The article discusses the 4-H Science mission of the 4-H Youth Development Program, an out-of-school-time program addressing science technology engineering and mathematics (STEM) learning. It states that one of the approaches is on robotics education using a Junk Drawer Robotics curriculum having three levels: Give Robots a Hand, Robots on the Move, and Mechatronics, each level having modules that focus on science and engineering concepts.
The C2C award addresses the lack of validated instruments to measure teamwork and collaboration in middle and high school students in out of school time (OST) settings by implementing a rigorous four-phase process to develop new assessments. Phase 1 focuses on defining the construct of teamwork and collaboration skills so it aligns with the research literature and is relevant to outcomes in a variety of STEM OST programs. Construct maps are developed during Phase 2 to guide item development. The instruments are piloted in Phase 3 through think-aloud interviews and survey administration with a diverse set of youth and programs. Through an iterative process, items are revised or removed based on their psychometric properties. The final phase is a national field test with a cross-section of STEM OST programs. C2C's intellectual merit is its potential to advance understanding of how to measure teamwork and collaboration skills in STEM OST programs. There is a national call for more measures to evaluate 21st century skills. C2C's creation of instruments to measure teamwork and collaboration skills in STEM OST programs helps to address this gap. The work of C2C addresses broader impacts and benefit society by creating tools to understand the role STEM OST programs play in readying our nation's youth for the STEM workforce. C2C will create instruments validated specifically for this diverse population, allowing programs to understand the role they play in important societal STEM workforce readiness outcomes. C2C also benefits the informal science education field by conceptualizing the construct of teamwork and collaboration within STEM OST programs and developing validated instruments to understand the impact of these programs on youth.
This issue brief illustrates the power of strong, successful partnerships between afterschool programs and STEM-rich institutions. Additionally, the partnerships described offer promising and innovative models that can have a significant impact on both students and their instructors. Afterschool programs have a long and rich history of leveraging community resources to best meet the needs of the youth they serve. They recognize that STEM-rich institutions -- science centers and museums, universities and colleges, corporations and businesses, and government agencies -- have a lot to offer. All
The project is designed to engage Hispanic students in grades K-5 in STEM in afterschool programs within community-based organizations (CBOs). The project builds on the foundation of an NSF-supported afterschool science program--APEX (Afterschool Program Exploring Science). In collaboration with National Council of La Raza (NCLR), and ASPIRA, the project adapts APEX into a bilingual English/Spanish format and, using a train the trainer model, disseminates it nationally, using a train the trainer model. Each of the ten local project sites will build on a partnership between a science museum and a CBO affiliate of NCLR or ASPIRA. The project is designed to: (1) Build the organizational capacity of partner science museums to work with CBOs and the Hispanic community. (2) Strengthen links between science museums and Hispanic serving CBOs in their communities. (3) Engage the expertise, involvement, and collaboration of national Hispanic-serving organizations, NCLR and ASPIRA, in STEM education. (4) Increase the engagement of Hispanic children and families in STEM. The project evaluation will investigate how effectively the project builds the organizational capacity of partner museums and CBOs in engaging Hispanic children and families in STEM; the types and strength of science museum/CBO partnerships; the effectiveness of the project in increasing Hispanic student and family engagement in STEM, and the types of contributions the project makes to the field of informal STEM learning. The evaluation will use qualitative and quantitative methods, including surveys, interviews, case studies, social network and collaboration analysis, observations, activity tracking, embedded assessment, photo elicitation, and focus groups.
