Centered in Des Moines, Iowa, this project responds to the rapid ethnic and racial diversification occurring in America's heartland and addresses the challenge of the underrepresentation of minorities-both historical and newly arriving-in science. The goal of this project, Young Scientists and Ambitious Teachers Improving Health in an Urban Ecosystem, is to interrupt the reproduction of educational and health disparities in a low-income, urban context and to support historically-excluded youth in their trajectories toward science. To accomplish this, we collaborate with community organizations and local schools to support youth as they carry out a community-based participatory inquiry of mosquitoes and health, in which they access the Iowa Mosquito Surveillance database, the longest-standing mosquito data archive in the country. We use this youth-driven inquiry as a means to prepare educators to teach science in more authentic, ambitious, and culturally-responsive ways. By concurrently nurturing young scientists along with ambitious teachers, this project models a new approach for teacher preparation that is community-embedded. In addition, this project is central to Iowa State University's Pathways to College Initiative, a uniquely-configured promise program providing access and affordability to higher education for historically-excluded youth. The objectives of the project are three-fold. 1) Historically-excluded youth will develop authentic science knowledge, skills, and dispositions as well as curiosity, interest, and positive identification with science, and motivation for continued science study, by participating in a scientific community and engaging in the activities and discourses of the discipline. 2) Pre-service and in-service teachers will demonstrate competence in authentic and ambitious science teaching and model an affirming orientation toward cultural diversity in science. 3) Residents in the community will display more accurate understandings and transformed practices with respect to mosquitos in the urban ecosystem in service of enhanced health and well-being. The project illustrates a replicable way to address significant educational and health inequities in communities often marginalized from science. It will positively impact the orientations of participating youth and their educators toward science, as well as the health and well-being of community residents.
This project, Young Scientists and Ambitious Teachers Improving Health in an Urban Ecosystem, aims to interrupt the reproduction of educational and health disparities in a low-income, urban context in American's heartland. Resulting from youth-driven, community-based participatory inquiry of mosquitoes and health, residents will display more accurate understandings and transformed practices related to mosquito prevention and outdoor activity, which will translate into enhanced health and well-being. Thus, the project illustrates a replicable way to address significant educational and health inequities in communities often marginalized from science. It will positively impact the orientations of participating youth and their educators toward science, as well as the health and well-being of the youth and other community residents.
