- Year 2019
- NSF Noyce Award # 1660632
- First Name Valorie
- Last Name Zonnefeld
- Discipline Biology, Chemistry, Engineering, Geosciences, Math, Physics
- Presenters
Valorie Zonnefeld, Dordt University, valorie.zonnefeld@dordt.edu
Need
High-need, rural districts face unique challenges as the districts are often smaller and need teachers with broad preparation that equips them to teach multiple STEM disciplines.
Goals
How can teacher preparation programs design majors that prepare teachers to teach the breadth of content often necessary in smaller, rural schools?
Approach
The process of designing these pathways involved communication and collaboration between the Iowa Department of Education, the NSF Noyce Scholars Program officer, as well as key professors from the physics, computer science, mathematics, engineering, biology, chemistry, and education departments.
Outcomes
The key outcomes of this project to date are the new programs that have been and are being designed. It is too early to know how successful these programs are in drawing students into STEM education.
Broader Impacts
These design of these programs are valuable to other teacher education programs.
