this autoethnographic work illustrates the salience of student lifeworlds in affording opportunities for success in the science classroom. Additionally, this research seeks to illustrate how understanding the unconscious `backgrounding' and `foregrounding' of certain identities in the classroom can improve one's praxis in the urban science classroom and possibly increase student success in science. It is also hoped that this story reiterates the importance of using stories for purposes of scholarship, for moving towards better understandings of the social situations we are concerned to investigate as researchers and for better communication of those understandings.

The influence of secondary science teachers' pedagogical content knowledge, educational beliefs and perceptions of the curriculum on implementation and science reform

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bonner, Portia Selene

2001-07-01

Science education reform is one of the focal points of restructuring the educational system in the United States. However, research indicates a slow change in progression towards science literacy among secondary students. One of the factors contributing to slow change is how teachers implement the curriculum in the classroom. Three constructs are believed to be influential in curriculum implementation: educational beliefs, pedagogical knowledge and perception of the curriculum. Earlier research suggests that there is a strong correlation between teachers' educational beliefs and instructional practices. These beliefs can be predictors of preferred strategies employed in the classroom. Secondly, teachers' pedagogical knowledge, that is the ability to apply theory and appropriate strategies associated with implementing and evaluating a curriculum, contributes to implementation. Thirdly, perception or how the curriculum itself is perceived also effects implementation. Each of these constructs has been examined independently, but never the interplay of the three. The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the interplay of teachers' educational beliefs, pedagogical content knowledge and perceptions of a science curriculum with respect to how these influence curriculum implementation. This was accomplished by investigating the emerging themes that evolved from classroom observations, transcripts from interview and supplementary data. Five high school biology teachers in an urban school system were observed for ten months for correspondence of teaching strategies to the curriculum. Teachers were interviewed formally and informally about their perceptions of science teaching, learning and the curriculum. Supplementary material such as lesson plans, course syllabus and notes from classroom observations were collected and analyzed. Data were transcribed and analyzed for recurring themes using a thematic matrix. A theoretical model was developed from the emerging themes and sub-themes that attempts to explain how teachers begin with an intended curriculum but digress to the actual curriculum. The results of this study were consistent with previous research on teachers' beliefs and pedagogy but also revealed a new model to explain the interaction of the three constructs. Each instructor held individual beliefs about science, science teaching and pedagogy. However, there was some commonality with teachers' beliefs, pedagogy and perceptions that impacted the implementation of the curriculum. It is the interplay of teachers' educational beliefs, pedagogical content knowledge and perceptions of the curriculum that determines what is taught and instructional strategies used to teach a concept.

Toward Achieving the Goals: Projects of the Partners in the 1991 Urban Education Summit.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Council of the Great City Schools, Washington, DC.

This publication highlights the current activities of participants in the Council of the Great City Schools (CGCS) in their support of national urban education goals. In the fall of 1990, the National Urban Education Task Force, which was appointed by the CGCS, presented sample strategies for achieving the national urban education goals to…

Urban Middle School Students' Reflections on Authentic Science Inquiry

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rivera Maulucci, María S.; Brown, Bryan A.; Grey, Salina T.; Sullivan, Shayna

2014-01-01

This study explores the experiences of six urban middle school students in an authentic science inquiry program. Drawing on data including teaching journal entries, student work folders, and semi-structured focus group interviews of six participants, the findings explore six dimensions of authentic science inquiry, an approach to science inquiry…

First Year Site Visits to Milwaukee Urban Systemic Initiative Schools. A Report on the Milwaukee Public Schools Milwaukee Urban Systemic Initiative.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Huinker, DeAnn; Pearson, Gretchen; Posnanski, Tracy; Coan, Cheryl; Porter, Corrie

The Urban Systemic Initiatives (USI) program is an effort sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that targets large urban school systems with the goal of sustainable implementation of high-quality, standards-based teaching for the purpose of attaining system-wide increases in students' learning of challenging mathematics and science.…

Survey Results for First Wave Schools of the Milwaukee Urban Systemic Initiative. Report on Milwaukee Public Schools Milwaukee Urban Systemic Initiative.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Huinker, DeAnn; Coan, Cheryl; Mueller, Leah

The Urban Systemic Initiatives (USI) program is an effort sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that targets large urban school systems with the goal of sustainable implementation of high-quality, standards-based teaching for the purpose of attaining system-wide increases in students' learning of challenging mathematics and science.…

Urban Pre-Service K-6 Teachers' Conceptions of Citizenship and Civic Education: Weighing the Risks and Rewards

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Marri, Anand R.; Michael-Luna, Sara; Cormier, Maria Scott; Keegan, Patrick

2014-01-01

To effectively help urban pre-service teachers to provide civic education opportunities in their future classrooms, teacher educators should know how urban pre-service teachers themselves conceptualize citizenship and civic engagement. Through the research question--how do urban K-6 pre-service teachers currently enrolled in an urban education…

The Politics of Urban Education in the United States: The 1991 Yearbook of the Politics of Education Association (PEA).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cibulka, James G., Ed.; And Others

1991-01-01

This special issue journal on the politics of urban education contains the following articles: (1) "The Politics of Urban Education as a Field of Study: An Interpretive Analysis" (K. K. Wong); (2) "Urban Education as a Field of Study: Problems of Knowledge and Power" (J. G. Cibulka); (3) "Knowledge and Power in Research into the Politics of Urban…

The Effect of a Collaborative Mentoring Program on Beginning Science Teachers' Inquiry-based Teaching Practice

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nam, Jeonghee; Seung, Eulsun; Go, MunSuk

2013-03-01

This study investigated how a collaborative mentoring program influenced beginning science teachers' inquiry-based teaching and their reflection on practice. The one-year program consisted of five one-on-one mentoring meetings, weekly science education seminars, weekly mentoring group discussions, and self-evaluation activities. The participants were three beginning science teachers and three mentors at the middle school level (7-9th grades) in an urban area of South Korea. For each beginning teacher, five lessons were evaluated in terms of lesson design/implementation, procedural knowledge, and classroom culture by using the Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol. Five aspects of the beginning teachers' reflections were identified. This study showed that a collaborative mentoring program focusing on inquiry-based science teaching encouraged the beginning teachers to reflect on their own perceptions and teaching practice in terms of inquiry-based science teaching, which led to changes in their teaching practice. This study also highlighted the importance of collaborative interactions between the mentors and the beginning teachers during the mentoring process.

Envisioning a career in science, technology, engineering and mathematics: some challenges and possibilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sharkawy, Azza

2015-09-01

In How High School Students Envision Their STEM Career Pathways, Lin Zhang and Michael Barnett attempt to shed light on the problem of underrepresented students (e.g., Aboriginals, Hispanics, African Americans, urban, females) in STEM higher education and related careers by exploring, in general terms, five high school students' career visions and the experiences that influenced their career visions. In this paper, I attempt to extend the authors' discussions on the underrepresentation of minority students in STEM higher education by highlighting some of the factors that begin to influence youths' career decisions long before they reach the high school level and are required to make specific career choices. I also draw on Glen Aikenhead's Sci Edu, 27, 1-52 (1996) notion of border crossing and research by Victoria Costa Sci Edu, 79, 313-333 (on the significance of the relationship between students' cultural worlds and the cultural world of school science.

Investigating engagement, thinking, and learning among culturally diverse, urban sixth graders experiencing an inquiry-based science curriculum, contextualized in the local environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kelley, Sybil Schantz

This mixed-methods study combined pragmatism, sociocultural perspectives, and systems thinking concepts to investigate students' engagement, thinking, and learning in science in an urban, K-8 arts, science, and technology magnet school. A grant-funded school-university partnership supported the implementation of an inquiry-based science curriculum, contextualized in the local environment through field experiences. The researcher worked as co-teacher of 3 sixth-grade science classes and was deeply involved in the daily routines of the school. The purposes of the study were to build a deeper understanding of the complex interactions that take place in an urban science classroom, including challenges related to implementing culturally-relevant instruction; and to offer insight into the role educational systems play in supporting teaching and learning. The central hypothesis was that connecting learning to meaningful experiences in the local environment can provide culturally accessible points of engagement from which to build science learning. Descriptive measures provided an assessment of students' engagement in science activities, as well as their levels of thinking and learning throughout the school year. Combined with analyses of students' work files and focus group responses, these findings provided strong evidence of engagement attributable to the inquiry-based curriculum. In some instances, degree of engagement was found to be affected by student "reluctance" and "resistance," terms defined but needing further examination. A confounding result showed marked increases in thinking levels coupled with stasis or decrease in learning. Congruent with past studies, data indicated the presence of tension between the diverse cultures of students and the mainstream cultures of school and science. Findings were synthesized with existing literature to generate the study's principal product, a grounded theory model representing the complex, interacting factors involved in teaching and learning. The model shows that to support learning and to overcome cultural tensions, there must be alignment among three main forces or "causal factors": students, teaching, and school climate. Conclusions emphasize system-level changes to support science learning, including individualized support for students in the form of differentiated instruction; focus on excellence in teaching, particularly through career-spanning professional support for teachers; and attention to identifying key leverage points for implementing effective change.

Development of a Distance Education Program by a Land-Grant University Augments the 2-Year to 4-Year STEM Pipeline and Increases Diversity in STEM

PubMed Central

Drew, Jennifer C.; Oli, Monika W.; Rice, Kelly C.; Ardissone, Alexandria N.; Galindo-Gonzalez, Sebastian; Sacasa, Pablo R.; Belmont, Heather J.; Wysocki, Allen F.; Rieger, Mark; Triplett, Eric W.

2015-01-01

Although initial interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) is high, recruitment and retention remains a challenge, and some populations are disproportionately underrepresented in STEM fields. To address these challenges, the Microbiology and Cell Science Department in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences at the University of Florida has developed an innovative 2+2 degree program. Typical 2+2 programs begin with a student earning an associate’s degree at a local community college and then transferring to a 4-year institution to complete a bachelor’s degree. However, many universities in the United States, particularly land-grant universities, are located in rural regions that are distantly located from their respective states’ highly populated urban centers. This geographical and cultural distance could be an impediment to recruiting otherwise highly qualified and diverse students. Here, a new model of a 2+2 program is described that uses distance education as the vehicle to bring a research-intensive university’s life sciences curriculum to students rather than the oft-tried model of a university attempting to recruit underrepresented minority students to its location. In this paradigm, community college graduates transfer into the Microbiology and Cell Science program as distance education students to complete their Bachelor of Science degree. The distance education students’ experiences are similar to the on-campus students’ experiences in that both groups of students take the same department courses taught by the same instructors, take required laboratory courses in a face-to-face format, take only proctored exams, and have the same availability to instructors. Data suggests that a hybrid online transfer program may be a viable approach to increasing STEM participation (as defined by enrollment) and diversity. This approach is particularly compelling as the distance education cohort has comparable grade point averages and retention rates compared to the corresponding on-campus transfer cohort. PMID:25875606

Development of a distance education program by a Land-Grant University augments the 2-year to 4-year STEM pipeline and increases diversity in STEM.

