 | Geology doctoral candidate B.J. Arnold teaches a science class at Alliance Middle School in Alliance, Ohio. Photo by Bob Christy, '95 |
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Earth to America
Science fellows bring learning full circle
By Lisa Lambert, M.A. ’05 Some say the imagination and passion that led Americans to land on the moon is gone. Media and government reports warn of the United States losing its scientific and innovative edge, pointing to waning interest in science careers and declining academic test scores as evidence of a potentially debilitating national problem. One effort to reverse this trend pairs Kent State undergraduate and graduate students with K-12 teachers to develop innovative and engaging earth science curriculum materials. “If you don’t stimulate interest in science at an early age, you’re not going to get children interested later on,” says Sonia Ortega, director of the Graduate Teaching Fellows in K-12 Education (GK-12) program at the National Science Foundation (NSF). “Today’s students are the country’s future scientists, and it’s important for them to have role models.” A team of Kent State geography and geology faculty — led by Dr. Mandy Munro-Stasiuk, associate professor of geography, and co-principle investigators Dr. Scott Sheridan, associate professor of geography; Dr. Joseph Ortiz, associate professor of geology; Dr. Donna Witter, senior research fellow in geology; and Nancy Baker Cazan, science education coordinator at Stark County Educational Service Center — received an NSF grant for nearly $2 million to implement a “Graduate Teaching Fellows in K-12 Education” program on the Kent Campus. Although K-12 teachers and students receive great benefits from this program, the direct beneficiaries are the graduate fellows who receive funding to bring science and cutting-edge research to middle- and high-school classrooms. In addition to learning to communicate science to nonscientists, fellows in this program improve their teaching ability and gain additional skills that will prepare them for the workforce once they graduate. Building on an existing partnership with the Stark County Educational Service Center, the Kent State project will impact 36 middle- and high-school science teachers, along with nearly 5,000 students in their classes, to improve the quality of earth science education in 17 Stark County school districts. Ortiz says fewer than nine states in the country require high school students to take an earth science class. “There’s a tremendous need to educate people about how our planet works,” he says. “Many of the teachers delivering this content were trained in one of the basic sciences, but they don’t have as much training in earth science, which is an integrative field.” Ortega agrees. “Teachers in the nation’s K-12 schools often are not well-prepared to teach math and science,” she says. The Kent State program addresses this deficit with teacher workshops that employ diverse, hands-on activities. “I’ve worked with more than 200 teachers from Ohio during the workshops,” says Munro-Stasiuk, “and all of them were yearning to bring what they learned back to their classrooms.” The teacher workshops and classroom lessons utilize inquiry-based approaches, requiring students to participate actively in projects and use problem-solving skills, instead of passively sitting through lectures. GK-12 doctoral fellow B.J. Arnold says students gain the tools to ask, research and eventually answer their own questions — skills that will benefit students long after they graduate from high school. The fellows, who were drawn to the unique, nontraditional style of the program, are as passionate about education as they are about science. As they prepare to launch careers in the competitive arena of 21st-century science, they are happy to share their experiences with the scientists of the future, often debunking myths and confronting stereotypes along the way. | 
