Enhancing Community College STEM Teaching through Faculty Development

该项目旨在通过完善以改善STEM教学为重点的教师专业发展模式，服务于高质量本科生STEM教育的国家利益。具体地说，该项目将支持教师创建STEM课程模块，其中包括公民参与和公平问题。社区大学为日益多样化的受众提供STEM教育。这种教育需要向学生提供STEM知识和技能，并使他们具备系统思维和公民参与工具。为了实现这些教育目标，该项目将通过开发课程模块，在与社会相关的背景下解决环境变化科学问题，帮助教师改进他们的STEM课程。这一方法可能为加强STEM的教与学提供一个可扩展的模式，同时扩大对STEM的参与，并使公民和科学家为21世纪的挑战做好准备。该项目通过整合两个课程设计框架：新公民参与和责任的科学教育以及公平伦理，建立并扩展了贝尔维尤学院和北西雅图学院成功的教师专业发展努力。该项目将开发一种新的专业发展课程，旨在支持STEM教师修改环境课程，以培养学生的公民参与、系统思维和公平意识技能。该项目将分析本课程模块方法与传统的全程方法的有效性。该项目计划在这两所学院聘用至少35名STEM教职员工和1800名STEM学生，如果该模式被其他院校采用，可能会影响更多的教职员工和学生。一个可转移的专业发展课程的设计将受益于两所学院的合作，这使得研究人员能够在两个不同的社区大学背景下试点、修订和实施课程。这两个背景将使大规模实施和比较评价成为可能。项目小组将全面评估专业发展课程对STEM教学的影响、模块对学生学习结果的影响，以及模块的纳入如何影响学生与公民参与和公平有关的系统思维技能。该项目的所有材料和成果将在地方、区域和国家范围内广泛传播。NSF IUSE：EHR计划支持研究和开发项目，以提高所有学生的STEM教育的有效性。这个1级项目是在参与学生学习轨道内的情况，通过该计划支持有前途的实践和工具的创建、探索和实施。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project aims to serve the national interest in high quality undergraduate STEM education by improving a faculty professional development model focused on improving STEM teaching. Specifically, this project will support faculty to create STEM course modules that include issues of civic engagement and equity. Community colleges provide STEM education to an increasingly diverse audience. This education needs to provide students with STEM knowledge and skills, as well as equip them with both systems thinking and civic engagement tools. To achieve these educational goals, the project will help faculty improve their STEM courses by developing course modules that address the science of environmental change within a socially relevant context. This approach may provide a scalable model for strengthening STEM teaching and learning, while simultaneously broadening participation in STEM and preparing citizens and scientists for 21st century challenges.This project builds upon and extends Bellevue College’s and North Seattle College’s successful faculty professional development efforts by incorporating two curriculum design frameworks: Science Education for New Civic Engagement and Responsibility and the Equity Ethic. The project will develop a new professional development curriculum intended to support STEM faculty as they modify environmental lessons to build students' civic engagement, systems thinking, and equity-minded skills. The project will analyze the effectiveness of this course module approach versus a traditional whole-course approach. The project plans to engage at least 35 STEM faculty and 1,800 STEM students at the two colleges, with the potential to impact many more faculty and students if the model is adopted by other institutions. The design of a transferrable professional development curriculum will benefit from the two-college collaboration, which enables the investigators to pilot, revise, and implement the curriculum in two different community college contexts. These two contexts will enable large scale implementation and comparative evaluation. The project team will conduct a comprehensive evaluation of the effects of the professional development curriculum on STEM teaching, the impact of the modules on student learning outcomes, and how incorporation of the modules affects students’ systems thinking skills as related to civic engagement and equity. All materials and results from this project will be broadly disseminated at local, regional, and national scales. The NSF IUSE: EHR Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. This Level 1 project is situation within the Engaged Student Learning track, through which the program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.