PubMed

Drew, Jennifer C; Oli, Monika W; Rice, Kelly C; Ardissone, Alexandria N; Galindo-Gonzalez, Sebastian; Sacasa, Pablo R; Belmont, Heather J; Wysocki, Allen F; Rieger, Mark; Triplett, Eric W

2015-01-01

Although initial interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) is high, recruitment and retention remains a challenge, and some populations are disproportionately underrepresented in STEM fields. To address these challenges, the Microbiology and Cell Science Department in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences at the University of Florida has developed an innovative 2+2 degree program. Typical 2+2 programs begin with a student earning an associate's degree at a local community college and then transferring to a 4-year institution to complete a bachelor's degree. However, many universities in the United States, particularly land-grant universities, are located in rural regions that are distantly located from their respective states' highly populated urban centers. This geographical and cultural distance could be an impediment to recruiting otherwise highly qualified and diverse students. Here, a new model of a 2+2 program is described that uses distance education as the vehicle to bring a research-intensive university's life sciences curriculum to students rather than the oft-tried model of a university attempting to recruit underrepresented minority students to its location. In this paradigm, community college graduates transfer into the Microbiology and Cell Science program as distance education students to complete their Bachelor of Science degree. The distance education students' experiences are similar to the on-campus students' experiences in that both groups of students take the same department courses taught by the same instructors, take required laboratory courses in a face-to-face format, take only proctored exams, and have the same availability to instructors. Data suggests that a hybrid online transfer program may be a viable approach to increasing STEM participation (as defined by enrollment) and diversity. This approach is particularly compelling as the distance education cohort has comparable grade point averages and retention rates compared to the corresponding on-campus transfer cohort.

Unique collaboration between research scientists and educators to prepare new Earth Science teachers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pagnotta, Ashley; Grcevich, J.; Shara, M.; Mac Low, M.; Lepine, S.; Nadeau, P.; Flores, K.; Sessa, J.; Zirakparvar, N.; Ustunisik, G.; Kinzler, R.; Macdonald, M.; Contino, J.; Cooke-Nieves, N.; Zachowski, M.

2013-01-01

Abstract: The Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) Program at the American Museum of Natural History is a first-of-its-kind program designed to prepare participants to be world-class Earth Science teachers. The dearth of Earth Science teachers in New York State has resulted in fewer students taking the statewide Earth Science Regents Exam, which negatively affects graduation rates and reduces the number of students who pursue related college degrees. The MAT program was designed to address this problem, and is the result of a collaboration between research scientists and educators at the Museum, with faculty comprised of curators and postdoctoral researchers from the Departments of Astrophysics, Earth and Planetary Sciences, and the Division of Paleontology, as well as doctoral-level Education faculty. The full-time, 15-month program combines courses and field work in astrophysics, geology, earth science, and paleontology at the Museum with pedagogical coursework and real-world teaching experience in local urban classrooms. The program is part of New York State’s Race to the Top initiative and particularly targets high-needs schools with diverse student populations. Because of this, the MAT program has the potential to stimulate interest and achievement in a variety of STEM fields among thousands of students from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds. The first cohort of teacher candidates entered the MAT program in June of 2012. They represent diverse scientific expertise levels, geographic backgrounds, and career stages. We report on the first six months of this pilot program as well as the future plans and opportunities for prospective teacher candidates.

Community perception regarding rabies prevention and stray dog control in urban slums in India.

PubMed

Herbert, Mrudu; Riyaz Basha, S; Thangaraj, Selvi

2012-12-01

The lack of community awareness about rabies control is a major issue that thwarts efforts to prevent human deaths caused by rabies. The objectives of this study were (1) to assess community knowledge and attitudes about rabies, rabies prevention and stray dog control in an urban slum community and (2) to determine the factors that influence rabies awareness in urban slums. Using a systematic random sampling strategy, 185 participants were selected from 8 urban slums. The data were collected by direct interview using a pre-tested, structured questionnaire. In the study population, 74.1% of the participants had heard about rabies, and 54.1% knew that rabies is a fatal disease. Only 33.5% of the interviewees felt that people in the community had a role to play in controlling the stray dog population. Gender, age and educational status were significantly associated with rabies awareness. Our study indicates that there are gaps in the knowledge and attitudes of individuals living in urban slums regarding rabies prevention and control. Efforts to promote awareness should be targeted at men, older people and uneducated individuals. Copyright © 2012 King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The effectiveness of student team-achievement division (STAD) for teaching high school chemistry in the United Arab Emirates

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Balfakih, Nagib M. A.

2003-05-01

Education in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) faces major problems which may hinder its future development. These include low achievement in science and a negative attitude toward science subjects, which have resulted in a high number of student dropouts from the science track in high school. It is believed among UAE educators that the main reason is the way science that has been taught in its schools. A solution to this problem depends on finding effective teaching methods, which maintain student achievement, improve students' attitude and provide opportunities to develop essential scientific skills. The effectiveness of Student Team-Achievement Division (STAD) for teaching science to high school classes in the UAE was investigated. The sample was selected randomly. A representative group of UAE high school students was chosen from the northern province, which includes urban areas, and from the eastern province, which includes rural areas. The study involved sixteen tenth grade classes. During the second semester of the academic year 1998/1999, three units in the chemistry curriculum were covered. This study was designed to investigate the effectiveness of STAD in teaching high school chemistry in the UAE and to find out which groups, gender, area, and ability benefitted most.

Curricular Issues in Urban High School Physical Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schmidlein, Robert; Vickers, Brad; Chepyator-Thomson, Rose

2014-01-01

Urban physical education curriculum articles are sparsely published in major educational journals (Chepyator-Thomson et al., 2008; Culp, 2005). This leaves urban physical educators the daunting task to modify and prepare curriculum based on formal class training and educational workshops and to interpret journal articles to be applied to the urban…

Equity, the Arts, and Urban Education: A Review

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kraehe, Amelia M.; Acuff, Joni B.; Travis, Sarah

2016-01-01

This review examines empirical studies of educational equity in and through the arts with broad implications for urban education. It extends the literature by (a) describing the interrelated spaces of urban education and the arts, (b) integrating knowledge of arts education across formal and informal learning environments, and (c) examining the…

Troubled Waters: where Multiple Streams of Inequality Converge in the Math and Science Experiences of Nonprivileged Girls

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Parrott, Laurel; Spatig, Linda; Kusimo, Patricia S.; Carter, Carolyn C.; Keyes, Marian

Water is often hardest to navigate at the confluence of individual streams. As they experience math and science, nonprivileged girls maneuver through roiling waters where the streams of gender, ethnicity, poverty, place, and teaching practices converge. Just as waters of separate streams blend, these issues - too often considered separate factors - become blended and difficult to isolate, and the resulting turbulence produces a bumpy ride. We draw on 3 years of qualitative data collected as part of an intervention program to explore the math and science experiences and perceptions of a group of ethnically diverse, low socioeconomic status rural and urban adolescent Appalachian girls. After describing program and community contexts, we explore "opportunity to leant" issues - specifically, expectations, access to content, and support networks - and examine their schooling experiences against visions of science and math reform and pressures for accountability. Data are discussed within a framework of critical educational theory.

Voices of successful science teachers in an urban diverse single gender girls' school

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Malhan, Jyoti

This research study was conducted as a qualitative case study of four successful science teachers of female students in a diverse, title 1, urban, public girls' school. The study was designed to hear the 'muted' voices of successful science teachers concerning their beliefs and practices when they effectively provide learning opportunities for female students of color in their classrooms. Ethic of Care, equity pedagogy and culturally responsive pedagogy, created the theoretical framework for interpretation of the powerful narratives and storytelling that influenced this group of successful teachers. Data were collected by conducting in-depth, semi-structured interviews. Constant comparative method and narrative analysis were used to code and categorize the data. Analysis was conducted after each interview to discover emergent themes. Teachers conducted member checks throughout the process. The findings from the study yielded the following: (1) teachers had a passion for science and incorporated ongoing scientific developments and real-life examples and applications in their teaching, (2) teachers adopted a caring, concerned, and student-centered approach to teaching, (3) teachers acknowledged certain benefits to a single-sex girls education which included fewer distractions, increased confidence and comfort level of students, (5) teachers built relationships with students that encouraged students to engage with rigorous course content and meet higher expectations for performance. Themes that emerged included: care, culturally responsive pedagogy and culturally relevant curriculum.

A meta-analysis of the impacts of internal migration on child health outcomes in China.

PubMed

Sun, Xiaoyue; Chen, Mengtong; Chan, Ko Ling

2016-01-22

According to China's 2010 population census, 38.81 million children migrated from rural to urban areas in Mainland China, a phenomenon that has attracted much scholarly attention. Due to the lack of quantitative synthesis of migrant children's developmental outcomes, we undertook a meta-analysis to compare their developmental outcomes with those of their urban counterparts. We searched Applied Social Sciences Index and Abstracts (ASSIA), Australian Education Index, British Education Index, ERIC, ProQuest Education Journals, PsycINFO, Social Services Abstracts, Family & Society Studies Worldwide, Medline, Women's Studies International databases and the Chinese CNKI database to identify relevant studies. Studies reporting physical and mental health outcomes of migrant children as well as potential protective and risk factors of child developmental outcomes were included. We assessed study quality using a quality assessment checklist. We selected 25 studies from a total of 1592. Our results reveal that migrant children in public schools present significantly greater mental health problems and lower well-being than their urban counterparts, while migrant children in migrant schools do not present significantly different outcomes. In addition, migrant children were found to be more likely to be exposed to physical health risks due to limited utilization of health services. The disadvantageous health outcomes of migrant children were found to be related to a series of individual and social factors, including academic performance, social relationships, and discrimination. Migrant children are disadvantaged by the sociocultural circumstances in urban areas. Government should target them and provide appropriate support in order to improve their developmental status, which will have a positive impact on the stability and development of society.

Aula Verde: art as experience in community-based environmental education.

PubMed

Abarca, Marco A

2010-01-01

After winning a class-action lawsuit against unconstitutional prison conditions in Puerto Rico, Marco Abarca managed to direct part of the fine monies accumulated throughout years of litigation toward an investment that would improve the living conditions in one of the largest and poorest housing projects in Puerto Rico. With the participation of parolees and probationers, he began to transform a mosquito-infested badland into a natural haven. Then, with the help of science educators, the group designed a workshop for elementary school children on urban ecology. As the participants organized, what developed was a community-based, self-employed enterprise known as Aula Verde.

Profile of an Effective Urban Music Educator

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Baker, Vicki D.

2012-01-01

The purpose of this study was to develop a profile of an effective urban music educator in an effort to provide strategies for university teacher training programs to prepare students to teach in urban schools. The study examined urban music teachers' (N = 158) educational background, effective and ineffective characteristics, perceived…

Urban Literacies: Critical Perspectives on Language, Learning, and Community. Language & Literacy Series

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kinloch, Valerie, Ed.

2011-01-01

Urban Literacies showcases cutting-edge perspectives on urban education and language and literacy by respected junior and senior scholars, researchers, and teacher educators. The authors explore--through various theoretical orientations and diverse methodologies--meanings of urban education in the lives of students and their families across three…

The SERC K12 Educators Portal to Teaching Activities and Pedagogic Approaches

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Larsen, K.; Kirk, K. B.; Manduca, C. A.; Ledley, T. S.; Schmitt, L.

