This award provides funding for a 3 year standard award to support a Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) in Engineering Site program at the University of Delaware entitled, "Nature InSpired Engineering Research Experiences for Teachers (NISE-RET)," under the direction of Dr. Kenneth Barner.
The NISE-RET site is a collaborative effort involving five engineering departments, educational pedagogy, technology and program evaluation experts, and regional school districts. Working in concert, the multidisciplinary team will provide 30 (10 per year) pre-service and in-service secondary school Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) teachers serving the mid-Atlantic region with an immersive six-week summer program. The summer program will feature broad exposure to nature inspired research in an array of engineering disciplines, guided discovery and in-depth research in a chosen engineering discipline, and guided development of research inspired teaching modules to enhance existing standards-based curricula.
The NISE-RET site's broader impact is focused on the inclusion of participants serving high need schools and an emphasis on the development of universally accessible teaching modules. A particular emphasis will be placed on accessible experiments and multimodal/alternative output formats, such as tactile representations and audio graphs for individuals with visual impairments. Thus, the NISE-RET site initiatives and outcomes will directly impact high need students, including those with disabilities.
