GP-IN: GLOBE Youth Geoscientists Program

全球青年地球科学家(GYG)项目将产生一种非正式STEM教育的创新模式，支持不同的贫困高中生过渡到中学后教育和地球科学职业。它将利用科学家从全球方案--全球学习和观察造福环境--开发的数据收集协议，提供基于项目的实践科学体验，以吸引青年成为贡献科学知识的年轻专业人员。这些体验将伴随着与成人STEM专业人员的互动、职业探索、大学准备和自我反省活动，所有这些都是在安全和支持性的环境中进行的。该项目将有助于缩小学生获得真正的地球科学体验的关键差距，作为建立科学能力、信心、动力和归属感的一种手段。此外，大学探索和准备活动将通过提供大学和职业导航技能、大学校园之旅、与大学生互动的机会以及可以帮助申请大学和经济援助的组织的链接，为处于教育关键和脆弱过渡点的学生提供支持--从高中到大学的桥梁。这样做的目的是为了支持和激励。这一合作关系将促进与科学家、行业专业人士和大学的接触，并将通过支持基于学生暑期经历的高级项目和大学申请程序，与学生的学年教师建立联系。WestEd将与其合作伙伴--加州大学伯克利分校的劳伦斯科学馆(The Hall)和学院和职业学院支持网络(CCASN)--一起实施这一项目。该计划将结合全球学习和观察惠及环境(全球)、职业发展经验、大学准备和青年发展/领导战略，为加利福尼亚州旧金山湾区东湾区新兴的高年级学生构建可复制的夏季地球科学体验，这些高年级学生在STEM职业生涯中传统上代表不足，否则他们在教育生涯的这个关键时刻可能得不到重要的支持。GYG利用全球学生主导的科学方法，将过去的工作扩展到非正式的暑期学习环境中。它还将创建一个明确的大学准备部分，与IUSE：GEOPATHS倡议的目标一致。GYG计划将采取生态系统方法来支持青年，吸引科学家和STEM专业人员作为生态系统的关键参与者。该项目的目标如下：1)为来自科学界代表性不足的人口的当地学生创造一种融入全球的丰富的地球科学研究体验，以支持他们进入大学和为职业做好准备。2)扩大WESTED和CCASN之间的密切合作，将劳伦斯科学馆包括在内，并在科学馆建设能力，以维持这笔赠款以外的全球性节目编制。3)为未得到充分服务的青年提供一种学习丰富的地球科学体验的模式，其他非正式学习组织可以复制这种模式，支持当地学校，提供暑期学习和中学后准备，并实现促进大学和职业准备的学校的政策目标。评估部分将帮助记录该模型的组成部分和流程，并有助于建立关于STEM、STEM职业发展和上大学、行业参与和有助于学生取得积极结果的项目特点的年轻人参与的知识库。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。

The GLOBE Youth Geoscientists (GYG) project will produce an innovative model for informal STEM education that can support transitions for diverse underserved high school students to postsecondary education and careers in the geosciences. It will provide hands-on, project-based science experiences using scientist-developed data collection protocols from the GLOBE program — Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment — to engage youth as young professionals contributing to scientific knowledge. These experiences will be coupled with interactions with adult STEM professionals, career exploration, college preparation, and self-reflection activities, all within a safe and supportive setting. The program will help close a critical gap for students to obtain a real geosciences experience as a means to build competence, confidence, motivation, and belonging in the sciences. In addition, college exploration and preparatory activities will support students at a critical and vulnerable transition point in their education — bridging from high school to college — by providing college and career navigation skills, tours to college campuses, opportunities to interact with college students, and links to organizations that can assist with college and financial aid applications. The aim is to support as well as inspire. The partnership will facilitate engagement with scientists, industry professionals, and colleges, and will connect with the students’ school-year teachers by supporting senior projects and college application processes that build on the students’ summer experiences.WestEd, together with its partners, the Lawrence Hall of Science (the Hall) and the College and Career Academy Support Network (CCASN), both at the University of California, Berkeley, will implement this project. The program will combine Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE), career development experiences, college preparation, and youth development/leadership strategies to build a replicable summer geosciences experience for rising seniors in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in California who are traditionally underrepresented in STEM careers and who might otherwise not receive important support at this critical juncture in their educational careers. GYG leverages GLOBE’s student driven approach to science to expand past work into an informal summer learning setting. It will also create an explicit college preparation component, consistent with the goals of the IUSE: GEOPATHS initiative. The GYG program will take an ecosystem approach to supporting youth, engaging scientists and STEM professionals as critical participants in the ecosystem. The goals of the project are as follows: 1) Create a GLOBE-infused learning-rich geoscience research experience for local students from populations underrepresented in the sciences to support their college entry and career readiness. 2) Expand the close collaboration between WestEd and CCASN to include the Lawrence Hall of Science and build capacity at the Hall to sustain GLOBE-infused programming beyond this grant. 3) Provide a model for a learning-rich geoscience experience for underserved youth that can be replicated by other informal learning organizations, in support of their local schools, offering summer learning and postsecondary preparation as well as fulfilling the policy goals of schools that promote college and career readiness. The evaluation component will help document the model’s components and processes and contribute to the knowledge base about engagement of youth from populations underrepresented in STEM, STEM career development and college-going, industry engagement, and program features that contribute to positive student outcomes.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.