Projects

The fundamental purpose of this project is to support teacher practice and professional learning around oral scientific argumentation in order to improve the quality of this practice in classrooms. The key outcome of this work will be a research-informed and field-tested prototype to improve the quality of teaching and learning argumentation in middle school science classrooms usable in different learning environments.

This project is developing and researching customization tools to support teachers’ instructional shifts to achieve equitable sensemaking in middle school science classrooms. These tools will help teachers to better notice and leverage the ideas and experiences of non-dominant students to support all students in equitable sensemaking.

This project is developing and researching customization tools to support teachers’ instructional shifts to achieve equitable sensemaking in middle school science classrooms. These tools will help teachers to better notice and leverage the ideas and experiences of non-dominant students to support all students in equitable sensemaking.

This project will test and refine a teaching model that brings together current research about the role of language in science learning, the role of cultural connections in students' science engagement, and how students' science knowledge builds over time. The outcome of this project will be to provide an integrated framework that can guide current and future science teachers in preparing all students with the conceptual and linguistic practices they will need to succeed in school and in the workplace.

This project is (1) conducting a qualitative study on the way facilitators use Math for All (MFA), an NSF-supported set of professional development materials for teachers who teach elementary school students with disabilities; (2) developing resources based on that study for teacher leaders and other facilitators of professional development; and (3) conducting fieldtests of the resources to examine their usefulness and impact.

This project focuses on developing anti-racist mathematics teaching and learning practices that have led to inequitable school experiences for Black, Indigenous, and Latinx students. This study is a partnership with school and central office leaders from one district and educational researchers from three universities with expertise in both educational leadership and mathematics education. Partnership activities include documenting how leaders learn and develop anti-racist leadership practices and then measuring the impact on teachers’ instruction and students’ experiences.

The Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) will host a workshop that brings together NSF-funded teams working on midscale research infrastructure incubator projects for STEM education research with a focus on education equity. ICPSR will share information, resources, and support incubator teams in developing and managing mid-scale infrastructure projects. These incubator projects have identified research infrastructure gaps related to assessments, teacher practices, and digital tools to support student learning and have proposed pilot tools, cyberinfrastructure, large-scale datasets, etc., for filling these gaps. To scale these pilots, the teams will need to successfully develop proposals to create mid-scale research infrastructure (Midscale RI). However, Midscale RI proposals require specialized knowledge that is not common within the STEM education research community and thus may limit the community’s ability to develop competitive Midscale RI proposals.

This project will explore how a nationally implemented professional development model is applied in two distinct Indigenous communities, the impact the model has on teacher practice in Native-serving classrooms, and the model's capacity to promote the integration of culturally responsive approaches to STEM teaching.

Although there is a push to integrate artificial intelligence (AI) in K-12 education, the novelty of AI means that little is known about what schools, teachers, students, and parents know, need, and expect regarding AI in classrooms. The lack of access to AI knowledge and training is especially significant in rural high-needs communities where schools are under-resourced. This year-long partnership development project will seek to strengthen and expand existing research-practice partnerships (RPPs) with East Tennessee teachers and school leaders, develop new RPPs with parents and students enrolled in East Tennessee middle and high schools, and co-construct a shared vision for AI that aligns with the needs and assets of the partner community.

This project will collaborate with Indigenous communities to create educational resources serving Inupiaq middle school students and their teachers. The Cultural Connections Process Model (CCPM) will formalize, implement, and test a process model for community-engaged educational resource development for Indigenous populations. The project will contribute to a greater understanding of effective natural science teaching and science career recruitment of minority students.

Science in the Learning Gardens (SciLG) designs and implements curriculum aligned with Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) and uses school gardens as learning contexts in grade 6 (2014-2015), grade 7 (2015-2016) and grade 8 (2016-2017) in two low-income urban schools. The project investigates the extent to which SciLG activities predict students’ STEM identity, motivation, learning, and grades in science using a theoretical model of motivational development.

