CADRE Summer 2009 Newsletter

Greetings from CADRE

Dear Colleagues,

CADRE (originally known as the DR-K12 Resource Network) will soon complete its first year. Our major task this year has been an analysis of the DR-K12 portfolio, examining the projects from many perspectives, and resulting in a comprehensive look at the first two cohorts. The analysis will help NSF to better understand the scope and depth of research and development on STEM resources, models, and technologies. We will also identify some of the gaps! The analysis will help us to define similarities among projects in order to identify various communities within the portfolio, and to learn about the projects' common challenges and needs. Most importantly, we will soon achieve our goal of giving PIs greater specifics about their colleagues' projects.

We plan to present the analysis at the DR-K12 PI Meeting, November 8-10, 2009. At the same time, we expect to introduce the CADRE website for PIs who want information related to DR-K12 projects. We would not have been able to begin the site development without the wisdom and guidance of PIs who have shared their views about effective (and ineffective) websites. We appreciate their candor in answering the question that is at the core of CADRE: Given the realities of a PI's professional life, what can CADRE do that is both valuable and easily accessible?

In the course of developing the portfolio analysis and website, we met with our advisors, who generously shared their time, experience, and expertise. We also established planning groups on three topics: student assessment, English language learners, and dissemination. To these groups, we are asking a similar question: Given all your existing professional networks, what would be compelling about developing a working group or special interest group specific to the DR-K12 community? What would be the best approaches for doing this? Again, we appreciate the time and ideas of these individuals.

Over the year, we have developed several indices of dissemination vehicles for your work. You can find them in our first newsletter and in the paragraphs that follow. If you have additions that might be useful to other PIs, please let us know. A white paper on dissemination to policy and practice communities is in development.

We are optimistic about the possibilities for Year Two. The first year was largely a planning year, and we are pleased that our support system is up and running and is based on the needs and interests of PIs. There will be a CADRE booth at the PI Meeting, and we hope you will come by, pick up additional information, and talk to the team.

Sincerely,
Barbara Brauner Berns for the CADRE Team
CADRE Principal Investigator

Event: 2009 DR-K12 PI Meeting

Building the Knowledge Base of Teacher Learning in STEM Education

Capital Hilton Hotel
Washington, D.C.
November 8-10, 2009

Registration has begun for the 2009 DR-K12 PI meeting. We welcome DR-K12 awardees along with TPC and IMD grantees, NSF program officers, and special guests. This is the last meeting in a series of five supported through a grant to Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC). EDC, along with Abt Associates and Policy Studies Associates, are happy to be able to provide more comprehensive support to DR-K12 grantees in the future through CADRE, the resource network.

The 2009 PI meeting will include PI-led sessions that focus on project work related to teacher knowledge, practice, and development; curriculum and assessment; research design and methodology, and program management. In addition, PI-facilitated special interest groups will offer grantees with an interest in topics such as social networking, early childhood STEM education, diverse teaching and learning contexts, language and discourse the opportunity to gather and informally discuss their work and issues related to the topic.

Highlights of the meeting include:

If you haven't already registered, please register now. Spaces are limited and only available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Projects & People: CADRE Working Groups

CADRE has three working groups underway, focusing on assessment, ELL, and dissemination and partnerships. Each group will convene at the 2009 DR-K12 PI Meeting.

Student Assessment Working Group:
Updated 10/13/09
This group will assemble at the DR-K12 PI Meeting to begin planning support activities that will meet the needs of PIs over the duration of the network. As a first step, CADRE is mapping the grants that have been funded in the three cohorts of DR-K12. This will give us a landscape to plan supports and resources that add value to the work of PIs as well as to identify expertise and needs that exist within the current DR-K12 community. The initial planning group included the following PIs: Jere Confrey, Angela DeBarger, Geneva Haertel, Heather Hill, Diane Ketelhut, Cathy Kinzer, Min Li, Xiufeng Liu, Robert Mislevy, Jim Pellegrino, Bill Penuel, Guillermo Solano-Flores, and Mark Wilson.

If you are interested in joining this working group and contributing to a long-term agenda in student assessment, please email Catherine McCulloch (cmcculloch@edc.org). We will meet at the PI Meeting on Monday, November 8, at 6:30pm.

ELL Working Group:
Updated 10/13/09
Does your project pay special attention to the needs of English language learners? We have developed a working group to bring together leaders of projects that are developing resources, models, and tools to advance STEM teaching and learning for this student population. To date, this group includes Carole Beal, Marco Bravo, Kathryn Chval, Barbara Crawford, Mark Driscoll, Dan Heck, Beverly Irby, Cathy Kinzer, Rafael Lara-Alecio, Kate McNeill, and Guillermo Solano-Flores.

