This Minority K-12 Initiative for Teachers and Students (MKITS) application seeks to develop, evaluate, and disseminate new teaching materials centered on cardiovascular and pulmonary health. The purpose of this proposal is to utilize information from National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) supported basic and patient oriented clinical research as examples to create lessons and activities that effectively teach scientific and mathematical principles, health promotion, and disease prevention. In so doing, this program, titled Minority Opportunities in Research Education (MORE), will meet the NHLBI MKITS objectives of minority teachers and students (1) gaining scientific knowledge and research skills in heart, lung, blood and sleep disorders, (2) participating in research experiences related to cardiovascular and pulmonary health, and (3) developing career goals in science, research, and medicine. In San Antonio, TX, investigators at the University of Texas Health Science Center (UTHSCSA) have a 10 year history of successfully partnering with school teachers and school districts. For the present proposal, we designed six specific aims to achieve the long-range goals: 1. To recruit teachers of minority students into a discovery program of science education and curriculum development; 2. To deliver an interactive six-week seminar series on the scientific process as a means for answering questions and solving problems; 3. By creating interdisciplinary teams of teachers and scientists, to develop inquiry based instructional materials based on examples of NHLBI supported heart, lung, blood and sleep disorder research; 4. To develop a cohesive set of quantiative evaluation strategies to determine whether the new teaching materials improves, (a) knowledge and skills specific to State of Texas and National Standards for math and science curricular objectives, (b) knowledge specific to heart, lung, blood, and sleep disorders, and (c) the capacity to engage in the scientific process of discovery to test hypotheses; 5. To measure changes in students and teachers attitudes and beliefs about science as a career; 6. To disseminate the new teaching materials through the internet and teacher professional development workshops.
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