SciGirls CONNECT is a broad national outreach effort to encourage educators, both formal and informal, to adopt new, research-based strategies to engage girls in STEM. SciGirls (pbskids.org/scigirls) is an Emmy award-winning television program and outreach program that draws on cutting-edge research about what engages girls in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) learning and careers. The PBS television show, kids' website, and educational outreach program have reached over 14 million girls, educators, and families, making it the most widely accessed girls' STEM program available nationally. SciGirls' videos, interactive website and hands-on activities work together to address a singular but powerful goal: to inspire, enable, and maximize STEM learning and participation for all girls, with an eye toward future STEM careers. The goal of SciGirls is to change how millions of girls think about STEM. SciGirls CONNECT (scigirlsconnect.org) includes 60 partner organizations located in schools, museums, community organizations and universities who host SciGirls clubs, camps and afterschool programs for girls. This number is intended grow to over 100 by the end of the project in 2016. SciGirls CONNECT provides mini-grants, leader training and educational resources to partner organizations. Each partner training session involves educators from a score of regional educational institutions. To date, over 700 educators have received training from over 250 affiliated organizations. The SciGirls CONNECT network is a supportive community of dedicated educators who provide the spark, the excitement and the promise of a new generation of women in STEM careers. Through our partner, the National Girls Collaborative Project, we have networked educational organizations hosting SciGirls programs with dozens of female role models from a variety of STEM fields. The SciGirls CONNECT website hosts monthly webinars, a quarterly newsletter, gender equity resources, SciGirls videos and hands-on activities. SciGirls also promotes the television, website and outreach program to thousands of elementary and middle school girls and their teachers both locally and nationally at various events.
The goal of this outreach program was for Chemistry at the Space-Time (CaSTL) limit to partner with the Boys and Girls Club (BGC) of Santa Ana, CA to increase their participants' interest, enthusiasm and learning outcomes in Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) fields, through the development of science and chemistry hands-on lessons. The Boys and Girls Club of Santa Ana serves nearly 2,700 participants each day at six sites. Ninety percent of their participants identify as Hispanic/Latino and 93% are on free or reduced lunch. Although the Boys and Girls Club offers limited STEM activities, they agreed to partner with CaSTL, a UC-Irvine NSF-funded Center for Chemical Innovation, to expand their STEM ISE activities. CaSTL, in close collaboration with both the California Science Project of Irvine (CSPI), developed 24 science lesson plans that engage participants in high-level, hands-on, and interactive lessons that expose program participants to the visualization of chemistry and physics, based on CaSTL's mission. All lessons align with the California Science Standards, are highly interactive, and do not mimic the school day. These lessons compliment the state standards, but go much further in providing the participants experimental, hands-on activities that they often do not receive in their schools, due to budget, space and time restrictions. CaSTL faculty and graduate students ensured that the lens through which CaSTL research occurs was clearly represented in the lessons. CaSTL graduate students developed one of the lessons and kit and taught the spectroscopy lesson at the club.
Backyard Mystery is an NSF-funded curriculum, focused on diseases, pathogens and careers, using interactive paper and physical activities. Content is for middle school participants in afterschool settings, like 4-H and other similar venues. The curriculum engages student interest in genetics and genomics and in the bioSTEM workforce. The curriculum storyline is placed in a familiar setting to students--the backyard--and explores fungi, bacteria, viruses and parasites in a way that is engaging fun and informative. It can be tailored to specific audiences, e.g. participants interested in animal science will gain from focusing on the parasite panel. The curriculum is available in two forms: a combined lesson that brings all of the elements together in one session and another in which the content is broken out into three separate lessons. We would like to share this curriculum with facilitators and educators for both out-of-school time and classroom settings. It is available electronically and free to use. We only ask for users to complete a brief survey to give us feedback, which is helpful for NSF.
