The Effects of Teacher Participation in a Scientific Work Experience Program on Student Attitudes and Achievement: A Collaborative Multi-site Study

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Scientific Work Experience Programs for Teachers (SWEPTs) are laboratory-based training programs run in industry, university or government R&D settings. There are 72 SWEPTs currently existing in 34 states, with estimated annual expenditures between $11-15 million. However, there is limited evaluation data on the impact of SWEPTs and virtually no student outcome data.This project will follow the participants and their students of 8 SWEPT programs over 4 years (approximately 70 teacher and 140 classes). A comparable set of teachers and their students from the same schools will similarly be studied. Student performance will be determined through a common set of achievement measures created specifically for this study from the National Assessment of Education Progress instruments. Student attitude and classroom experience data will also be collected. Teacher data will include biographical information and classroom practices. Pre-post data will be collected each year of the study from both teachers and students. The study will be overseen by Dr. Silverstein at Columbia University for the 8 SWEPTs but the study will be carried out by Westat, Inc. The first year of this four-year study will be devoted to completing implementation arrangements.