Title of Project: Graduate Teaching Fellows in K-12 Education (GK-12) Track 2: SFSU/SFUSD Science Teachers and Research Scholars (STAR) Program Institution: San Francisco State University (SFSU) ,College of Science and Engineering(COSE) PI/Co-PI.s: John Stubbs, PI; Kimberly Tanner, Kathleen O.Sullivan, Gretchen Rollwagen Bollens, Co-PI.s Number of Fellows per year: 12 School District Partners: San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) Target audience of the project (K-12 grade band): Middle and High schools ,Grades 6-12 Setting: Urban NSF supported disciplines involved: Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Geosciences, Mathematics
The STAR Program is focused on individual partnerships between SFSU science graduate students and SFUSD teachers, working together on-site in middle and high schools to deliver high quality inquiry-based science instruction. This Track 2 project uses a three phase plan to institutionalize graduate student-teacher partnerships by replacing the NSF GK-12 Graduate Teaching Fellows (GTF) over 5 years with COSE Graduate Research and Teaching Partners (GRTP). These GRTP will be graduate students in the COSE who are working toward their Master's degree in a science content discipline (Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Geosciences, Mathematics), but have a new requirement added to their thesis, a Science Education component. The GRTP will take a series of pedagogy courses and, as a culminating experience, will participate in a 10 hour per week on-site partnership with a middle or high school teacher.
Intellectual Merit: The project contributes to the knowledge base of the emerging discipline of science education partnership, as well as pioneers strategies and structures for the integration of partnership efforts into the mission and goals of university science departments. The Fellows develop pedagogical skills and K-12 education advocacy as part of their graduate training. Teachers improve inquiry-based teaching methods and mentoring skills, and K-12 students experience enhanced science learning and gain access to diverse role models pursuing careers in science. The institutionalization plan is a creative focus that imbues science education outreach into traditional research degrees throughout the SFSU COSE.
Broader Impacts: The STAR Program partners, SFSU and the SFUSD, are both diverse urban educational institutions. The 60,000+ students in the SFUSD, 55% of which are from economically disadvantage families, represent over 50 ethnic backgrounds, with no single group representing >30% of the total student body. Moreover, the STAR Program draws from a diverse graduate and undergraduate population at SFSU in which ~20% are Latina/ African American students.Thus, this program will directly influence K-16+ students traditionally underrepresented in science, as well as disseminate a model for institutionalizing partnership programs to other urban institutions. The project expands the current science education partnership efforts at SFSU, establishes courses and reward structures that will sustain the effort beyond the term of the grant, and initiates new academic pathways in existing COSE Master's degree programs to involve graduate students in science education partnership efforts as part of their scientific training.
Results from Track 1: GTF (27 to date) have improved their skill in devising effective science learning activities and have committed to continued outreach in their careers. Partner teachers have a renewed sense of enthusiasm for teaching science, documented in external evaluation surveys. The GTF-teacher partners have made grade-specific adaptations of over 80 inquiry-based lesson plans to date, with direct impact on ~1500 students in 5 middle schools (4 inner city) and 1000 students in six high schools( 4 inner city). The inner city schools have >60% Latina/African American student populations. All partner teachers(14 MS, 16 HS) report that students have significantly increased interest in science activities as a direct result of GTF presence. From experience gained in Track 1, procedures have evolved which establish effective GTF-teacher partnerships prior to semester startup. Finally, the Track 1 experience has resulted in a very close partnership between the SFUSD and SFSU, which will allow for rapid and smooth implementation of the Track 2 STAR Program. Finally, the COSE administration has become a strong advocate of institutionalizing the GK-12 model as a component of science graduate degrees.
This project is partially supported by the Directorate for Biological Sciences.
