Projects

The goal of this project is to build teacher capacity for integrating computational thinking (CT) into grades 6–8 science classrooms. The project will support teacher professional vision and adaptive expertise for CT-infused instruction through instructional coaching, professional development workshops, and an online professional learning community. These efforts aim to empower teachers to design, enact, and adapt CT-integrated lessons that foster students’ positive attitudes toward science and enhance their knowledge of science and CT.

This project explores how immersive field science experiences and carefully designed digital resources can help secondary teachers make science more engaging and relatable for students. The research team will study how teachers incorporate what they learn from real-world science experiences into their classroom teaching and whether online materials can replicate some of the same benefits. By improving both immersive and digital professional learning experiences, the project aims to increase access to and decrease the cost of high-quality instructional supports, especially for teachers who cannot attend traditional field-based learning.

The goal of this project is to build teacher capacity for integrating computational thinking (CT) into grades 6–8 science classrooms. The project will support teacher professional vision and adaptive expertise for CT-infused instruction through instructional coaching, professional development workshops, and an online professional learning community. These efforts aim to empower teachers to design, enact, and adapt CT-integrated lessons that foster students’ positive attitudes toward science and enhance their knowledge of science and CT.

As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes increasingly embedded in the technologies used by both students and teachers, it is essential for them to understand how to be safe while using AI. Furthermore, AI and cybersecurity technology together are better at detecting malicious activities than conventional security systems. The need to blend the two disciplines into a single, integrated curriculum for K-8 education is highlighted by the interconnectedness of AI and cybersecurity as complementary systems. This project will "plant the seeds" of these literacies by spiraling content on topics from computer programming, internet fundamentals, and introduction to data and AI along with cybersecurity topics in small doses throughout students' K-8 education. This project will lay the foundation for the students to eventually develop a comprehensive understanding of how different technologies work and interact.

As STEM education researchers work to improve STEM teaching and learning in schools and districts across the nation, rural communities are often overlooked. There is a definite critical need for STEM education research focused on rural communities. Rural schools typically have less funding for STEM programs, have trouble recruiting and retaining quality STEM teachers, and have less access to STEM learning opportunities. Yet, rural communities possess an abundance of ingenuity, resourcefulness, and collective problem-solving skills. This project works to address this need by bringing together researchers, rural educators, and workforce leaders in rural communities to support the mutual exchange of knowledge and learning around pressing problems in rural K-12 STEM education, understanding rural ingenuity within teaching STEM, and STEM education's connection with the local workforce.

While simulations are powerful tools for scientific inquiry, most students need scaffolding to engage productively in simulation-based inquiry. This project will develop and study an automated feedback system designed to support middle school students' simulation-based inquiry into wildfires, floods, and hurricanes. The system, called Hazbot, will leverage advanced artificial intelligence (AI) technologies—including machine learning and large language models (LLMs)—to provide timely, personalized feedback as students investigate the three different natural hazards.

As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes increasingly embedded in the technologies used by both students and teachers, it is essential for them to understand how to be safe while using AI. Furthermore, AI and cybersecurity technology together are better at detecting malicious activities than conventional security systems. The need to blend the two disciplines into a single, integrated curriculum for K-8 education is highlighted by the interconnectedness of AI and cybersecurity as complementary systems. This project will "plant the seeds" of these literacies by spiraling content on topics from computer programming, internet fundamentals, and introduction to data and AI along with cybersecurity topics in small doses throughout students' K-8 education. This project will lay the foundation for the students to eventually develop a comprehensive understanding of how different technologies work and interact.

This project addresses a crucial need in K-12 science teacher education to respond to local school district needs for high-quality science teaching and the role of teacher education programs to develop programs that provide prospective teachers the best opportunity for success as science teachers. Specifically, the project aims to advance science teacher education by applying a pragmatic, iterative approach to developing teacher education program resources and tools that will support the implementation of evidence-based STEM teaching and learning practices in K-12 science classrooms. The project will identify evidence-based STEM teaching and learning practices through a systematic review of K-12 STEM education research and resources. Rather than generate new evidence, the project leverages the evidence that already exists to support educators in adapting and sustaining existing high-quality practices that have already demonstrated positive impacts on students' STEM learning.