2013-12-01

The Science Education Resource Center (SERC) has created a portal to information for K12 educators to provide high-quality grade level appropriate materials from a wide variety of projects and topics. These materials were compiled across the SERC site, showcasing materials that were created for, or easily adaptable to, K12 classrooms. This resource will help support implementation of Next Generation Science Standards by assisting educators in finding innovative resources to address areas of instruction that are conceptually different than previous national and state science standards. Specifically, the K12 portal assists educators in learning about approaches that address the cross-cutting nature of science concepts, increasing students quantitative reasoning and numeracy skills, incorporating technology such as GIS in the classroom, and by assisting educators of all levels of K12 instruction in using relevant and meaningful ways to teach science concepts. The K12 portal supports educators by providing access to hundreds of teaching activities covering a wide array of science topics and grade levels many of which have been rigorously reviewed for pedagogic quality and scientific accuracy. The portal also provides access to web pages that enhance teaching practices that help increase student's system thinking skills, make lectures interactive, assist instructors in conducting safe and effective indoor and outdoor labs, providing support for teaching energy and climate literacy principles, assisting educators in addressing controversial content, provide guidance in engaging students affective domain, and provides a collection of tools for making teaching relevant in 21st century classrooms including using GIS, Google Earth, videos, visualizations and simulations to model and describe scientific concepts. The portal also provides access to material for specific content and audiences by (1) Supporting AGIs 'Map your World' week to specifically highlight teaching activities and approaches that use maps as the basis of instruction for a wide range of topics commonly taught in K12 science courses such as natural hazards, urban development, plate tectonics, climate change, ocean science, and water resources; and (2) Providing easy access to a vast collection of materials specifically for teachers of AP and IB classes including collections of teaching activities for all science disciplines as well as pedagogic approaches that are appropriate for the lab-intensive nature of these classes. The contents of the K12 portal are drawn from a number of projects and collaborations, including CLEAN, Earth Exploration Toolbook, Minnesota Science Teachers Education Project, Pedagogy in Action, EarthLabs, NAGT and On the Cutting Edge. Teachers can add their own materials to the site by sharing lessons plans, activities, and labs. K12 educators of all levels will find a wide variety of resources to spark the curiosity and interest of students. Explore the SERC K12 Educators Portal at: http://serc.carleton.edu/k12/index.html

Urban Community Development and Private Education Dilemma: Based on a Field Study of a City in East China

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Qian, Li; Anlei, Jing

2014-01-01

Urbanization is an issue of universal concern today distinctly affecting the supply, content, and orientation of education. Based on a field study in a city in East China, the article argues that rural-urban migration in the process of urbanization created private sectors in education enterprises that were in sync with the urban community…

NREL Launches Sustainable Mobility Initiative, Joins CDOT Partnership |

Science.gov Websites

analysis, and vehicles and fuels research with vehicle automation, behavioral science, and urban science to patterns and the urban environment. "CDOT is a boots-on-the-ground agency," said Alex Schroeder control to mobility choices. Urban Testbeds and Transportation as a Service The escalating pressures of a

Improving Student Achievement in Math and Science

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sullivan, Nancy G.; Hamsa, Irene Schulz; Heath, Panagiota; Perry, Robert; White, Stacy J.

1998-01-01

As the new millennium approaches, a long anticipated reckoning for the education system of the United States is forthcoming, Years of school reform initiatives have not yielded the anticipated results. A particularly perplexing problem involves the lack of significant improvement of student achievement in math and science. Three "Partnership" projects represent collaborative efforts between Xavier University (XU) of Louisiana, Southern University of New Orleans (SUNO), Mississippi Valley State University (MVSU), and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Stennis Space Center (SSC), to enhance student achievement in math and science. These "Partnerships" are focused on students and teachers in federally designated rural and urban empowerment zones and enterprise communities. The major goals of the "Partnerships" include: (1) The identification and dissemination of key indices of success that account for high performance in math and science; (2) The education of pre-service and in-service secondary teachers in knowledge, skills, and competencies that enhance the instruction of high school math and science; (3) The development of faculty to enhance the quality of math and science courses in institutions of higher education; and (4) The incorporation of technology-based instruction in institutions of higher education. These goals will be achieved by the accomplishment of the following objectives: (1) Delineate significant ?best practices? that are responsible for enhancing student outcomes in math and science; (2) Recruit and retain pre-service teachers with undergraduate degrees in Biology, Math, Chemistry, or Physics in a graduate program, culminating with a Master of Arts in Curriculum and Instruction; (3) Provide faculty workshops and opportunities for travel to professional meetings for dissemination of NASA resources information; (4) Implement methodologies and assessment procedures utilizing performance-based applications of higher order thinking via the incorporation of Global Learning Observations To Benefit the Environment (GLOBE), Mission to Planet Earth and the use of Geographic Imaging Systems into the K-12th grade curriculum.

Synergetic Use of Crowdsourcing for Environmental Science Research, Applications and Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nair, U. S.; Thau, D.

2015-12-01

Environmental science research and applications often utilize information that is not readily available or routinely collected by government agencies. Whereas, the quality and quantity of environmental monitoring data is continually improving (e. g., spectral and spatial resolution of satellite imagery) contextual information needed to effectively utilize the data is sparse. Examples of such contextual information include ground truth data for land cover classification, presence/absence of species, prevalence of mosquito breeding sites and characteristics of urban land cover. Often, there are no agencies tasked with routine collection of such contextual information, which could be effectively collected through crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing of such information, that is useful for environmental science research and applications, also provide opportunities for experiential learning at all levels of education. Appropriately designed crowdsourcing activity can be transform students from passive recipients of information to generators of knowledge. Multiple examples of synergistic use of crowdsourcing, developed by the Public Environmental Education and Research Apps (PEERA) group, at the University of Alabama in Huntsville will be presented. One example is crowdsourcing of land use and land cover (LULC) data using Open Data Kit (ODK) and associated analysis of satellite imagery using Google Earth Engine (GEE). Implementation of this activity as inquiry based learning exercise, for both middle school and for pre-service teachers will be discussed. Another example will detail the synergy between crowdsourcing for biodiversity mapping in southern India and environmental education. Other crowdsourcing activities that offer potential for synergy between research and public education will also be discussed.

Research on application of intelligent computation based LUCC model in urbanization process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Zemin

2007-06-01

Global change study is an interdisciplinary and comprehensive research activity with international cooperation, arising in 1980s, with the largest scopes. The interaction between land use and cover change, as a research field with the crossing of natural science and social science, has become one of core subjects of global change study as well as the front edge and hot point of it. It is necessary to develop research on land use and cover change in urbanization process and build an analog model of urbanization to carry out description, simulation and analysis on dynamic behaviors in urban development change as well as to understand basic characteristics and rules of urbanization process. This has positive practical and theoretical significance for formulating urban and regional sustainable development strategy. The effect of urbanization on land use and cover change is mainly embodied in the change of quantity structure and space structure of urban space, and LUCC model in urbanization process has been an important research subject of urban geography and urban planning. In this paper, based upon previous research achievements, the writer systematically analyzes the research on land use/cover change in urbanization process with the theories of complexity science research and intelligent computation; builds a model for simulating and forecasting dynamic evolution of urban land use and cover change, on the basis of cellular automation model of complexity science research method and multi-agent theory; expands Markov model, traditional CA model and Agent model, introduces complexity science research theory and intelligent computation theory into LUCC research model to build intelligent computation-based LUCC model for analog research on land use and cover change in urbanization research, and performs case research. The concrete contents are as follows: 1. Complexity of LUCC research in urbanization process. Analyze urbanization process in combination with the contents of complexity science research and the conception of complexity feature to reveal the complexity features of LUCC research in urbanization process. Urban space system is a complex economic and cultural phenomenon as well as a social process, is the comprehensive characterization of urban society, economy and culture, and is a complex space system formed by society, economy and nature. It has dissipative structure characteristics, such as opening, dynamics, self-organization, non-balance etc. Traditional model cannot simulate these social, economic and natural driving forces of LUCC including main feedback relation from LUCC to driving force. 2. Establishment of Markov extended model of LUCC analog research in urbanization process. Firstly, use traditional LUCC research model to compute change speed of regional land use through calculating dynamic degree, exploitation degree and consumption degree of land use; use the theory of fuzzy set to rewrite the traditional Markov model, establish structure transfer matrix of land use, forecast and analyze dynamic change and development trend of land use, and present noticeable problems and corresponding measures in urbanization process according to research results. 3. Application of intelligent computation research and complexity science research method in LUCC analog model in urbanization process. On the basis of detailed elaboration of the theory and the model of LUCC research in urbanization process, analyze the problems of existing model used in LUCC research (namely, difficult to resolve many complexity phenomena in complex urban space system), discuss possible structure realization forms of LUCC analog research in combination with the theories of intelligent computation and complexity science research. Perform application analysis on BP artificial neural network and genetic algorithms of intelligent computation and CA model and MAS technology of complexity science research, discuss their theoretical origins and their own characteristics in detail, elaborate the feasibility of them in LUCC analog research, and bring forward improvement methods and measures on existing problems of this kind of model. 4. Establishment of LUCC analog model in urbanization process based on theories of intelligent computation and complexity science. Based on the research on abovementioned BP artificial neural network, genetic algorithms, CA model and multi-agent technology, put forward improvement methods and application assumption towards their expansion on geography, build LUCC analog model in urbanization process based on CA model and Agent model, realize the combination of learning mechanism of BP artificial neural network and fuzzy logic reasoning, express the regulation with explicit formula, and amend the initial regulation through self study; optimize network structure of LUCC analog model and methods and procedures of model parameters with genetic algorithms. In this paper, I introduce research theory and methods of complexity science into LUCC analog research and presents LUCC analog model based upon CA model and MAS theory. Meanwhile, I carry out corresponding expansion on traditional Markov model and introduce the theory of fuzzy set into data screening and parameter amendment of improved model to improve the accuracy and feasibility of Markov model in the research on land use/cover change.

