This collaboration between the University of California at Berkeley (UCB) and the Chabot Space and Science Center (Chabot) is engaging local students, educators, and the public in hands-on activities and informal educational opportunities that focus on climate science and the measurement of air quality and greenhouse gases (GHG) in the greater San Francisco Bay Area. The project leverages a new network of ~250 research nodes with sensors that constantly collect atmospheric data (CO2, CO, NO2, O3, temperature and relative humidity) currently under development for deployment in the San Francisco Bay Area. Through this award, 22 nodes of the network that will provide data for use in K-12 educational programs administered by Chabot is being built and deployed. Seminars, classes, teacher trainings, website information and exhibits on the science of climate change that support the educational use of this network are being created to support in-service teachers and their students from four schools in the region, including the highly diverse Oakland Unified School District. Joint activities to bring UCB faculty, graduate students and undergraduate researchers into regular contact with the in-service teachers and K-12 students from the greater Bay Area are included in the project. Data collected through the sensor network offers a place-based teaching opportunity for students in the Chabot programs and at host site schools. An annual seminar to report on the scientific results of the study offers an additional opportunity for engagement of the K-12 students, teachers and members of the public who participate in Chabot's educational efforts. The project supports a developing regional alliance between the UCB Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) Program, the UCB Earth and Planetary Sciences Department and Atmospheric Science Center, Chabot and its partner, the Oakland Unified School District, for the specific purpose of increasing the participation of traditionally underrepresented students in the geosciences and STEM disciplines. The project provides a new model for integrating research, education and outreach that can be replicated in municipalities around the globe.
In this project we established an intertdiciplinary approach to K-12 teaching about the scientific method, about the Earth's climate and climate change. The project involved scientists from the University of California, Berkeley, who developed a new type of observing system for atmospheric CO2 and other gases that was installed on the roofs of schools in Oakland, Berkeley, El Cerrito and San Leandro, and educators from the Chabot Space and Science Center, who developed a teacher training program that brings the measurements from the roofs into the classroom. Berkeley scientists participated in the curriculum development and teacher training and visited the classrooms. Educators at Chabot brought the science to life for students of all ages. The direct access to observations by K-12 students is a unique feature of the project, one that allowed frank discussions with scientists about the process of going from observations to a unique idea that is supported by measurements. In additon to communicating facts and theories about the earth and its atmosphere, teaching about this process was an exciting element of the project. In some cases, students used hand held sensors to do their own experiments about sources of CO2 in their schools--in a few cases they found ventilation was inadequate and that unhealthy levels of CO2 were present in their classrooms--perhaps explaining why the students are sleepier in those classes than in others.