Disengagement from mathematics during middle and high school is a widespread concern that contributes to lower academic achievement and diminished long-term participation in STEM fields. Research shows that students' beliefs about their ability to grow and improve—often referred to as growth mindsets—can significantly enhance motivation, persistence, and performance. However, classroom environments and teacher practices play a critical role in shaping these beliefs. This project evaluates a professional development program, Fellowship Using the Science of Engagement (FUSE), designed to help 6th through 9th grade math teachers adopt instructional practices that foster growth mindset-supportive learning environments. The program provides teachers with research-based insights into adolescent development, structured opportunities to revise their instructional language and feedback practices, and personalized guidance through AI-supported coaching. The study examines whether the FUSE program improves teacher mindsets, communication practices, and well-being, and whether these changes lead to increased student motivation, improved perceptions of classroom climate, and higher performance on state mathematics assessments.

The growing importance of data, data science and artificial intelligence (AI) in education, work, and personal and civic life has increased the need for all U.S. students to develop data literacy, statistical reasoning, and computational thinking skills. However, most middle school students—especially those with learning disabilities (SLD)—receive limited or no instruction in these areas. Data science and AI instruction is often limited to high school settings, narrowly framed within mathematics or science, and rarely designed with the flexibility to support learner variability. The purpose of this project is to develop and refine Data Adventures, a series of open-access, modular, and instructional experiences units designed to introduce middle school students to data literacy, computational thinking, and digital storytelling, while also promoting critical understanding of AI and its role in education, work technology, and everyday life.

Coding is a key part of computer science, and promoting opportunities that engage learners in coding is vital to the U.S. workforce development. This project builds upon prior research that created a free coding app, OctoStudio, which is widely available for use in elementary and secondary schools. The goals of the project are twofold: First, the team will develop and design features that broaden the technology so that it is more accessible for more users. Second, the team will explore the usability of these new features across potential users. The new features will have potential to allow blind and low vision users to meaningfully engage in coding, which ultimately benefits society by broadening the STEM workforce and bringing coding to a greater population of students.

This project synthesizes research on teacher learning to distill ideas and develop a new, deeper understanding of how preK-12 teacher professional learning in mathematics and science influences teacher beliefs, knowledge, and practice. This study will provide information that enables states, districts, and schools to elevate the quality of teacher professional learning in STEM to lead to more effective instruction that fosters more and better STEM student engagement and learning and motivates more students to choose STEM careers.

Significant resources have been invested in workforce development to ensure the world is prepared for the growth of the quantum industry, yet relatively little work has focused on K-12 education. This project will address the challenge of effectively engaging K-12 students in this new area and teaching them complex quantum science concepts by developing a toolkit of K-12 quantum frameworks that will serve as a guide for building student understanding of quantum concepts over time. This project will identify the alignment of content across grade levels required for teaching quantum within the disciplines of chemistry, physics, mathematics, and computer science.

Scientific argumentation is one of the eight essential practices in the Next Generation Science Standards. Over the past decade, various methods have been employed to help middle-school students develop argumentation skills in formal learning environments. Despite these efforts, teachers continue to face challenges in motivating and engaging students, particularly in addressing the increasingly varied needs of students. Additionally, districts and schools struggle to integrate these research-based methods into their curriculum in ways that gain buy-in from teachers, students, and stakeholders. To address these challenges, this partnership development project brings together the West Aurora School District in Illinois and Northern Illinois University to pursue two primary goals: (1) co-construct a research and development plan focusing on ways to enhance support and effectiveness in the teaching practice of scientific argumentation through technology, and (2) develop a model for building a design research partnership between a school district and a mid-size public university.

This project will develop a sustainable Research-Practice Partnership (RPP) model between the Worcester Public Schools (WPS) and the Learning Sciences Lab at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). Together, WPI and WPS will build the collaborative infrastructure for conducting impactful STEM education research within WPS. Specifically, the RPP will establish and document shared infrastructural systematic processes and materials, brainstorm and facilitate research ideas that address pressing issues in mathematics education, and build a community of trust among researchers, administrators, teachers, and families to make future research and implementation, innovation, and collaboration more impactful, accessible, and efficient.

The rapid onset of AI, and generative AI tools such as LLMs, amplify the need for AI literacies, including concepts, practices and ethics, for K-12 schools. Some AI literacy resources, such as AI4K12 and AI4ALL, have emerged, but it may be challenging for schools, particularly those in small districts, to navigate these resources. Furthermore, researchers need further guidance on how to support schools for AI literacy. These challenges for schools and researchers include how to coordinate planning across teachers, school leaders and researchers, how to implement across grade levels, classrooms, and content areas; how to provide training and preparation time to support lesson design and implementation; and how to support teachers in their own AI literacy. To address these needs, district leaders and teachers from Forest Park School District and researchers from the University of Illinois Chicago will engage in a one-year research practice partnership development to build a long-term RPP, co-design an AI literacy curriculum, and support professional development to implement the curriculum.