Psychiatric disorders and urbanization in Germany

PubMed Central

Dekker, Jack; Peen, Jaap; Koelen, Jurrijn; Smit, Filip; Schoevers, Robert

2008-01-01

Background Epidemiological studies over the last decade have supplied growing evidence of an association between urbanization and the prevalence of psychiatric disorders. Our aim was to examine the link between levels of urbanization and 12-month prevalence rates of psychiatric disorders in a nationwide German population study, controlling for other known risk factors such as gender, social class, marital status and the interaction variables of these factors with urbanization. Methods The Munich Composite International Diagnostic Interview (M-CIDI) was used to assess the prevalence of mental disorders (DSM-IV) in a representative sample of the German population (N = 4181, age: 18–65). The sample contains five levels of urbanization based on residence location. The epidemiological study was commissioned by the German Ministry of Research, Education and Science (BMBF) and approved by the relevant Institutional Review Board and ethics committee. Written informed consent was obtained for both surveys (core survey and Mental Health Supplement). Subjects did not get any financial compensation for their study participation. Results Higher levels of urbanization were linked to higher 12-month prevalence rates for almost all major psychiatric disorders (with the exception of substance abuse and psychotic disorders). The weighted prevalence percentages were highest in the most urbanized category. Alongside urbanization, female gender, lower social class and being unmarried were generally found to be associated with higher levels of psychopathology. The impact of urbanization on mental health was about equal (for almost all major psychiatric disorders) in young people and elderly people, men and women, and in married and single people. Only people from a low social class in the most urbanized settings had more somatoform disorders, and unmarried people in the most urbanized settings had more anxiety disorders. Conclusion Psychiatric disorders are more prevalent among the inhabitants of more urbanized areas. probably because of environmental stressors. PMID:18201380

Creating Hybrid Spaces for Engaging School Science among Urban Middle School Girls

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barton, Angela Calabrese; Tan, Edna; Rivet, Ann

2008-01-01

The middle grades are a crucial time for girls in making decisions about how or if they want to follow science trajectories. In this article, the authors report on how urban middle school girls enact meaningful strategies of engagement in science class in their efforts to merge their social worlds with the worlds of school science and on the…

Recruiting and Retaining Teachers in Urban Schools: Implications for Policy and the Law.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jones, Deneese L.; Sandidge, Rosetta F.

1997-01-01

Addresses teacher supply/demand demographics in urban schools, as well as the legal and policy concerns typically faced by educational leaders responsible for staffing urban schools. Discusses basic principles educational leaders in urban schools must master to comply with the dictates of the law and sound educational policy. (GR)

The Urban Primary School. Education in an Urbanised Society

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Maguire, Meg; Wooldridge, Tim; Pratt-Adams, Simon

2006-01-01

This book offers an in-depth understanding of the unique challenges and contributions of urban primary schools. The authors set urban education in the wider social context of structural disadvantage, poverty, oppression and exclusion, and reassert some critical urban educational concerns. Recognizing that practice needs to be informed by theory,…

Education and Intergenerational Income Mobility in Urban China

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Congbin, Guo; Weifang, Min

2008-01-01

This study examines the relationship between education and intergenerational income mobility in urban China based on the data of "Chinese Urban Household Education and Employment Survey" (CHUHEES)--2004 by Institute of Economics of Education of Peking University. It analyzes the characteristics of the intergenerational income mobility of…

Understanding adolescent student perceptions of science education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ebert, Ellen Kress

This study used the Relevance of Science Education (ROSE) survey (Sjoberg & Schreiner, 2004) to examine topics of interest and perspectives of secondary science students in a large school district in the southwestern U.S. A situated learning perspective was used to frame the project. The research questions of this study focused on (a) perceptions students have about themselves and their science classroom and how these beliefs may influence their participation in the community of practice of science; (b) consideration of how a future science classroom where the curriculum is framed by the Next Generation Science Standards might foster students' beliefs and perceptions about science education and their legitimate peripheral participation in the community of practice of science; and (c) reflecting on their school science interests and perspectives, what can be inferred about students' identities as future scientists or STEM field professionals? Data were collected from 515 second year science students during a 4-week period in May of 2012 using a Web-based survey. Data were disaggregated by gender and ethnicity and analyzed descriptively and by statistical comparison between groups. Findings for Research Question 1 indicated that boys and girls showed statistically significant differences in scientific topics of interest. There were no statistical differences between ethnic groups although. For Research Question 2, it was determined that participants reported an increase in their interest when they deemed the context of the content to be personally relevant. Results for Research Question 3 showed that participants do not see themselves as youthful scientists or as becoming scientists. While participants value the importance of science in their lives and think all students should take science, they do not aspire to careers in science. Based on this study, a need for potential future work has been identified in three areas: (a) exploration of the perspectives and interests of non-mainstream students and urban students whose representation in this study was limited; (b) investigation of topics where students expressed low interests topics; and (c) development and design of authentic communities of practice in the science classroom.

Factors Affecting the Retention of First-career and Second-career Science Teachers in Urban High Schools

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rak, Rosemary C.

The turnover of high school science teachers is an especially troubling problem in urban schools with economically disadvantaged students. Because high teacher turnover rates impede effective instruction, the persistence of teacher attrition is a serious concern. Using an online survey and interviews in a sequential mixed-methods approach, this study investigates the perceptions of high school science teachers regarding factors that contribute to their employment decisions. The study also compares first-career and second-career science teachers' perceptions of retention and attrition factors and identifies conditions that urban school leaders can establish to support the retention of their science teachers. A purposeful sample of 138 science teachers from urban area New England public high schools with 50% or more Free and Reduced Price Lunch-eligible students participated in the survey. Twelve survey respondents were subsequently interviewed. In accord with extant research, this study's results suggest that school leadership is essential to fostering teacher retention. The findings also reveal the importance of autonomy, professional community, and adequate resources to support science instruction. Although mentoring and induction programs receive low importance ratings in this study, career-changers view these programs as more important to their retention than do first-career science teachers. Second-career interviewees, in particular, voice the importance of being treated as professionals by school leaders. Future research may examine the characteristics of mentoring and induction programs that make them most responsive to the needs of first-career and second-career science teachers. Future studies may also investigate the aspects of school leadership and professional autonomy that are most effective in promoting science teacher retention. Keywords: career-changers; school leaders; science teachers; second-career teachers; teacher retention; teacher turnover; urban high school

Transforming Perceptions of Urban Education: Lessons from Rowan University's Urban Teacher Academy

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

White, Meg; Brown, Corine Meredith; Viator, Martha Graham; Byrne, Laurel L.; Ricchezza, Lorraine C.

2017-01-01

To be an effective urban educator requires teachers to understand the contextual factors of students, the school, and the community, and their cumulative effects on learning. Urban teacher academies support a better understanding of urban classrooms and challenge stereotypes of the urban context. The focus of this study was to compare…

Educating the Web-Savvy Urban Teacher: Website Evaluation Tips and Internet Resources for Secondary Educators

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Harushimana, Immaculee

2008-01-01

This article, "The Web-Savvy Urban Teacher," addresses the question of what educational technology educators and scholars can do to close the pedagogical mismatch, which exists today between "digital native" secondary students and their predigital educators. The infrequent use of the Internet as a resource in urban schools is detrimental for…

Critical Pedagogy, Physical Education and Urban Schooling. Counterpoints: Studies in the Postmodern Theory of Education. Volume 432

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fitzpatrick, Katie

2013-01-01

"Critical Pedagogy, Physical Education and Urban Schooling" is a critical ethnography of health, physical education and the schooling experiences of urban youth. The subjects of health and physical education are compulsory in most schools internationally, but many contemporary practices in these subjects reinforce rather than challenge the…

University-Urban High School Partnership: Math and Science Professional Learning Communities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

ndunda, mutindi; Van Sickle, Meta; Perry, Lindsay; Capelloni, Alison

2017-01-01

This study focused on science and math professional learning communities (PLCs) that were implemented through a university-urban high school partnership. These PLCs were part of mandated school-wide, content-based PLCs implemented as part of the reform efforts initiated in an urban school to address the school's failure to meet Adequate Yearly…

Second Year Site Visits to Milwaukee Urban Systemic Initiative Schools. Report for the Milwaukee Public Schools.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Huinker, DeAnn; Coan, Cheryl

The Urban Systemic Initiatives (USI) program is an effort sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that targets large urban school systems with the goal of sustainable implementation of high-quality, standards-based teaching for the purpose of attaining system-wide increases in students' learning of challenging mathematics and science.…

Voices of Reform: Infusion of Standards-Based Mathematics and Science Teaching in an Urban District.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Huinker, DeAnn; Coan, Cheryl; Posnanski, Tracy

This study examined the impact of a systemic reform initiative to implement standards-based mathematics and science teaching and learning in one urban school district, noting its effect on teachers, principals, students, and classroom practice. Participants were a sample of elementary and secondary schools involved in the Milwaukee Urban Systemic…

Exploring the Impact of Reality Pedagogy: Understanding Its Implementation on Urban Immigrant Students

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Taher, Tanzina; Mensah, Felicia Moore; Emdin, Christopher

2017-01-01

This ethnographic case study follows two urban immigrant students in their yearlong journey in an urban science classroom where the first two pedagogic tools of reality pedagogy (cogenerative dialogue and co-teaching) were implemented. This study examines the role reality pedagogy plays in the science classroom for these two students, while…

Increasing Student Access to Qualified Science and Mathematics Teachers through an Urban School-University Partnership

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cavallo, Ann M. L.; Ferreira, Maria M.; Roberts, Sally K.

2005-01-01

Urban schools across the United States face a pervasive problem in their science and mathematics programs-a disproportionate number of the teachers in these classrooms are not certified, thus making them underqualified to teach these subject areas. Furthermore, urban schools deal with teacher shortages and attrition in these critical areas. The…

The NSF-RCN Urban Heat Island Network

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Snyder, P. K.; Twine, T. E.; Hamilton, P.; Shepherd, M.; Stone, B., Jr.

2016-12-01

In much of the world cities are warming at twice the rate of outlying rural areas. The frequency of urban heat waves is projected to increase with climate change through the 21st century. Addressing the economic, environmental, and human costs of urban heat islands requires a better understanding of their behavior from many disciplinary perspectives. The goal of this four-year Urban Heat Island Network is to (1) bring together scientists studying the causes and impacts of urban warming, (2) advance multidisciplinary understanding of urban heat islands, (3) examine how they can be ameliorated through engineering and design practices, and (4) share these new insights with a wide array of stakeholders responsible for managing urban warming to reduce their health, economic, and environmental impacts. The NSF-RCN Urban Heat Island Network involves atmospheric scientists, engineers, architects, landscape designers, urban planners, public health experts, and education and outreach experts, who will share knowledge, evaluate research directions, and communicate knowledge and research recommendations to the larger research community as well as stakeholders engaged in developing strategies to adapt to and mitigate urban warming. The first Urban Climate Institute was held in Saint Paul, MN in July 2013 and focused on the characteristics of urban heat islands. Scientists engaged with local practitioners to improve communication pathways surrounding issues of understanding, adapting to, and mitigating urban warming. The second Urban Climate Institute was held in Atlanta, Georgia in July 2014 and focused on urban warming and public health. The third Urban Climate Institute was held in Athens, GA in July 2015 and focused on urban warming and the role of the built environment. Scientists and practitioners discussed strategies for mitigation and adaptation. The fourth Institute was held in Saint Paul, MN in July 2016 and focused on putting research to practice. Evaluation experts at the Science Museum of Minnesota have extensively evaluated the Institutes to inform other research coordination networks and to identify effective ways that researchers and practitioners can share knowledge and communicate more effectively.

Adiposity among children in Norway by urbanity and maternal education: a nationally representative study.

