Science Teacher and Researcher (STAR) National Pilot Proposal

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The Science Teacher and Researcher (STAR) program addresses the science and mathematics teacher recruitment and retention crisis by creating a prestigious dual "teacher-researcher" career path in an innovative partnership between universities, K-12 districts, federal research agencies, and industry. STAR leverages existing federal research and development assets to help prepare a new generation of science and math teachers equipped with the skills to inspire more of our nation's students to choose STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) career paths. The STAR program has three main goals for addressing the crisis in science and mathematics teaching: 1) enhanced recruitment of high quality teachers, 2) improved teacher education and professional development, and 3) improved teacher retention rates. Founded and implemented in 2007 at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo on behalf of the California State University (CSU) system, STAR provides cutting edge research experiences and career development for teachers during the early critical years. The key experience of the STAR program is a paid summer research internship in a national laboratory or at a NASA research center. The internship includes weekly education seminars and workshops conducted by master teachers, science education faculty, and education staff at the research facility. By anchoring preservice teachers in a community of scientific practice, they better understand what it means to be a researcher as well as a teacher of science or mathematics. This pilot expansion of the STAR program, based on the success of the program in California, is funding 45 Noyce Scholars to become STAR Fellows with 20 in California and 25 in new pilot STAR university-laboratory partnerships in up to five other states. It is increasing the pool of STAR Fellows who are Noyce Scholars and allowing evaluation of the impact of the STAR program as a value-added component of Noyce programs across the country and contributing to the research literature on the impact of providing research experiences for preservice teachers.