GP:IN Geoscience Teaching Outdoors in NC (GET OUT in NC)

University Of North Carolina At Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill NC

Investigators

Abstract

The Institute for the Environment at the University of North Carolina (NC) at Chapel Hill, together with the NC Museum of Natural Sciences, will implement Geoscience Teaching Outdoors in NC (GET OUT in NC). The goal of this project is to support a diverse future workforce and STEM-literate public, by implementing educational programming on community resilience to climate change for secondary science teachers and youth. Over three years, GET OUT in NC will engage 40 secondary teachers from eastern NC in learning experiences in state parks, building their capability to incorporate current research on climate change impacts into their teaching. The project also will directly engage 50-60 high school aged youth in programming at the Greenville, NC location of the NC Museum of Natural Sciences, introducing diverse youth to education and careers in geosciences. NC State Parks and Martin County Schools also are collaborating on this project. The overarching goal of Geoscience Teaching Outdoors in NC (GET OUT in NC) is to support a diverse future workforce and STEM-literate public, specifically by engaging diverse youth in eastern North Carolina in geoscience research, education, and career pathways. The project has three primary objectives: (1) enhance secondary science teachers’ geoscience knowledge and pedagogy to enable them to engage their students in active geoscience learning; (2) increase knowledge of and interest in geosciences research and careers among high school aged youth through informal learning about local/regional climate change impacts and solutions; and (3) cultivate a geoscience learning ecosystem by supporting collaboration among educators, researchers, and natural resource professionals from local science centers and state parks, local school districts, and university geoscience departments. By interweaving two critical issues facing our society, namely the need for community resilience to climate change impacts and lack of diversity in geosciences, this project lays a foundation for diversifying the workforce while developing local solutions that can replicated broadly. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.