RET in Engineering and Computer Science SITE: Research Experience for Teachers on Cyber-Enabled Technologies

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Cyber-enabled technologies are increasingly more critical for addressing national challenges like security, economic competitiveness, and innovation. It is therefore imperative that current and future generations of teachers are prepared to meet the needs of a diverse, cyber-saavy workforce. This renewal RET Site at Florida International University will continue providing opportunities that nurture teachers’ unrealized research potential while meeting the need to increase diversity in this rapidly growing field. The site has already hosted 78 high school STEM teachers, representing 42 schools across the Miami-Dade district, and aims to prepare an additional 49 teachers with this renewal award. Through the immersive 6-week summer program, high school STEM teachers will be paired with faculty mentors to conduct cutting-edge research that will deepen their content knowledge, build related curriculum and classroom activities, and support their students’ career choices in this area.This award supports the renewal of a Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) Site focused on cyber-enabled technologies at Florida International University (FIU). The primary goals of the RET site are to (1) build long-term collaborative partnerships between K-12 STEM teachers and the research community; (2) increase K-12 teachers’ knowledge of cyber-enabled technologies; (3) increase K-12 teachers’ technology competency through research and professional development programs; and (4) assist teachers in developing class curriculum based on this experience. This site will provide participants an opportunity to engage in high-quality cutting-edge research during a six-week summer program under the mentorship of faculty. The program will serve 49 STEM teachers who teach grades 9-12 and live within commuting distance of FIU. Research projects are centered on emerging cyber-enabled technologies, including internet of things, adversarial machine learning, social networks, and security. An important objective of the program is for the teachers to transfer their research experience to their classrooms. To accomplish this, teachers meet weekly and work closely with faculty, staff, students, and each other to collectively consider ways to communicate the concepts and research process used during the summer to their students, and to develop educational modules based on their exposure through the summer. Other career development program activities include weekly seminars, field trips, workshops, and academic year follow-ups.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.