PubMed

Biehl, Anna; Hovengen, Ragnhild; Grøholt, Else-Karin; Hjelmesæth, Jøran; Strand, Bjørn Heine; Meyer, Haakon E

2013-09-12

International research has demonstrated that rural residency is a risk factor for childhood adiposity. The main aim of this study was to investigate the urban-rural gradient in overweight and obesity and whether the association differed by maternal education. Height, weight and waist circumference (WC) were measured in a nationally representative sample of 3166 Norwegian eight-year-olds in 2010. Anthropometric measures were stratified by area of residence (urbanity) and maternal education. Risk estimates for overweight (including obesity) and waist-to-height ratio ≥0.5 were calculated by log-binomial regression. Mean BMI and WC and risk estimates of overweight (including obesity) and waist-to-height ratio ≥0.5 were associated with both urbanity and maternal education. These associations were robust after mutual adjustment for each other. Furthermore, there was an indication of interaction between urbanity and maternal education, as trends of mean BMI and WC increased from urban to rural residence among children of low-educated mothers (p = 0.01 for both BMI and WC), whereas corresponding trends for children from higher educational background were non-significant (p > 0.30). However, formal tests of the interaction term urbanity by maternal education were non-significant (p-value for interaction was 0.29 for BMI and 0.31 for WC). In this nationally representative study, children living rurally and children of low-educated mothers had higher mean BMI and waist circumference than children living in more urban areas and children of higher educated mothers.

The Impact of High School Science Teachers' Beliefs, Curricular Enactments and Experience on Student Learning During an Inquiry-based Urban Ecology Curriculum

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McNeill, Katherine L.; Silva Pimentel, Diane; Strauss, Eric G.

2013-10-01

Inquiry-based curricula are an essential tool for reforming science education yet the role of the teacher is often overlooked in terms of the impact of the curriculum on student achievement. Our research focuses on 22 teachers' use of a year-long high school urban ecology curriculum and how teachers' self-efficacy, instructional practices, curricular enactments and previous experience impacted student learning. Data sources included teacher belief surveys, teacher enactment surveys, a student multiple-choice assessment focused on defining and identifying science concepts and a student open-ended assessment focused on scientific inquiry. Results from the two hierarchical linear models indicate that there was significant variation between teachers in terms of student achievement. For the multiple-choice assessment, teachers who spent a larger percentage of time on group work and a smaller percentage of time lecturing had greater student learning. For the open-ended assessment, teachers who reported a higher frequency of students engaging in argument and sharing ideas had greater student learning while teachers who adapted the curriculum more had lower student learning. These results suggest the importance of supporting the active role of students in instruction, emphasising argumentation, and considering the types of adaptations teachers make to curriculum.

The Burden of Urban Education: Public Schools in Massachusetts, 1870-1915.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lazerson, Marvin

Confronted by a rapidly changing urban-industrial society, Massachusetts educators undertook reforms between 1870 and 1915 to make the public school a more relevant institution. Kindergarten, manual training, vocational education, evening schools, and citizenship education represented answers to problems arising from industrialism and urbanism.…

The Sociology of Urban Education: Desegregation and Integration.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Willie, Charles Vert

In this book, the problems of racial segregation and desegregation in urban schools and colleges are discussed in light of cultural, biological, and social questions. Part I explores various issues in urban education, such as racial balance and quality education, white flight, community control, the city-suburban connection, education for the…

Theme: Urban Agriculture.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ellibee, Margaret; And Others

1990-01-01

On the theme of secondary agricultural education in urban areas, this issue includes articles on opportunities, future directions, and implications for the profession; creative supervised experiences for horticulture students; floral marketing, multicultural education; and cultural diversity in urban agricultural education. (JOW)

A Different View of Urban Schools: Civil Rights, Critical Race Theory, and Unexplored Realities. Revised Edition. Counterpoints: Studies in the Postmodern Theory of Education. Volume 291

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Epstein, Kitty Kelly

2012-01-01

The revised edition of "A Different View of Urban Schools" updates a unique story about the realities of urban education in America and provides new insights on the origin of urban education issues; the route to a diverse and effective teaching force; and the impact of federal legislation and corporate involvement on urban schools. Dr. Epstein's…

NREL to Helm Laboratory Consortium on Vehicle Connectivity and Automation |

Science.gov Websites

automation, integrated multi-modal transportation systems, behavioral and decision science, urban science money, reduce emissions, save lives, and reshape the urban environment," says Gearhart. Other NREL

Urbanicity and Urban Education: A New Look. ERIC/CUE Disadvantaged Series, Number 52, Fall 1977.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

ERIC Clearinghouse on Urban Education, New York, NY.

This volume contains speeches made by educators, civil servants and administrators who attended a conference devoted to redefining the problems of education in the context of urban life. Edmund W. Gordon's presentation provides a basic framework of urbanicity, its environmental and social characteristics, and three broad categories which have…

Exam-Oriented Education and Implementation of Education Policy for Migrant Children in Urban China

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hu, Bo; West, Anne

2015-01-01

This paper investigates the implementation of education policy for migrant children in urban China. Historically, rural and urban residents in China were separated by the "hukou" system, and rural children were not allowed to attend urban schools. Since the relaxation of the "hukou" system in the early 1980s, large numbers of…

EDUCATING THE URBAN STUDENT FOR THE URBAN WAY OF LIFE.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

WILLIE, CHARLES V.

THE AUTHOR DEALS WITH THE ROLE OF THE UNIVERSITY IN EDUCATING STUDENTS TO BE CITIZENS AND LEADERS IN OUR URBANIZED SOCIETY. HE SEES URBANIZATION AS BEING DIFFERENT FROM, THOUGH RELATED TO, INDUSTRIALIZATION, AND HE SEES DISTINCT DIFFERENCES IN THE SOCIAL AND EDUCATIONAL RESPONSES NEEDED TO DEAL WITH THEM. WHILE INDUSTRIALIZATION, THE MAIN FOCUS OF…

A Race against Time: The Crisis in Urban Schooling. Contemporary Studies in Social and Policy Issues in Education.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cibulka, James G., Ed.; Boyd, William Lowe, Ed.

This collection of papers presents three approaches to urban educational reform. After "Introduction--Urban Education Reform: Competing Approaches" (James G. Cibulka and William Lowe Byrd), Part 1, "Systems Reforms of Urban School Systems," includes (1) "Accountability at the Improv: Brief Sketches of School Reform in Los…

Partners in Urban Education: Working as an Aide in an Inner-City School.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rose, Norman M.

The series "Partners in Urban Education" focuses on the most important resource available to the urban school and community-people. Parents, paraprofessionals, teachers, and principals are recognized as equal partners in the education of the urban child. The series contains one handbook for each of these partners; this document comprises the…

Fiscal Policy in Urban Education. A Volume in Research in Education Fiscal Policy and Practice.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Roellke, Christopher, Ed.; Rice, Jennifer King, Ed.

This volume focuses on school finance challenges in large urban school districts, fiscal accountability in these schools, and the fiscal dimensions of urban school reform. The 12 papers are (1) "School Finance and Urban Education Reform" (Christopher Roellke and Jennifer King Rice); (2) "Can Whole-School Reform Improve the…

Planning Urban Education: New Ideas and Techniques to Transform Learning in the City.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Roberts, Dennis L., II, Ed.

This volume contains a number of articles which examine the crisis in urban education from a scientific, technological, and "total systems" frame of reference, and propose new strategies for making schools more effective and cities more livable. Urban education is viewed within the context of a total urban community system. Management, planning,…

Latinos in science: Identifying factors that influence the low percentage of Latino representation in the sciences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Miranda, Susan Jennifer

A mixed methods approach was used to identify factors that influence the underrepresentation of Latinos in the domain of science. The researcher investigated the role of family influences, academic preparation, and personal motivations to determine science-related career choices by Latinos. Binary logistic regression analyses were conducted using information from Latinos gathered from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS: 88) administered by the National Center for Education Statistics. For the present study, data were analyzed using participants' responses as high school seniors, college students, and post-baccalaureates. Students responded to questions on school, work, parental academic influences, personal aspirations, and self-perception. To provide more insight into the experiences of Latinos in science and support the statistical analyses, nine students majoring in science in a private, urban university located in the northeastern part of the country were interviewed. Eleven variables related to parents' academic support and students' perceptions of parental support were taken together as predictors for two separate criteria from the survey. These results identified parents' level of education and the importance of academics to parents in their teen's college choice as significant predictors in determining college major in science. When the criterion was degree in science, the significant predictor was the frequency parents contacted high school as volunteers. Student interviews supported this information, demonstrating the importance of parental support in attaining a degree in science. Academic preparation was also analyzed. Students' reasons for taking science classes in high school was a significant predictor for science major; significant predictors for science degree were the emphasis placed on objectives in math and science classes and number of courses in biology and physics. Student interviews supported this information and demonstrated the influence their own motivation placed on their goals. Survey data were also obtained about the students' test scores and academic achievement. Data collected from the statistical and interview components of the study developed a greater understanding for the lack of Latinos in the sciences as influenced by personal and familial factors.

Not Driven by High-Stakes Tests: Exploring Science Assessment and College Readiness of Students from an Urban Portfolio Community High School

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fleshman, Robin Earle

2017-01-01

This case study seeks to explore three research questions: (1) What science teaching and learning processes, perspectives, and cultures exist within the science classroom of an urban portfolio community high school? (2) In what ways does the portfolio-based approach prepare high school students of color for college level science coursework,…

Determination of Motivation of 5th Grade Students Living in Rural and Urban Environments towards Science Learning and Their Attitudes towards Science-Technology Course

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kenar, Ismail; Köse, Mücahit; Demir, Halil Ibrahim

2016-01-01

In this research, determination of motivation of 5th grade students living in rural and urban environments towards science learning and their attitudes towards science-technology course is aimed. This research is conducted based on descriptive survey model. Samples are selected through teleological model in accordance with the aim of this…

Trends in Educational Inequality in Different Eras (1940-2010)--A Re-Examination of Opportunity Inequalities in Urban-Rural Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chunling, Li

2015-01-01

Based on national sampling survey data from 2006, 2008, and 2011, the author uses the Mare educational transition model to systematically examine changing trends in inequalities in urban-rural educational opportunities at all educational stages from 1940 to 2010. Through a comparative analysis of five birth year groups, inequalities in urban-rural…

Conditions and Decisions of Urban Elementary Teachers Regarding Instruction of STEM Curriculum

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smith, Erica L.; Parker, Carolyn A.; McKinney, David; Grigg, Jeffrey

2018-01-01

The study was situated in a National Science Foundation supported Math Science Partnership between a private university and an urban school district. This study sought to understand the decision-making process of elementary teachers as they implement an integrated science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) curriculum in their…

The Role of Afterschool and Community Science Programs in the Lives of Urban Youth

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rahm, Jrene; Moore, John C.; Martel-Reny, Marie-Paule

2005-01-01

Afterschool and community science programs have become widely recognized as important sanctuaries for science learning for low-income urban youth and as offering them with "missing opportunities." Yet, more needs to be known about how youth, themselves, perceive such opportunities. What motivates youth to seek out such opportunities in…

Urban Elementary Science Teacher Leaders: Responsibilities, Supports, and Needs

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wenner, Julianne A.