Socio-environmental issues are both a key to secondary student interest in science and a difficult terrain for teachers to navigate. Problems like climate change have not only scientific but also social, political, and ethical aspects. In order to prepare students for fully understanding such issues, attention needs to be given to how teachers can be supported and learn for effective instruction. This four-year project enacts and researches a teacher professional development program, “Teaching for the Anthropocene,” with middle and high school science teachers that brings a concept of "critical systems thinking." The project investigates how critical systems thinking may enhance teachers’ understanding of socio-environmental issues and support them to integrate those understandings into their curriculum and teaching. The project also identifies potential challenges educators may face as well as what local conditions and program supports help them practically apply critical systems thinking in their classrooms.

Socio-environmental issues are both a key to secondary student interest in science and a difficult terrain for teachers to navigate. Problems like climate change have not only scientific but also social, political, and ethical aspects. In order to prepare students for fully understanding such issues, attention needs to be given to how teachers can be supported and learn for effective instruction. This four-year project enacts and researches a teacher professional development program, “Teaching for the Anthropocene,” with middle and high school science teachers that brings a concept of "critical systems thinking." The project investigates how critical systems thinking may enhance teachers’ understanding of socio-environmental issues and support them to integrate those understandings into their curriculum and teaching. The project also identifies potential challenges educators may face as well as what local conditions and program supports help them practically apply critical systems thinking in their classrooms.

STEM learning is a function of both student level and classroom level characteristics. Though research efforts often focus on the impacts of classrooms level features, much of the variation in student outcomes is at the student level. Hence it is critical to consider individual students and how their developmental systems (e.g., emotion, cognition, relational, attention, language) interact to influence learning in classroom settings. This is particularly important in developing effective models for personalized learning. To date, efforts to individualize curricula, differentiate instruction, or leverage formative assessment lack an evidence base to support innovation and impact. Tools are needed to describe individual-level learning processes and contexts that support them. The proposed network will incubate and pilot a laboratory classroom to produce real-time metrics on behavioral, neurological, physiological, cognitive, and physical data at individual student and teacher levels, reflecting the diverse dynamics of classroom experiences that co-regulate learning for all students.

To successfully understand and address complex and important questions in the field of environmental science, many kinds of communities’ knowledge about their local environment need to be engaged. This one-year partnership development project involves a collaboration to design an approach that would yield opportunities for K-12 students to learn about environmental science in ways that honor both traditional STEM knowledge and Native ways of knowing among the Pomo community in California.

Progress in science is motivated and directed by uncertainties. Yet even though uncertainty is a crucial fulcrum for scientific thought, school students are taught science within an overarching assumption that scientific knowledge is certain. This project explores the intellectual leverage of enabling middle school students to experience how scientific work grapples with uncertainty. The overall goal of this project is to understand how teachers can create equitable learning environments for culturally and linguistically diverse learners using Student Uncertainty for Productive Struggle as a pedagogical model in middle school science classrooms.

Providing computer science (CS) education to students prior to high school is critical for catalyzing their interest in CS and closing achievement and development gaps. However, the retention rate for underrepresented group participants in middle school CS teacher preparation programs is lower than that for their peers. The resulting lack of diversity in CS teachers contributes to students’ inequitable access to quality middle school CS education. In this project will investigate effective design and implementation strategies of CS teacher preparation programs aimed to increase the number of middle school CS teachers from underrepresented groups.

With recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI), the United States needs to develop a diverse workforce with strong computational skills and the knowledge and capability to work with AI. Recent studies have raised questions about the extent to which youth are aware of AI and its application in industries of the future that may limit their interest in pursuing learning that lead toward careers in these industries. To address this challenge, learning trajectories (LTs) will be developed and researched for AI concepts that are challenging for middle and high school students. The project will design and pilot test learning activities and assessments targeting these concepts based on the LTs, offer teacher professional development on the LTs and related activities, and research the effectiveness of the LT-based activities when implemented by teachers during the regular school day.

Professional learning communities (PLCs) are one common model for teachers to collaborate and learn from one another. The goal of this study is to understand how teachers' expertise is positioned in a PLC and the larger system of the school and district to inform mathematics teaching and learning. This should help schools and districts understand the features of PLCs that are important for supporting teachers as they collaborate and learn.

While research has identified some features of professional development that impact teacher and student outcomes, there is still much mathematics education researchers do not know regarding which design features are most impactful to learning and how specific features of professional development connect to teacher learning. This project will investigate six prior NSF-funded professional development projects looking for features of the professional development associated with teacher uptake and learning, such as how the establishment of community or norms of collaboration support teachers’ long-term classroom practice.