- Year 2017
- NSF Noyce Award # 1660781
- First Name Tara
- Last Name O'Neill
- Discipline Other: STEM/STEMS^2
- Co-PI(s)
Kirsten Mawyer, University of Hawaii at Manoa, kmawyer@hawaii.edu
Geoffrey Mathews, University of Hawaii at Manoa, mathewsg@hawaii.edu
- Presenters
Tara O’Neill, University of Hawaii at Manoa, toneill@hawaii.edu
Kirsten Mawyer, University of Hawaii at Manoa, kmawyer@hawaii.edu
Need
According to the Hawaii Department of Education (HIDOE) Educational Specialist for Science, the state is experiencing a major K-12 teacher shortage and is in desperate need of teachers licensed in secondary STEM content areas (L. Kaupp, personal communication, August 24, 2016). This ‘Building Sustainable Pathways to STEM Teaching’ capacity building proposal aims to explore the potential that exists in the current infrastructure at the University of Hawaii (UH) system to increase the number of licensed, highly effective secondary STEM educators. Currently, undergraduate students who major in STEM fields are deterred from seeking licensure due to additional time in school, expense, or reduction in STEM content training.
Goals
This Noyce capacity building project aims to overcome the barriers limiting undergraduate STEM majors interest in becoming STEM educators by building evidence-based, innovative models and strategies for recruiting and supporting undergraduate STEM majors in preparing for licensure the the fields of math, science, and integrated STEM and pursuing teaching careers. The work achieved during the capacity project will be used to build pathways for implementing a future Track 1 Noyce project. This capacity building project will strengthen collaboration between University of Hawaii Manoa (UHM) College of Education (CoE) and STEM faculty from the College of Arts and Sciences (CoAS), College of Engineering (CoEng), and Kapiolani Community College (KCC). The project team will hold a series of investigative meetings, planning retreats, and design workshops facilitated by experts in the integration of pre-service teacher preparation with STEM majors (e.g., representatives from the UTeach program) in order to: 1) Design course sequences allowing double majors (STEM fields and education), 2) Design new courses to introduce students to teaching early in their college careers, enabling them to concurrently complete STEM degrees and College of Education coursework, and 3) Develop recruitment plans involving awareness-raising, advising, scholarships, and articulation agreements with KCC.
Approach
Based on research reviewing the UTeach model in which students concurrently complete full STEM degrees and education courses for licensure (P?rez & Romero, 2014), we believe there is great potential for more meaningful and productive collaboration between the CoE and undergraduate STEM programs at both UHM and KCC.
The work of this capacity project will take place in four sequential parts: 1) Recruitment of Advisory Committee and external experts, 2) Advisory committee planning and design meetings, 3) external UTeach model expert presentations and 4) Noyce Track 1 grant proposal writing. We will recruit 10 STEM departments and programs across the UH system to serve as integrated advisory committee members. These committee members will participate in a series of 6 planning/design workshops and participate in a two day learning retreat presented by the invited UTeach model expert. Upon completion of the workshops and retreat, the committee will write the Noyce Track 1 grant proposal.
Outcomes
This is a recently funded project (awarded May 2017). The work presented in this poster will focus on initial partnership and program progress. For example, the beginning of a relationship between Institute for Teacher Education and the Hawaii Institute for Marine Biology’s MakerLab and the development of program designs that enable undergraduates to concurrently major in secondary science or math education and astronomy.
Over the course of this project, the advisory committee with design:
? Course sequences allowing double majors to complete with minimal extension of time to graduation
? New courses to introduce students to teaching early in their college careers, enabling them to concurrently complete STEM degrees and Education coursework
? Appropriate modifications to existing courses
? Recruitment plans involving awareness-raising, advising, and scholarships
Broader Impacts
Two broader areas of impact are anticipated. First, this project will result in team building across colleges at UHM. Historically, there has been little communication between STEM departments and the CoE, despite the university?s important role in preparing 60% of the teachers licensed in Hawaii. Second, meeting up to 25% of the Hawaiiof the Hawaii Department of Education?s (HIDOE) demand for new math and science teachers. HIDOE hires approximately 130 math and science teachers per year (HIDOE, 2015). Based on a comparison with the UTeach program at University of Texas (UT) Austin, we project to produce 35 math and science teacher annually. These teachers will offset two classes of hires that present long running difficulties for the state: non-licensed hires (tend to have limited teaching skills) and out-of-state licensed hires (have a significantly higher attrition rate than in-state licensed teachers).