2017-01-01

The challenge of science achievement gaps is one that scholars have struggled to solve. Teacher leadership holds great promise in closing those gaps. Therefore, the purpose of the research reported here was to explore the responsibilities and supports of formally designated science teacher leaders (STLs) in urban elementary schools that have been…

Science As A Second Language: Acquiring Fluency through Science Enterprises

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shope, R.; EcoVoices Expedition Team

2013-05-01

Science Enterprises are problems that students genuinely want to solve, questions that students genuinely want to answer, that naturally entail reading, writing, investigation, and discussion. Engaging students in personally-relevant science enterprises provides both a diagnostic opportunity and a context for providing students the comprehensible input they need. We can differentiate instruction by creating science enterprise zones that are set up for the incremental increase in challenge for the students. Comprehensible input makes reachable, those just-out-of-reach concepts in the mix of the familiar and the new. EcoVoices takes students on field research expeditions within an urban natural area, the San Gabriel River Discovery Center. This project engages students in science enterprises focused on understanding ecosystems, ecosystem services, and the dynamics of climate change. A sister program, EcoVoces, has been launched in Mexico, in collaboration with the Universidad Loyola del Pacífico. 1) The ED3U Science Inquiry Model, a learning cycle model that accounts for conceptual change: Explore { Diagnose, Design, Discuss } Use. 2) The ¿NQUIRY Wheel, a compass of scientific inquiry strategies; 3) Inquiry Science Expeditions, a way of laying out a science learning environment, emulating a field and lab research collaboratory; 4) The Science Educative Experience Scale, a diagnostic measure of the quality of the science learning experience; and 5) Mimedia de la Ciencia, participatory enactment of science concepts using techniques of mime and improvisational theater. BACKGROUND: Science has become a vehicle for teaching reading, writing, and other communication skills, across the curriculum. This new emphasis creates renewed motivation for Scientists and Science Educators to work collaboratively to explore the common ground between acquiring science understanding and language acquisition theory. Language Acquisition is an informal process that occurs in the midst of exploring, solving problems, seeking answers to questions, playing, reading for pleasure, conversing, discussing, where the focus is not specifically on language development, but on the activity, which is of interest to the participant. Language Learning is a formal education process, the language arts aspect of the school day: the direct teaching of reading, writing, grammar, spelling, and speaking. Fluency results primarily from language acquisition and secondarily from language learning. We can view the problem of science education and communication as similar to language acquisition. Science Learning is a formal education process, the school science aspect of the school day: the direct teaching of standards-aligned science content. Science Acquisition is an informal process that occurs in the midst of exploring, solving problems, seeking answers to questions, playing, experimenting for pleasure, conversing, discussing, where the focus is not specifically on science content development, but on the inquiry activity, driven by the curiosity of the participant. Treating Science as a Second Language shifts the evaluation of science learning to include gauging the extent to which students choose to deepen their pursuit of science learning.

Disconnects Between Audiences, Resources, and Initiatives: Key Findings of the Coastal Areas Climate Change Education Partnership

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Muller-Karger, F. E.; Ryan, J. G.; Feldman, A.; Gilbes, F.; Trotz, M.; McKayle, C.; Stone, D.; Plank, L.; Meisels, G.; Peterson, M.; Reynolds, C. J.

2012-12-01

The Coastal Areas Climate Change Education (CACCE) Partnership focused on defining a plan for effective education on climate change and its salient issues in coastal communities Florida and the US Caribbean territories. The approach included assessing perceptions and needs of stakeholders, evaluating the nature of available educational and information resources, and establishing a partnership that includes the public and professional organizations most relevant in planning and in addressing the resiliency of coastal communities. Information gathering activities included surveys among K-12 educators and students on climate change perceptions and current classroom activities in both Florida and the Caribbean territories; surveys of professional urban and land-use planners across Florida regarding their understanding of related in their professional practice; and conducting an inventory of relevant educational materials and information resources. Survey results showed a range of misperceptions about climate change, its causes and its likely impacts. At present, students and teachers in high and middle schools show poor understanding of climate science, and minimal time is spent in instruction on climate change in science courses in Florida and Puerto Rico schools. Also, there has to be professional development efforts and access to rich instructional content in a continuum spanning schools and professional communities including planners (which we surveyed). Architects and engineers are communities that also need to be surveyed and included in future efforts. A major obstacle to efforts at providing continuing education for planners and municipal officials is the lack of consensus on and access to regionally-specific scientific data regarding climate impacts and the relevant instructional content. It is difficult for professionals to prepare for climate change if they cannot define impacts in the Florida-Caribbean region and its coastal urban areas. Across over 1000 websites and online information resources on climate change reviewed for this project, less than a dozen items were identified that address climate change issues and impacts relevant to Florida and the US Caribbean Territories. This represents a serious issue for planners, who need to make effective arguments for climate adaptation strategies to the public and to public officials. These disconnects between stakeholder information and education needs, and available educational content and informational resources, is a significant obstacle to any future public education efforts on climate change in the US most vulnerable regions of the US.

Catalyzing Cross-Disciplinary Research and Education Within and Beyond the Environmental and Geosciences to Address Emerging, Societally-Relevant Issues

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cak, A. D.; Vigdor, L. J.; Vorosmarty, C. J.; Giebel, B. M.; Santistevan, C.; Chasteau, C.

2017-12-01

Tackling emergent, societally-relevant problems in the environmental sciences is hardly confined to a single research discipline, but rather requires collaborations that bridge diverse domains and perspectives. While new technologies (e.g., Skype) can in theory unite otherwise geographically distributed participation in collaborative research, physical distance nevertheless raises the bar on intellectual dialogue. Such barriers may reveal perceptions of or real differences across disciplines, reflecting particular traditions in their histories and academic cultures. Individual disciplines are self-defined by their scientific, epistemologic, methodologic, or philosophical traditions (e.g., difficulties in understanding processes occurring at different scales, insufficient research funding for interdisciplinary work), or cultural and discursive hurdles (e.g., navigating a new field's jargon). Coupled with these challenges is a considerable deficiency in educating the next generation of scientists to help them develop a sufficient comfort level with thinking critically across multiple disciplinary domains and conceptual frameworks. To address these issues, the City University of New York (CUNY), the largest public urban university in the U.S., made a significant investment in advancing cross-disciplinary research and education, culminating in the opening of the CUNY Advanced Science Research Center (ASRC) in New York City (NYC) in late 2014. We report here on our experiences incubating new collaborative efforts to address environmental science-related research as it is interwoven with the ASRC's five research initiatives (Environmental Sciences, Neuroscience, Structural Biology, Photonics, and Nanoscience). We describe the ASRC's overall structure and function as both a stand-alone interdisciplinary center and one that collaborates more broadly with CUNY's network of twenty-four campuses distributed across NYC's five boroughs. We identify challenges we have faced so far, particularly in attempting to overcome traditional scientific, discursive, and cultural barriers, and how we are addressing them. We also describe several outreach and educational programming efforts designed to promote cross-disciplinarity, including informal science education.

Contesting the City: Neoliberal Urbanism and the Cultural Politics of Education Reform in Chicago

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lipman, Pauline

2011-01-01

This article examines the intertwining of neoliberal urbanism and education policy in Chicago. Drawing on critical studies in geography, urban sociology and anthropology, education policy, and critical analyses of race, the author argues that education is constitutive of material and ideological processes of neoliberal restructuring, its…

Lessons Learned: Implementation of the Milwaukee Urban Systemic Initiative in Years One and Two. Report for the Milwaukee Public Schools.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Doyle, Lynn H.; Huinker, DeAnn

The Urban Systemic Initiatives (USI) program is an effort sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that targets large urban school systems with the goal of sustainable implementation of high-quality, standards-based teaching for the purpose of attaining system-wide increases in students' learning of challenging mathematics and science.…

Urban Underrepresented Minority Students in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math: An Analysis of the Differences between Developmental Assets and Academic Achievement

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wells, Jovan Grant

2013-01-01

The purpose of this study is to determine the relationship between the developmental assets and academic achievement of urban underrepresented minority male and female students in a specialized science, technology, engineering, and math program, and the developmental assets and academic achievement of urban underrepresented minority male and…

Language of poverty strategies: Implemented in the urban elementary science classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jeanpierre, Bobby Jo

2000-08-01

This research study reports the results of school-based staff development models used at three urban elementary schools that had liaison teachers assisting classroom teachers in implementing instructional strategies in science teaching from "Language of Poverty," a curriculum framework designed to address the academic needs of disadvantaged students. The case study of two urban elementary schools and six classroom teachers, and survey and interview data results of a third school, uncovered insights into several areas of science teaching in urban settings. One conclusion is that in spite of substantial allocation of resources and assistance, teachers did not translate instructional strategies from "Language of Poverty" curriculum into their classroom practices in a way that would foster urban disadvantaged students' understanding of "big science concepts." A second conclusion is that the school-based staff development models were limited in their ability to address the diverse professional needs of all of its staff. Third, as it relates to students, discipline issues occurred in these urban classrooms across ethnicity and gender. And in addition to teachers being knowledgeable of relevant social and cultural group norms' application of this knowledge in an appropriate and consistent manner is needed to effectively address discipline concerns.

Achieving Flourishing City Schools and Communities--Corporate Reform, Neoliberal Urbanism, and the Right to the City

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Means, Alexander

2014-01-01

This essay critiques the ideological assertions of corporate school reform and discusses how these logics perpetuate failure in urban education. Drawing on theories of neoliberal urbanism, the right to the city, and the commons, the essay argues that educational researchers and advocates need to reframe the values of urban education in line with a…

More Ambitious Educational Choices in Urban Areas: A Matter of Local Labor Market Characteristics?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Boone, Simon; Van Houtte, Mieke

2016-01-01

Urban-rural disparities in educational outcomes have so far primarily received attention in U.S.-based research. These studies show that pupils in rural areas are at a disadvantage compared with pupils in (sub)urban areas. This article aims to examine urban-nonurban differences in educational choice in a European context, namely Flanders (the…

Youth Science Ambassadors: Connecting Indigenous communities with Ocean Networks Canada tools to inspire future ocean scientists and marine resource managers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pelz, M.; Hoeberechts, M.; Hale, C.; McLean, M. A.

2017-12-01

This presentation describes Ocean Networks Canada's (ONC) Youth Science Ambassador Program. The Youth Science Ambassadors are a growing network of youth in Canadian coastal communities whose role is to connect ocean science, ONC data, and Indigenous knowledge. By directly employing Indigenous youth in communities in which ONC operates monitoring equipment, ONC aims to encourage wider participation and interest in ocean science and exploration. Further, the Youth Science Ambassadors act as role models and mentors to other local youth by highlighting connections between Indigenous and local knowledge and current marine science efforts. Ocean Networks Canada, an initiative of the University of Victoria, develops, operates, and maintains cabled ocean observatory systems. These include technologies developed on the world-leading NEPTUNE and VENUS observatories as well as community observatories in the Arctic and coastal British Columbia. These observatories, large and small, enable communities, users, scientists, teachers, and students to monitor real-time and historical data from the local marine environment from anywhere on the globe. Youth Science Ambassadors are part of the Learning and Engagement team whose role includes engaging Indigenous communities and schools in ocean science through ONC's K-12 Ocean Sense education program. All of the data collected by ONC are freely available over the Internet for non-profit use, including disaster planning, community-based decision making, and education. The Youth Science Ambassadors support collaboration with Indigenous communities and schools by facilitating educational programming, encouraging participation in ocean data collection and analysis, and fostering interest in ocean science. In addition, the Youth Science Ambassadors support community collaboration in decision-making for instrument deployment locations and identify ways in which ONC can help to address any areas of concern raised by the community. This presentation will share the successes and challenges of the Youth Science Ambassador program in engaging both rural and urban Indigenous communities. We will share activities and experiences, discuss how we have adapted to meet the needs of each community, and outline ideas we have for the future development of the program.

