RET Site: Energize Teachers

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The “RET Site: Energize Teachers (ET-RET)” program at Tennessee Technological University (TTU) aims to offer real-world research experience to 30 teachers from rural and other communities with high populations of underrepresented individuals in STEM fields. Tennessee is home to the Nation’s largest public utility, largest U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) national laboratory (Oakridge National Laboratory), and a growing electric vehicle industry. These and other electric power-related industries in Tennessee demand a highly trained workforce in electric power generation, storage and distribution. At the same time, Tennessee has large expanses that include many rural school districts in need of teachers with high-level experience in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) disciplines. The three-year program focuses on a six week, on-campus, hands-on research experience wherein teachers will work directly with one of TTU’s engineering faculty in Electrical, Mechanical or Chemical Engineering. During that time, the teacher participants will also develop curricular modules for direct integration into existing or new courses that they will teach in subsequent terms at their home schools. A “hub” of teachers, university faculty and industry guests will be formed to establish a support network for both the research-trained RET teacher-graduates and other teachers to access. The hub will be a virtual entity where teachers can access input from experts on a wide-variety of energy-related topics. The “RET Site: Energize Teachers (ET-RET)” program at Tennessee Technological University (TTU) aims to offer real-world research experience to 30 teachers from rural and other communities with high populations of underrepresented individuals in STEM fields. The RET faculty team at Tennessee Technological University is actively engaged in research across a broad range of energy related topics including novel battery materials, material and electrochemical characterization and modeling of battery system technologies, novel methods for recovery of waste energy from structures and low-level heat sources and wireless power transfer technologies. These and other topics will provide a framework for research training of three cohorts of 10 teachers each over a period of three years. The goals are to improve the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) literacy of the teacher participants in an effort to elevate student competencies in the same areas and to increase the level of interest in STEM disciplines among students in rural and underserved communities in middle-Tennessee. The team plans to observe the RET-trained teachers and their students to improve the efficacy of the training using cycles of continuous improvement. A “hub” of teachers, university faculty and industry guests will be formed to establish a support network for both the research-trained RET teacher-graduates and other teachers to access. The hub will be a virtual entity where teachers can access input from experts on a wide-variety of energy-related topics.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.