Shaping Innovative New Educators in STEM through Culturally Responsive, Sustaining, and Ecologically Grounded Hands-on Experiences and Professional Development

Moravian University, Bethlehem PA

Investigators

Abstract

This project aims to serve the national need for increasing the number of highly-qualified STEM educators, especially those serving students in high-need schools. The project will recruit prospective STEM majors and STEM professionals and provide scholarship support beginning in their junior year or stipend support for post-baccalaureate teacher certification. Scholars will be immersed in a combination of specialized coursework, field experiences, professional development and mentoring, educational nonprofit partnerships, and summer pre-teaching opportunities. The experiences and programmatic elements are designed to prepare teachers for success with youth who are most in need of highly-qualified and committed STEM educators. Scholars will develop rigorous and equitable practices that address their students’ academic, social, and emotional needs by working with a team of faculty in STEM, education, and psychology. The project at Moravian University includes partnerships with the Allentown School District, Bethlehem Area School District, Communities in School of Eastern Pennsylvania, and Lehigh Valley Summerbridge. Three project goals provide a framework for the principal investigators work. First is to recruit and increase the number of highly qualified and diverse STEM prospective teachers enrolled at Moravian University. Second is to prepare STEM teachers with innovative hands-on experiences and high-impact practices that provide them with the skills to become culturally responsive and highly effective educators in high-need school districts. Third and finally is to retain teachers by enhancing their support system of STEM educators to increase success as innovative, highly effective, long-term professionals in high-need schools. The program is guided by an ecologically grounded perspective on STEM teaching and learning. By emphasizing the importance of pedagogical content knowledge and culturally responsive teaching, this project has strong potential to prepare future educators for successful careers as STEM educators in high-need schools. The project aims to recruit and support a total of 28 undergraduate and post-baccalaureate scholars in biology, general science, computer science, and mathematics. By modeling STEM excellence in high-need schools, the project has the potential to prepare STEM teachers who will teach and inspire students to pursue careers in STEM. Project evaluation will assess the impact of support system on teacher success and retention. Results from the projects will be disseminated through various STEM teacher education conferences and journals such as the Journal of Biological Education and the Association of Science Teacher Education annual conference. This Track 1: Scholarship and Stipends project is supported through the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program (Noyce). The Noyce program supports talented STEM undergraduate majors and professionals to become effective K-12 STEM teachers and experienced, exemplary K-12 teachers to become STEM master teachers in high-need school districts. It also supports research on the effectiveness and retention of K-12 STEM teachers in high-need school districts. 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.