Conceptualizing Astronomical Distances for Urban Populations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Popinchalk, Mark; Olson, Kristen; Ingber, Jenny; O'Brien, Mariel

2017-01-01

Students living in urban environments may have a washed-out night sky, but their enthusiasm for astronomy can still shine bright. As an educator, it can sometimes be a challenge to see the opportunities afforded by city living to the teaching of astronomy; however, several benefits can be identified. For example, the intrinsic understanding children have of the distances and scales involved in their everyday life is enhanced when they live in a regimented urban structure. This existing understanding of scale is critical to building a foundation for later conceptualizing of the universe.Leveraging the assets of New York City and the resources found in the American Museum of Natural History, The Science and Nature Program offers students (PreK through 8th grade) robust science learning experiences. To address concepts important for studying astronomy, we present a novel twist on the classic lesson “Earth as a Peppercorn,” by scaling the solar system to the size of New York City. Using local landmarks and their distance in relation to the Museum to represent the planets, students can use their prior knowledge of their surroundings to appreciate the impressive scale of our neighborhood in space in the context of their own neighborhoods. We correlate the activity with NGSS standards, present preliminary feedback on it’s success, and discuss the opportunities to apply a similar model lesson to other astronomical systems.

A citizen science campaign encouraging urban forest professionals to engage the public in the collection of tree phenological data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Clarke, K. C.

2009-12-01

There are growing concerns among leading national and local organizations about American scientific literacy, fundamental understanding of science, and the value of scientific research. These organizations, including the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, have been at the forefront in addressing these concerns. In an effort to improve scientific literacy, research conducted by Sam Droege, among others, suggested using citizen science and public participation as instrumental methods to engage the public. Urban Tree Phenology (UTP), a project of Project BudBurst and the USDA Forest Service, is one such citizen science program that sought to engage the public, including the professionals and amateurs among them, in collecting urban tree phenophase data. UTP participants monitored and reported the stages of phenological events, such as First Leaf and Leaf Fall, of 24 native and cultivated urban tree species, using the steps shown in Figure 1. Data collected will support the long-term research of plant ecology, climate change, public health, urban heat islands on tree physiology, and urban tree management. UTP, using the architectures of online learning, has developed two instructional tutorials to assist data collection (Phase 1). The instructional tutorials were published online, in print and PowerPoint formats, at www.UrbanTreePhenology.com. By completing these tutorials, participants will gain the skills necessary to provide urban tree phenological data to national research databases via the Internet. Phase 2 will test and review the instructional materials developed, and in Phase 3, the administrators of UTP will distribute promotional materials to national research organizations and to participants of the Project BudBurst national citizen science campaign.

Constructing Assessment Model of Primary and Secondary Educational Quality with Talent Quality as the Core Standard

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chen, Benyou

2014-01-01

Quality is the core of education and it is important to standardization construction of primary and secondary education in urban (U) and rural (R) areas. The ultimate goal of the integration of urban and rural education is to pursuit quality urban and rural education. Based on analysing the related policy basis and the existing assessment models…

Science as a Second Language: Acquiring Fluency through Science Enterprises

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shope, R. E.

2012-12-01

Science Enterprises are problems that students genuinely want to solve, questions that students genuinely want to answer, that naturally entail reading, writing, exploration, investigation, and discussion. Engaging students in personally-relevant science enterprises provides both a diagnostic opportunity and a context for providing students the comprehensible input they need. We can differentiate instruction by creating science enterprise zones that are set up for the incremental increase in challenge for the students. Comprehensible input makes reachable, those just-out-of-reach concepts in the mix of the familiar and the new. We explore a series of science enterprise tools that have been developed and implemented in the context of informal science education projects that have reached over 10,000 urban youth in the Greater Los Angles area over the past six years. 1) The ED3U Science Inquiry Model, a learning cycle model that accounts for conceptual change; 2) The ¿NQUIRY Wheel, a compass of scientific inquiry strategies; 3) Inquiry Science Expeditions, a way of laying out a science learning environment, emulating a field and lab research collaboratory; 4) The Science Educative Experience Scale, a diagnostic measure of the quality of the science learning experience; and 5) Science Mimes, participatory enactment of science understanding. Practical examples of Science Enterprises will be presented, including a range of projects: Watershed Ecology; Astrobiology; Mars Rovers; Planetary Science; Icy Worlds. BACKGROUND: Language Acquisition is an informal process that occurs in the midst of exploring, solving problems, seeking answers to questions, playing, reading for pleasure, conversing, discussing, where the focus is not specifically on language development, but on the activity, which is of interest to the participant. Language Learning is a formal education process, the language arts aspect of the school day: the direct teaching of reading, writing, grammar, spelling, and speaking. Fluency results primarily from language acquisition and secondarily from language learning. We can view the problem of science education and communication as similar to language acquisition. Science Learning is a formal education process, the school science aspect of the school day: the direct teaching of standards-aligned science content. Science Acquisition is an informal process that occurs in the midst of exploring, solving problems, seeking answers to questions, playing, experimenting for pleasure, conversing, discussing, where the focus is not specifically on science content development, but on the inquiry activity, driven by the curiosity of the participant. Comprehensible input refers to the premise that we acquire language in the midst of activity when we understand the message; that is, when we understand what we hear or what we read or what we see. Acquisition is caused by comprehensible input as it occurs in the midst of a rich environment of language activity while doing something of interest to the learner. Providing comprehensible input is not the same as oversimplifying or "dumbing down." It is devising ways to create conditions where the interest of the learner is piqued.

CTE's Role in Urban Education. Issue Brief

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Association for Career and Technical Education (ACTE), 2012

2012-01-01

This Issue Brief explores the promising role that career and technical education programs play in addressing key student achievement issues facing urban schools. CTE programs engage urban students by providing rigorous and relevant coursework, fostering positive relationships, establishing clear pathways and connecting education and…

Early Lessons for Planning and Implementing a Program to Prepare Urban Special Education Academic Leaders

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barbetta, Patricia; Cramer, Elizabeth; Nevin, Ann; Moores-Abdool, Whitney

2006-01-01

The mission for Urban SEALS (Special Education Academic Leaders), a federally funded doctoral preparation program, is to prepare doctoral-level special educators, including those who are culturally and/or linguistically diverse (CLD) to assume leadership roles in the education of urban students with disabilities who are CLD. This paper provides…

Urban Schools: Challenges and Possibilities for Early Childhood and Elementary Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Boutte, Gloria Swindler

2012-01-01

Addressing the seemingly perpetual turbulent landscape of urban schools, the role that elementary educators and teacher educators can play in reversing negative trends and trajectories is considered. Three urban education journals were examined over a 5-year period (2005-2010) to determine the emphasis on elementary students or schools. Of the 429…

Young African American Children Constructing Academic and Disciplinary Identities in an Urban Science Classroom

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kane, Justine M.

2012-01-01

In this paper, I offer a framework for exploring the academic and disciplinary identities young African American children construct in urban science classrooms. Using interviews, fieldnotes, and videotapes of classroom lessons, I juxtapose the ways in which two children tell about their experiences in school and science with their performances of…

A Balancing Act in the Third Space: Graduate-Level Earth Science in an Urban Teacher-Residency Program

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zirakparvar, N. Alex

2015-01-01

This article describes a museum-based urban teacher-residency (UTR) program's approach to building subject-specific content knowledge and research experience in Earth Science teacher candidates. In the museum-based program, graduate-level science courses and research experiences are designed and implemented specifically for the UTR by active Earth…

Voices of Successful Science Teachers in an Urban Diverse Single Gender Girls' School

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Malhan, Jyoti

2016-01-01

This research study was conducted as a qualitative case study of four successful science teachers of female students in a diverse, title 1, urban, public girls' school. The study was designed to hear the 'muted' voices of successful science teachers concerning their beliefs and practices when they effectively provide learning opportunities for…

Urban High School Students' Critical Science Agency: Conceptual Understandings and Environmental Actions around Climate Change

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McNeill, Katherine L.; Vaughn, Meredith Houle

2012-01-01

This study investigates how the enactment of a climate change curriculum supports students' development of critical science agency, which includes students developing deep understandings of science concepts and the ability to take action at the individual and community levels. We examined the impact of a four to six week urban ecology curriculum…

First-Year Urban Mathematics and Science Middle School Teachers: Classroom Challenges and Reflective Solutions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kelly, Angela M.; Gningue, Serigne M.; Qian, Gaoyin

2015-01-01

This study explored the challenges facing 1st-year alternatively certified teachers of mathematics and science in urban middle schools. Four teachers, participants in a National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded Robert Noyce Scholarship Program, were followed from preservice training through their 1st year of teaching, having taken part in…

19 Urban Questions: Teaching in the City. Second Edition. Counterpoints: Studies in Postmodern Theory of Education, Vol. 215

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Steinberg, Shirley R., Ed

2010-01-01

The second edition of "19 Urban Questions: Teaching in the City" adds new questions to those in the original volume. Continuing the developing conversation in urban education, the book is provocative in style and rich in detail. Emphasizing the complexity of urban education, Shirley R. Steinberg and the authors ask direct questions about what…

Yes We Can! Improving Urban Schools through Innovative Educational Reform. Contemporary Perspectives on Access, Equity, and Achievement

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Howell, Leanne L., Ed.; Lewis, Chance W., Ed.; Carter, Norvella, Ed.

2011-01-01

Yes We Can: Improving Urban Schools through Innovative Educational Reform is a empirically-based book on urban education reform to not only proclaim that hope is alive for urban schools, but to also produce a body of literature that examines current practices and then offer practical implications for all involved in this arduous task. This book is…

Social stratification and science education: A longitudinal analysis, 1981-1986, of minorities' integration into the scientific talent pool

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mulkey, Lynn M.; Ellis, Ronald S.

It is common knowledge that scientists are those persons who have the unique attributes required to perform in the role, but contrary to what is widely believed, scientists might also be those who have had access to resources of which other members of the population have been deprived. This study investigates the effectiveness of interventions designed to mediate the negative influence of ascription (race and ethnicity) on the scientific talent pool (students having interest and ability in science). Minorities refers to participants representing the major ethnic and racial groups in the New York City school system: Blacks and Hispanics. Cross-tabulations showed that urban underachieving public high school students take significantly more mathematics and science classes, more frequently graduate from high school and more often enroll in college as compared with students of the same population, who were not exposed to the program. These findings on the effectiveness of tutoring, career counseling, exposure to industrial and academic research sites and to scientist role models, and after-school and weekend classes in mathematics and science, reinforce the observations of Thomas (1986) of the importance of prerequisites for increasing participation of minorities in the natural and technical sciences and mathematics. They extend knowledge of factors which lessen the effects of ascription on educational attainment, and which promote meritocratic conditions for achieving a scientific occupation.