This group will convene at the PI Meeting on Sunday, November 8, from 2:30-4:30pm to learn about each other's work and challenges. If you would like to participate, please email Lisa Marco (lmarco@edc.org). We will contact you to learn your interests and needs.

CADRE Dissemination Session: Bridging to Practice
Monday, November 9, from 8:00-9:30am
Updated 10/13/09
If you have a project that is developing resources, models, or technologies for eventual use in the classroom, you may want to participate in this thought-provoking session on dissemination. Regardless of where you are in your R&D cycle, the chances of your project's results reaching the classroom can benefit from early efforts to build on existing partnerships and increase usability. This working session will explore traditional and nontraditional strategies for increasing the likelihood that resources, models, and technologies will be successfully disseminated to practitioners. Participants will also discuss options for future dissemination activities under the CADRE umbrella that will bring together researchers, developers, K–12 educators, policymakers, and other partners to develop practical tools and knowledge for dissemination. All DR-K12 grantees are welcome!

Please contact Derek Riley (driley@policystudies.com or 202-939-5304) if you plan to participate and/or if you have questions or suggestions.

 

 

Projects & People: 2009-2010 CADRE Fellows

The CADRE Fellows program provides a small number of emerging researchers and developers working with PIs on DR-K12 projects with the opportunity to attend the 2009 DR-K12 PI meeting and engage in ongoing professional support. This is a significant professional development experience for early career researchers and developers to gain exposure beyond their particular project and institution and to learn about research and development from across the country related to STEM education. Fellows will have the opportunity to experience an NSF PI meeting alongside their own PI, network with PIs and fellows from across the country, and gain insights into NSF and what it takes to be successful and effective in this work.

The application deadline has been extended to October 2, 2009.

Learn more and download an application, here.

 

Projects & People: CADRE Advisory Board Meeting

A public thanks to the CADRE Advisory Group, who met in Boston for several days in May. With their guidance and thoughtful recommendations, we were able to confirm that many of our plans were, in fact, on target. We also learned that we had to think longer and harder about other ideas. The meeting concluded with one important marching order: as frequently as possible, CADRE supports (meetings, website, publications) will be co-designed by PIs but coordinated by CADRE staff.

Our appreciation to the following for their participation in the advisory meeting and for the ways in which they have provided consultation since that time. Advisors include both PIs and members of the larger research community. A complete list of advisors and their bios are available here.

Resource: Dissemination Index of Networks and Social Media

For your convenience, we have compiled a new index of networks and social media to aid in disseminating knowledge and products and developing partnerships with stakeholders and end users. The networks and social media in the index provide opportunities to learn from and participate in dialogue with practitioners and policymakers about current salient issues in STEM education. The index includes information on content focus, network membership, and media audiences. In addition, we have updated the index of STEM conferences and the index of STEM publications. Please let us know if having this information in one place works for you!

Download:

Index of STEM Networks and Social Media
Index of STEM Conferences
Index STEM Publications

Resource: 2010 DR-K12 Solicitation

Preliminary proposals are back!

Preliminary Proposal Deadline: October 5, 2009 (due by 5:00pm proposer's time)
Full Proposal Deadline: January 7, 2010

View a list of announced 2009 DR-K12 awardees here. We will update this list as additional announcements are made.

Resource: Website Development

The CADRE website (currently in development) was informed by input from DR-K12 PIs. We learned that PIs are very interested in identifying projects doing similar work and learning more about each other's successes, challenges, resources, and findings. PIs also expressed an interest in learning more about NSF processes and expectations, learning about resources and events related to their work, and identfying new funding and partnering opportunities. In response, the CADRE website will provide advanced tools to explore and learn about other projects, secure spaces to share successes and challenges with DR-K12 colleagues, tools to facilitate collaboration around topics of interest, opportunities to disseminate to public and DR-K12 audiences, and a library of tools and resources to support and advance your work. We expect to introduce the website at the PI Meeting, November 8-10, 2009.

The website is meant to serve the needs of the CADRE community. To that end, we invite you to test the alpha version of this site in October. If you are interested in volunteering, please contact Amy Busey (abusey@edc.org).

If you would like to learn more about the website or are interested in having your project featured on the site, please contact Amy Busey (abusey@edc.org).

Contact Us

If you want additional information about CADRE or have specific questions, please contact Amy Busey (abusey@edc.org).