The Science Teacher and Researcher (STAR) program addresses the science and mathematics teacher recruitment and retention crisis by creating a prestigious dual "teacher-researcher" career path in an innovative partnership between universities, K-12 districts, federal research agencies, and industry. STAR leverages existing federal research and development assets to help prepare a new generation of science and math teachers equipped with the skills to inspire more of our nation's students to choose STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) career paths. The STAR program has three main goals for addressing the crisis in science and mathematics teaching: 1) enhanced recruitment of high quality teachers, 2) improved teacher education and professional development, and 3) improved teacher retention rates. Founded and implemented in 2007 at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo on behalf of the California State University (CSU) system, STAR provides cutting edge research experiences and career development for teachers during the early critical years. The key experience of the STAR program is a paid summer research internship in a national laboratory or at a NASA research center. The internship includes weekly education seminars and workshops conducted by master teachers, science education faculty, and education staff at the research facility. By anchoring preservice teachers in a community of scientific practice, they better understand what it means to be a researcher as well as a teacher of science or mathematics. This pilot expansion of the STAR program, based on the success of the program in California, is funding 45 Noyce Scholars to become STAR Fellows with 20 in California and 25 in new pilot STAR university-laboratory partnerships in up to five other states. It is increasing the pool of STAR Fellows who are Noyce Scholars and allowing evaluation of the impact of the STAR program as a value-added component of Noyce programs across the country and contributing to the research literature on the impact of providing research experiences for preservice teachers.
As emphasized by the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), preparing K-12 students for future careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) requires engaging students in the doing of science, mathematics, and engineering. Founded in 2007, the STEM Teacher and Researcher Program (STAR) is an innovation in teacher preparation that addresses this challenge through a significant partnership between the California State University (CSU) system, the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program, and multiple federal agencies. STAR provides paid summer internships involving cutting-edge research at national laboratory facilities for pre-service and early career science and mathematics teachers. By anchoring pre-service teachers in a community of research practice, these future teachers come to better understand what it means to be researchers as well as a teachers of science and mathematics. The development of this “teacher-researcher†identity during formative years impacts teachers’ classroom practices, ability to motivate and prepare students to pursue STEM careers, and potential for assuming leadership roles in STEM education. Through support from the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program, the STAR National Pilot Project was established in 2010 to expand the STAR pre-service teacher-researcher model to a national scale. Through this effort, the STAR Program has grown and strengthened in the following significant ways over the past fours years: The total number of STAR Fellows has almost quadrupled, growing from 73 participants prior to 2010 to 281 in 2013, about a quarter of whom have participated in STAR for two or three summers. The total number of Noyce Scholars participating in STAR has increased more than tenfold, from 10 (14% of all participants) to 124 (44%). The total number of internships arranged by STAR has more than quadrupled from 85 to 355, of which 172 (48%) have been filled by Noyce Scholars. Founded in California, the program has expanded to include participants from 42 Noyce campuses in 17 states. The number of federal agencies involved has grown from two (NASA and Department of Energy) to six (including NSF, NOAA, NOAO, and DOD), and the number of participating laboratory facilities has grown from eight to 22. Through STAR, talented STEM majors join research teams at federal labs and engage in some of the nation’s most advanced science and engineering projects. These STAR Fellows are active contributors to their research teams and often conduct original research that adds new dimensions to ongoing investigations. The STAR Program is designed for Fellows to connect their research with their planned teaching careers. STAR Fellows meet within their lab cohort for weekly education workshops. During the workshops, which are facilitated by an experienced master teacher and university STEM education faculty member, participants explore ways to translate the research experience into their future classrooms in the context of the CCSS and NGSS. STAR Fellows present their research at national lab and STAR conferences and produce educational deliverables connecting their research experience to the classroom. Research posters resulting from the STAR Program are publicly available at http://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/star/. Evaluations of the impact of early research experiences on new STEM teachers have demonstrated positive gains related to teacher recruitment, preparation, and classroom practices. Survey and interview data document participants’ formation of identity as both researchers and teachers, as well as their deepened understanding of research practices and the nature of science. The data also demonstrates participants’ growth in self-efficacy as STEM teachers, enhanced prestige placed in the profession of teaching, and increased commitment to science and math teaching. The STAR Program was cited in Science (Tobias & Baffert, 2012) as a uniquely important and exemplary teacher-researcher program that enhances professionalism in teaching. The intellectual merit of the STAR Program includes the development of a national program providing a substantial cohort of pre-service teachers who have participated in research. Studying this group provides the opportunity to investigate how research as part of teacher preparation impacts classroom practice and teacher retention. In addition, STAR Fellows have contributed to research discoveries in a variety of disciplines through their mentored research at national labs. The broader impact of the grant is that the number of pre-service teachers prepared as “teacher-researchers†has increased by a factor of four, and these additional 208 STAR Fellows will impact up to 30,000 students per year — preparing the next generation of STEM professionals.  Â