The Important Elements of a Science Video

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Harned, D. A.; Moorman, M.; McMahon, G.

2012-12-01

New technologies have revolutionized use of video as a means of communication. Films have become easier to create and to distribute. Video is omnipresent in our culture and supplements or even replaces writing in many applications. How can scientists and educators best use video to communicate scientific results? Video podcasts are being used in addition to journal, print, and online publications to communicate the relevance of scientific findings of the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) National Water-Quality Assessment (NAWQA) program to general audiences such as resource managers, educational groups, public officials, and the general public. In an effort to improve the production of science videos a survey was developed to provide insight into effective science communication with video. Viewers of USGS podcast videos were surveyed using Likert response- scaling to identify the important elements of science videos. The surveys were of 120 scientists and educators attending the 2010 and 2011 Fall Meetings of the American Geophysical Union and the 2012 meeting of the National Monitoring Council. The median age of the respondents was 44 years, with an education level of a Bachelor's Degree or higher. Respondents reported that their primary sources for watching science videos were YouTube and science websites. Video length was the single most important element associated with reaching the greatest number of viewers. The surveys indicated a median length of 5 minutes as appropriate for a web video, with 5-7 minutes the 25th-75th percentiles. An illustration of the effect of length: a 5-minute and a 20-minute version of a USGS film on the effect of urbanization on water-quality was made available on the same website. The short film has been downloaded 3 times more frequently than the longer film version. The survey showed that the most important elements to include in a science film are style elements including strong visuals, an engaging story, and a simple message, and elements of substance including clarity, believability, and a take-home message. The least important are journalistic elements such as showing different points of view and obstacles overcome. The survey respondents also considered inclusion of a hypothesis statement and study methods unnecessary in a science video.

The oral histories of six African American males in their ecology of Advanced Placement Biology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Halasa, Katrina Bassam

The major purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the past in order to understand the complex phenomenon of students engaging in science (Newman, Ridenour, Newman, & DeMarco, 2003) specifically through the oral histories of six self-identified African American males enrolled in a high school Advanced Placement Biology class and the oral histories about events that followed during their post high school experiences. To elucidate an understanding of this phenomenon, this research explored the ecology of African American males' descriptions of their school science, their peer school science community, their lived experiences during and after graduation, and their meso-community (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). Many minority and low-income students are less likely to enroll in rigorous courses during high school (Education Trust, 2006). This study is of utmost importance because capturing the informants' oral histories may improve rigorous science education. Many African American male students are attending urban schools with an ever growing achievement gap among their White counterparts (Norman, Ault, Bentz, & Meskimen, 2001); therefore, they are disengaging in science. As a result, African American males are underrepresented in both science careers and achievements in science (Atwater, 2000; National Science Foundation, 1994). The six oral histories highlighted the ecological factors that affected African American males regarding (1) the impact of their relationship with their mothers, (2) the understanding of personal responsibility, (3) the notion of a scientist, (4) the issue of gender being more of an obstacle than race, (5) the understanding that education is valuable, (6) the interactions and influence of relationships with others on their decisions, (7) the development of integrity through the participation in sports, (8) the ecological neighborhood environment influences an image, (9) the enrollment of Advanced Placement Biology course helped the transition into higher education (10) the issue of race as it surfaced in their ecological environment, (11) the individual's personal effort determines their outcomes, (12) the need for recognition of internal satisfaction, (13) the role of portraying a hero, (14) the ideology of knowing yourself and your limits, (15) the issue of race was prevalent in both personal and public life, and (16) learning is interactive.

The Implementation of a Geospatial Information Technology (GIT)-Supported Land Use Change Curriculum with Urban Middle School Learners to Promote Spatial Thinking

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bodzin, Alec M.

2011-01-01

This study investigated whether a geospatial information technology (GIT)-supported science curriculum helped students in an urban middle school understand land use change (LUC) concepts and enhanced their spatial thinking. Five 8th grade earth and space science classes in an urban middle school consisting of three different ability level tracks…

Exploring Urban Literacy & Developmental Education. CRDEUL Monograph.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lundell, Dana Britt, Ed.; Higbee, Jeanne L., Ed.

This collection of papers includes: "Introduction: Why Should We Discuss 'Urban Literacy' in Developmental Education?" (Dana Britt Lundell and Jeanne L. Higbee); "History of the Center for Research on Developmental Education and Urban Literacy: 1996-2002" (Dana Britt Lundell); "The Traveling City: The Hudson's Store, Urban…

Strategies for Success: Achieving the National Urban Education Goals. Proceedings from Meetings with Representatives from 70 National Education, Business and Philanthropic Organizations.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Council of the Great City Schools, Washington, DC.

This document outlines 44 strategies for meeting the educational needs of urban areas by the year 2000. The strategies are based on six goals for urban education adapted from the national education goals issued by President George Bush and the National Governors' Association. The strategies were proposed by representatives from more than 70…

Wanted: Good Leaders for Urban Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Durden, Phyllis C.

2008-01-01

Differences in values and socio-economics, issues of diversity and equity, and changing educational expectations and structures challenge leadership preparation programs, particularly those in urban environments. This article focuses on discerning major urban education issues, defining constructs of leadership for urban schools, and identifying a…

PoLAR Voices: Informing Adult Learners about the Science and Story of Climate Change in the Polar Regions Through Audio Podcast

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Quinney, A.; Murray, M. S.; Gobroski, K. A.; Topp, R. M.; Pfirman, S. L.

2015-12-01

The resurgence of audio programming with the advent of podcasting in the early 2000s spawned a new medium for communicating advances in science, research, and technology. To capitalize on this informal educational outlet, the Arctic Institute of North America partnered with the International Arctic Research Center, the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and the UA Museum of the North to develop a podcast series called PoLAR Voices for the Polar Learning and Responding (PoLAR) Climate Change Education Partnership. PoLAR Voices is a public education initiative that uses creative storytelling and novel narrative structures to immerse the listener in an auditory depiction of climate change. The programs will feature the science and story of climate change, approaching topics from both the points of view of researchers and Arctic indigenous peoples. This approach will engage the listener in the holistic story of climate change, addressing both scientific and personal perspectives, resulting in a program that is at once educational, entertaining and accessible. Feedback is being collected at each stage of development to ensure the content and format of the program satisfies listener interests and preferences. Once complete, the series will be released on thepolarhub.org and on iTunes. Additionally, blanket distribution of the programs will be accomplished via radio broadcast in urban, rural and remote areas, and in multiple languages to increase distribution and enhance accessibility.

The impact of selected educational factors on the academic achievement of secondary students

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Epps, Bernethia Mechelle

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of related educational factors on the mathematics and science achievement of secondary students. The researcher compared the variables of instructional design, economic status and retention against the exit level scores on the mathematics and science Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) test of 11th grade students. The technique used for this investigation was a Three-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). Three hundred thirty five students from an urban school district in a metropolitan area in southeast Texas participated in this study. Ex-post facto data obtained from the district's student information system was utilized. Based on the results, the following conclusions were drawn. (1) Instructional design does impact mathematics and science achievement of students at the secondary level. (2) Retention during a student's ninth grade year does impact mathematics and science achievement. (3) The interaction of instructional design and retention does impact the mathematics and science achievement of students at the secondary level. (4) Economic status as a main effect or as an interaction effect does not impact mathematics and science achievement of students at the secondary level. For those seeking to explore this topic in greater depth, recommendations for further investigations might consider the study of teacher perceptions and attitudes toward students who attend school in the alternative setting. Additionally, future investigations might look into the level of experience and the reasons teachers choose to teach in the alternative setting.

Parent Involvement Practices of High-Achieving Elementary Science Students

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Waller, Samara Susan

This study addressed a prevalence of low achievement in science courses in an urban school district in Georgia. National leaders and educators have identified the improvement of science proficiency as critical to the future of American industry. The purpose of this study was to examine parent involvement in this school district and its contribution to the academic achievement of successful science students. Social capital theory guided this study by suggesting that students achieve best when investments are made into their academic and social development. A collective case study qualitative research design was used to interview 9 parent participants at 2 elementary schools whose children scored in the exceeds category on the Science CRCT. The research questions focused on what these parents did at home to support their children's academic achievement. Data were collected using a semi-structured interview protocol and analyzed through the categorical aggregation of transcribed interviews. Key findings revealed that the parents invested time and resources in 3 practices: communicating high expectations, supporting and developing key skills, and communicating with teachers. These findings contribute to social change at both the local and community level by creating a starting point for teachers, principals, and district leaders to reexamine the value of parent input in the educational process, and by providing data to support the revision of current parent involvement policies. Possibilities for further study building upon the findings of this study may focus on student perceptions of their parents' parenting as it relates to their science achievement.

Student questions in urban middle school science communities of practice

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Groome, Meghan

This dissertation examines student questions within three Communities of Practice (CoP), all urban middle school science environments. The study analyzed student questions from a sociocultural perspective and used ethnographic research techniques to detail how the CoP's shaped questions in the classroom. In the first study, two case study girls attempted to navigate questioning events that required them to negotiation participation. Their access to participation was blocked by participation frameworks that elevated some students as "gatekeepers" while suppressing the participation of others. The next two studies detail the introduction of written questioning opportunities, one into a public middle school classroom and the other into an informal classroom. In both studies, students responded to the interventions differently, most notable the adoption of the opportunity by female students who do not participate orally. Dissertation-wide findings indicate all students were able to ask questions, but varied in level of cognitive complexity, and the diagnostic interventions were able to identify students who were not known to be "target students", students who asked a high number of questions and were considered "interested in science". Some students' roles were as "gatekeepers" to participation of their peers. Two out of three teachers in the studies reported major shifts in their teaching practice due to the focus on questions and the methods used here have been found to be effective in producing educational research as well as supporting high-need classrooms in prior research. In conclusion, these studies indicate that social factors, including participation frameworks, gender dynamics, and the availability of alternative participation methods, play an important role in how students ask science-related questions. It is recommended that researchers continue to examine social factors that reduce student questions and modify their teaching strategies to facilitate questioning. This data should be shared with teachers and teacher educators to inform them how to increase and use student questions as well as alternate participation methods that strive for "science for all". Future research should focus on how students act as "gatekeepers" for the participation and potential ways to shift underrepresented students into the STEM pipeline.

Inclusion in Urban Educational Environments: Addressing Issues of Diversity, Equity, and Social Justice. Issues in the Research, Theory, Policy, and Practice of Urban Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Armstrong, Denise E.; McMahon, Brenda J.

2006-01-01

This book is motivated by the authors' experiences in working with students and their families in urban communities. They are particularly concerned about the urgent imperative to address the endemic educational and societal challenges that pervade the lives of urban students, particularly those who live in poverty, are of minority and immigrant…

Who Decided College Access in Chinese Secondary Education? Rural-Urban Inequality of Basic Education in Contemporary China

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Li, Jian

2016-01-01

This paper investigates the rural-urban inequalities in basic education of contemporary China. The China Education Panel Survey (2013-2014) (CEPS) was utilized to analyze the gaps between rural and urban inequality in junior high schools in terms of three domains, which include the equalities of access, inputs, and outcomes. From the sociocultural…