The purposes of this conference are to organize scholarly work about equity in science education and to broaden the set of scholars in science education who have equity as a focus.

This project will study implementation of an effective professional learning model for elementary science teachers that includes teacher leaders, administrators and university educators in a system perspective for improving science instruction in ways that make it sustainable.

This project will document factors explaining variations in science achievement across schools enrolling ethnically and linguistically diverse students. The research question is: what leadership and organizational features at the school level are associated with mitigating science achievement gaps? Researchers, in collaboration with school districts, will identify school leadership practices that can be connected with reductions in achievement gaps related to student ethnicity, English fluency, and social status.

This project will document factors explaining variations in science achievement across schools enrolling ethnically and linguistically diverse students. The research question is: what leadership and organizational features at the school level are associated with mitigating science achievement gaps? At the conclusion of the five-year project, the findings will take the form of recommendations about leadership practices and school organization that can be implemented in other school settings.

This project seeks to support emergent bilingual students in high school biology classrooms. The project team will study how teachers make sense of and use an instructional model that builds on students' cultural and linguistic strengths to teach biology in ways that are responsive. The team will also study how such a model impacts emergent bilingual students' learning of biology and scientific language practices, as well as how it supports students' identities as knowers/doers of science.

This project is studying three models of professional development (PD) to test the efficacy of a practicum for grade 3-5 in-service teachers organized in three cohorts of 25. There will be 75 teachers and their students directly impacted by the project. Additional impacts of the project are research results and professional development materials, including a PD implementation guide and instructional videos.

Building upon prior research on Head Start curriculum, this phase of Readiness through Integrative Science and Engineering (RISE) will be expanded to include classroom coaches and community experts to enable implementation and assessment of RISE in a larger sample of classrooms. The goal is to improve school readiness for culturally and linguistically diverse, urban-residing children from low-income families, and the focus on science, technology, and engineering will address a gap in early STEM education.

This project will develop, test, and refine a "train-the-trainer" professional development model for rural teacher-leaders. The project goal is to design and develop a professional development model that supports teachers integrating culturally relevant computer science skills and practices into their middle school social studies classrooms, thereby broadening rural students' participation in computer science.

This project will examine the relationship between teacher professional development associated with newly developed modules in urban ecology and the achievement and engagement of long-term English learners (LTEL).  Existing Urban Ecology learning modules will be enhanced to accommodate the needs of LTELs, and teachers will participate in professional development aimed at using the new materials to effectively integrate academic science discourse and literacy development for LTELs.

This effectiveness study focuses on the scale-up of a model of curricular and teacher professional development intervention aimed at improving science achievement of all students, especially English language learners (ELLs). The model consists of three basic components: (a) inquiry-oriented science curriculum, (b) teacher professional development for science instruction with these students, and (c) school resources for science instruction.

This project will support a conference series, including an in-person gathering and virtual follow-up meetings, that will bring together teachers, researchers, education leaders, and instructional material designers to build a shared understanding of how to integrate the use of high-quality instructional materials with the benefits of localizing these materials to better address students’ contexts and backgrounds. By fostering dialogue, sharing models, and setting priorities for future research and design, the project seeks to build knowledge about inclusive, effective, and culturally responsive approaches to science instruction that will advance equitable science education in K–12 classrooms.

The project plans to develop and study a series of metacognitive strategies that support learning and engagement for struggling middle school students during makerspace experiences. The study will focus narrowly on establishing a foundational understanding of how to ameliorate barriers to engaging in design learning through the use of metacognitive strategies. The project plans to translate and apply research on the use of metacognitive strategies in supporting struggling learners to develop approaches that teachers can implement to increase opportunities for students who are the most difficult to reach academically.

Project Accelerate blends the supportive structures of a student's home school, a rigorous online course designed specifically with the needs of under-served populations in mind, and hands-on laboratory experiences, to make AP Physics accessible to under-served students. The project could potentially lead to the success of motivated but under-served students who attend schools where the opportunity to engage in a rigorous STEM curriculum is not available.

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.