- Year 2018
- NSF Noyce Award # 1660796
- First Name Victor
- Last Name Donnay
- Discipline Other: Interdisciplinary focused on Education for Sustainability
- Co-PI(s)
Paul Morgan, West Chester University, PMorgan@wcupa.edu
Margaret Stephens, Community College of Philadelphia, mstephens@ccp.edu
- Presenters
Victor Donnay, Bryn Mawr College, vdonnay@brynmawr.edu
Paul Morgan, West Chester University, PMorgan@wcupa.edu
Need
This project addresses a key question: How do we engage and inspire students to succeed in STEM and prepare them for the challenges they will face in our 21st century world? We posit that linking STEM to issues of sustainability and using place based, project-based approaches will increase student engagement and success in STEM. To successfully make these connections between STEM and civic issues, teachers need to deepen their content knowledge and adopt new pedagogical approaches.
In May 2016, the School District of Philadelphia (SDP) adopted a comprehensive sustainability plan called GreenFutures. The plan calls for using an Education for Sustainability (EfS) framework: including principles of sustainability throughout the curriculum, across all grade levels and disciplines; using the school and community as a place-based context for learning and incorporating hands-on pedagogies that put learning into action by providing opportunities for students to address real issues.
Goals
1. Initiate development of an EfS-themed STEM Ecosystem based on the collective impact framework that will bring together groups for cross-sector collaboration to support the District’s GreenFutures implementation
2. Develop and pilot a model for place-based STEM teacher leadership development in EfS with the aim of submitting a Noyce Master Teacher Fellowship grant (September 2018 submission target) that will fully implement the model
3. Raise funds to support the infrastructure needed to sustain the EfS STEM Ecosystem, to provide matching funds for the Noyce Master Teacher Fellowship grant and to support general implementation of the GreenFutures plan
Approach
EfS-Philly will undertake the following activities to support these goals:
1. Carry out an asset mapping of the Philadelphia region’s resources that can support implementation of the GreenFutures plan’s EfS goals. Such resources include science museums, environmental centers, informal education organizations, institutions of higher education, teacher groups, government organizations and green businesses and non- profits.
2. Convene cross-sector stakeholders meetings of potential Ecosystem participants
3. Pilot the model of teacher leadership development with 14 SDP teachers from a range of disciplines and grade levels who together with three faculty from the Community College of Philadelphia will receive 60 hours of EfS focused professional development while taking part in an EfS learning community.
Outcomes
Our key finding is that with appropriate support, STEM teachers in an urban district are able to develop and implement curriculum units that connect their required content with the 9 EfS Standards (Cloud Institute Core Content Standards). These units take a place-based and project-based approach. The teachers were able to collaborate with local sustainability-related partners and incorporate these organizations into their lessons. In all, teachers developed 14 curriculum units. The teachers in the project developed their leadership skills as evidenced by their presentations at regional and national meetings in addition to sharing what they learned with colleagues in their own schools.
The project had two convenings of Sustainability Eco-System participants involving over 30 organizations. There was strong interest by the organizations in supporting the District?s EfS initiative.
Broader Impacts
Philadelphia is the poorest of the nation’s 10 largest cities with a third of its children living below the poverty line. This situation is mirrored in the School District of Philadelphia, a large urban district with 8,400 teachers educating 134,538 K-12 students in the 218 schools. The district is high-needs: more than three-fourth of the children attending qualify for free or reduced-price lunch (Poverty in Philadelphia and its schools: Facts and Figures, 2010).
By developing the EfS-Philly STEM Ecosystem, the project will harness the region?s STEM and sustainability assets to support the implementation of the SDP?s GreenFutures plan. While this project focuses on STEM teacher leadership development and EfS as it relates to STEM, the resources that the Ecosystem generates will be available to support all aspects of the SDP?s GreenFutures plan. EfS-Philly therefore has the long-term potential to impact all the teachers and students in the District.