Project LIFTOFF works with local, regional, and national partners to engineer statewide systems for Informal Science Education that inspire: YOUTH to pursue STEM education and careers through increased opportunities for quality, hands-on STEM learning. AFTERSCHOOL STAFF to facilitate STEM learning experiences that contribute to the overall STEM education and aspirations of youth in their programs. PROGRAM ADMINISTRATORS to encourage and support staff in the integration of STEM enrichment into the daily programming. STATE LEADERS to sustain and expand afterschool learning opportunities so that all students have access to engaging STEM experiences outside of the regular school day. Project LIFTOFF is dedicated to the development of the following essential elements of statewide systems for informal science education:
Access to appropriate STEM Curriculum for youth of all ages, abilities, and socio-cultural backgrounds that meets the needs and interests of individual community programs
Systematic STEM Professional Development that matches individual skills in positive youth development with abilities to facilitate discovery and science learning
A diverse Cadres of Trainers who will deliver the professional development, technical assistance and curriculum dissemination in their local communities
Authentic Evaluation of informal science efforts that determine the impacts on youth aspirations and the capacity of youth programs to provide quality STEM experiences
Local STEM education leadership to identify the ways in which collaborative education efforts can advance the development of 21st Century Skills and the preparedness for STEM workforce and higher education
Partnerships in support of youth development and informal science education that convene local, regional, and statewide organizations and stakeholders
To advance national initiatives and states' sySTEM engineering efforts, LIFTOFF coordinates an annual convening, the Midwest Afterschool Science Academy, that brings together national informal science experts, system leaders and youth development professionals to elevate the levels of science after school. The 5th MASA will be in the spring of 2014 in Kansas City, MO
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Missouri AfterSchool NetworkJeff Buehler
This research addresses the importance and benefits of informal science learning which complement formal science learning in school. Informal science learning is not fully developed and is a relatively new idea in Malaysia. Most of the researches in the field of science teaching and learning are focused on the formal learning environment in school hours. However, this research has an added value for the field of science teaching since the focus is on informal science learning environment. Informal science learning is not yet explored by any other local universities in Malaysia, thus, this research will lead to the existence of Informal Science Learning Centre in long term mission. Although the existence of the National Science Centre and Petroscience KLCC provide informal environment for science learning, nevertheless, it is argued that those two places has a weak foundation in integrating educational learning theories into the informal science activities offered in these two places. This research will provide a strong theoretical foundation of designing the informal science learning because the informal science learning in this study will be developed by using rigorous research methodology which comprise of action research method and case study design in order to translate the Multiple Intelligence Theory as informal science learning practices.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Mohd Ali SamsudinZurida IsmailAnna Christina AbdullahNooraida YakobSalmiza SalehMaznah Ali
This research study involves collaboration between researchers at the University of Maryland, College Park and Bowie State University, an HBCU, to examine a multi-component pre-service model for preparing minority students to teach upper elementary and middle level science. The treatment consists of (1) focused recruitment efforts by the collaborating universities; (2) a pre-service science content course emphasizing inquiry and the mathematics of data management; (3) an internship in an after school program serving minority students; (4) field placements in Prince Georges County minority-serving professional development schools; and (5) mentoring support during the induction year. The research agenda will examine each aspect of the intervention using quantitative and qualitative methods and a small number of case studies.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
James McginnisSpencer BensonScott Dantley
The National Partnerships for Afterschool Science (NPASS) Project was led by The Center for Science Education (CSE) at Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC) in Newton, MA in partnership with the Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS) in Berkeley, CA, with funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF). The NPASS project approach relied on a professional development training and mentorship model to build the capacity of community-based organizations (CBOs) to lead high-quality, hands-on science and engineering activities in their afterschool programming. An overarching project research question
The intent of this project is to use social network methods to study networks of afterschool and informal science stakeholders. It would attempt to create knowledge that improves afterschool programs access to informal science learning materials. This is an applied research study that applies research methods to improving access to and enactment of informal science education programs across a range of settings. The investigators plan to collect data from 600 community- and afterschool programs in California, conduct case studies of 10 of these programs, and conduct surveys of supporting intermediary organizations. The analysis of the data will provide descriptions of the duration, intensity, and nature of the networks among afterschool programs and intermediary agencies, and the diffusion patterns of science learning materials in afterschool programs. The project will yield actionable knowledge that will be disseminated among afterschool programs, intermediary organizations, funding agencies, and policymakers to improve the dissemination and support of afterschool science learning opportunities. The project is focused on free-choice settings where every day the largest numbers of children attend afterschool programs at schools and in other community settings. It seeks information about what conditions are necessary for informal science programs to significantly impact the largest possible number of children in these settings.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Barbara MeansAnn HouseCarlin LlorenteRaymond McGhee