- Year 2022
- NSF Noyce Award # 1758389
- First Name David
- Last Name Pagni
- Discipline Mathematics
- Co-PI(s)
Christa Solheid, Patrice Waller
- Presenters
David Pagni, Christa Solheid, Patrice Waller & Juan Lopez, CSU Fullerton
Need
The project focusses on two areas of need. First is the need to support students financially to achieve their goal of earning a secondary school mathematics teaching credential. Evidence collected over many years has shown that approximately 20% of students in the program experience financial hardship that extends their time to degree, either because they take a reduced course load to accommodate work or take a semester or year off to work full time. Others lack the funds to enter the credential program after graduation because it is a full-time program and allows them little or no time to work. Second, students who transfer from community college as math majors struggle with the coursework beyond calculus, often because they lack the relationships with peer and professors that non-transfers students develop during the first two years of their degree program. We have then, a need to develop an effective transfer model by collaborating with our community college partners in math. This project does this by involving the community college math majors as Noyce Associates in common seminars with the Cal State Fullerton Associates and Scholars.
Goals
1) Does additional financial support have an effect on Noyce Scholars completing the credential program in a timely manner? 2) Does intentional collaboration with community college partners have an effect on a smooth transition of math majors, including students being successful in the upper division math courses?
Approach
Freshmen and Sophomore students at CSUF and SAC will be recruited to be Noyce Associates and receive intentional mentoring experiences and internships, including content and teaching seminars hosted by the two institutions, tutoring opportunities, and visitations to partner secondary school math classrooms. Associates will be groomed to become Noyce Scholars during their Junior, Senior, and post baccalaureate credential year.
Outcomes
The project has been successful a producing effective mathematics teachers so far. At this point in the project, 23 Scholars have received their credential and 16 have full-time contracts with 7 having just finished the credential program in May 2022 and seeking positions for fall 2022.
Broader Impacts
Broader impacts of TMMT will be reflected in the increased number of highly effective mathematics teachers who go on to teach in high-need schools in Orange County and neighboring Los Angeles and Riverside counties, which will help address a critical and growing shortage. Because many of these teachers are expected to come from underrepresented groups, owing to the diversity at CSUF and SAC, they will also serve as role models and mentors for their equally diverse students, promoting access to mathematics or science for more minority secondary students. The model that is developed for identifying and transitioning community college transfer students into mathematics teaching tracks at four-year institutions can be replicated locally, regionally, statewide and nationally, extending its benefits across the country while creating the infrastructure at CSUF to perpetuate the program’s recruitment and support components indefinitely. Moreover, one of the MTEP Research Actions Clusters is researching recruitment (Oliver et al., 2013), the other retention and induction (http://www.aplu.org/projects-and-initiatives/stem-education/mathematics-teacher-education-partnership/mtep-racs/mtep-racs-strides.html), and TMMT will contribute to that research as well (see above).
