From Practice to Research: Engaging Science Communicators with Educational Research They Can Use

该项目将推动学生和教师创新技术体验(ITEST)计划的努力，以更好地了解和促进提高学生在科学、技术、工程或数学(STEM)领域追求职业生涯的动机和能力的实践。该项目将开发和调查一种新的专业资源的可行性，旨在为科学家、科学传播者和非正式科学、技术、发动机(STEM)教育工作者的实际工作提供信息，努力让儿童、青年、家庭和成年人参与STEM的学术、职业和终身学习途径。与STEM接触公众的科学家、科学传播者以及正式和非正式的科学教育者(下称“STEM传播者”)很少接受过正规的教育培训，而且往往不熟悉成熟的循证方法，这些方法是包容性和有效参与教学的关键。华盛顿大学研究+实践合作实验室开发了一种新的专业资源，专为K-12领导人和教育工作者设计，称为实践简介，已在全国各地的NGSS实施工作中广泛传播和采用。该项目将为STEM通信员开发和试行一套约20个练习简报。该项目的成果将是：(A)记录非正式科学教育工作者、开发人员、设计师、科学传播者和其他人的研究兴趣和需求；(B)确定实践简报模式是否对STEM教育工作者有价值以及是否值得推广到新的主题和用途。这个探索性项目产生的工具可以支持这些非正式STEM教育工作者的实践，从而影响他们向公众提供的项目的质量。此外，与K-12对应的练习简报一样，为STEM教育工作者和其他人提议的新一套练习简报可能会通过与大型国家协会(如科学技术协会中心、美国科学促进会、全国扩大参与联盟等)的伙伴关系进行扩展，以向多样化的科学传播工作人员提供信息，并加强其更广泛影响工作的质量和成果，这些工作侧重于青年参与STEM劳动力发展。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 will advance efforts of the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program to better understand and promote practices that increase student motivations and capacities to pursue careers in fields of science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM). The project will develop and investigate the viability of a new kind of professional resource designed to inform the practical work of scientists, science communicators, and informal Science, Technology, Engine (STEM) educators undertaking efforts to engage children, youth, families and adults in STEM academic, career, and lifelong learning pathways. Scientists, science communicators and formal and informal science educators who engage the public with STEM (hereinafter "STEM communicators") seldom have formal training in education, and frequently are unfamiliar with well-established evidence-based approaches that are key to inclusive and effective pedagogies of engagement. The Research+Practice Collaboratory of the University of Washington has developed a new professional resource designed for K-12 leaders and educators called the practice brief, which has been widely disseminated and taken up in NGSS implementation efforts across the country. The project will develop and pilot a suite of approximately 20 practice briefs with and for STEM communicators. The results of this project will be (a) the documentation of research interests and needs of informal science eductors, developers, designers, science communicators and others (b) the establishment of evidence for whether or not the practice brief model is valuable to STEM educators and worthy of extension to new topics and uses. The tools produced by this exploratory project can support the practices of these informal STEM educators, thus impacting the quality of programs they offer the public. Additionally, like their K-12 counterpart practice briefs, the proposed new set of briefs for STEM educators and others can potentially be scaled, through partnerships with large national associations such as the Association of Science-Technology Center, American Association for the Advancement of Science, National Alliance for Broadening Participation, and others, to inform the diverse science communication workforce, and to strengthen the quality and outcomes of their broader impacts work focused on youth engagement towards STEM workforce development.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.