- Year 2017
- NSF Noyce Award # 934921
- First Name Valerie
- Last Name Otero
- Discipline Other: Multidisciplinary
- Co-PI(s)
Laurie Langdon, University of Colorado Boulder, Laurie.Langdon@colorado.edu
Christy Gomez, Front Range Community College, Christy.Gomez@frontrange.edu - Presenters
Laurie Langdon, University of Colorado Boulder, Laurie.Langdon@colorado.edu
Christy Gomez, Front Range Community College, Christy.Gomez@frontrange.edu
Need
This poster highlights efforts to build integrated programs for recruiting, preparing, and supporting math and science teachers. A new Learning Assistant Program partnership between Front Range Community College (FRCC) and University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder) aims to create pathways for community college students to transfer, complete their STEM degree, and obtain their math or science teaching license (NSF awards 1557347 and 1557351) while participating on a Teacher Research Team. The Teacher Research Team (TRT) program was designed to simultaneously address science and math teacher recruitment and preparation, new teacher induction, and development of teacher researchers and leaders. Teams that include future and new teachers (NSF awards 1240073 and 1557351), Master Teaching Fellows (NSF awards 0934921 and 1340083), and teacher educators investigate problems of practice in their classrooms and develop evidence-based approaches to teaching and learning.
Goals
The LA Program collaboration provides early peer teaching opportunities to two-year college students through the Learning Assistant model, targets the Two Year College (TYC) to University pathway as a way to increase the number of STEM teachers from diverse backgrounds, and increases opportunities for TYC graduates. New LAs from both institutions are supported through an online version of the pedagogy course. The main goals of Teacher Research Teams are to: (a) prepare future teachers for their first year of teaching, (b) retain new teachers, many of whom are former Noyce scholars, (c) develop master teacher-leaders with agency for educational change and voice in the national dialogue, and (d) build practical, up-to-date perspectives and practices among teacher educators. TRTs engage in publishable educational research on problems of practice identified by each team. They give presentations at national conferences, publish peer-reviewed papers, and provide workshops for other teachers.
Approach
The TRT program provides Master Teaching Fellows with opportunities to be directly involved in the preparation of teachers. Teacher education programs are traditionally located within universities and involve contexts removed from the day-to-day realities of teaching in public schools. Yet, many experienced and knowledgeable teachers who are deeply engaged in the day-to-day realities do not have time or resources to participate fully in teacher preparation. Teacher educators, practicing teachers, and prospective teachers have much to learn from one another and from studying the contexts in which they work. This is the opportunity that the TRT model was designed to address. The practice of cultivating new teachers should not serve as yet one more responsibility for teachers but instead should serve as the very activity that makes novice and veteran teachers’ work more manageable, enhances their understanding of effective practices, and increases job satisfaction and retention.
Outcomes
In the first year of Front Range Community College’s LA Program, four faculty worked with nine LAs in math, chemistry, and physics courses. One math LA is in process of transferring to CU Boulder next year to complete her mathematics degree and pursue her secondary math teaching license. Within the TRT program, teachers are taking on new roles as teacher-leaders. Some emerging teacher-leaders are requesting funding to work part time as researchers and part time as teachers. Preliminary findings indicate that through the TRT experience, teachers develop agency as educational leaders, and are inducing principles about teaching and learning from this experience. Noyce scholars value the connections and relationships they make with teachers through TRTs, and they report that they feel more prepared for their first year of teaching in part due to additional time in classrooms beyond their normal practicum experiences.
Broader Impacts
By combining the Noyce Scholarship program with the Learning Assistant program, strong STEM majors are recruited to teaching careers. Through the Teacher Research Team program, students that are recruited to teaching can be supported during and beyond their first years of teaching. The partnership between two-year colleges and a flagship university provides opportunities to increase the number and diversity of students entering the teaching profession, as well as to improve learning outcomes for more than 1200 two-year college students in LA-supported courses. At its current scale, the Teacher Research Team project impacts 25 experienced teachers, 5 new teachers, 12 future teachers, and 4 teacher educators per year. Current and future students also benefit from their teachers’ investigations into making classrooms more effective and inclusive for all learners.
