Noyce Scholar Profile
Lucy Robins
Undergraduate major or graduate field of study: Biology
Subject area(s) and grade level teaching focus: Biology, 5-8 and 8-12
Category of scholarship/fellowship:
Master Teaching Fellow
Name of Noyce institution:
Harvard Graduate School of Education, Teacher Education Program
Current academic or teaching status:
First Year
School and school district:
Another Course to College, Boston Public Schools, Brighton, MA
Background:
I was born and raised in New York City. I attended Vassar College, in Poughkeepsie, NY, where I majored in biology and worked as a teaching assistant in the English as a Second Language Program at Poughkeepsie High School. After graduating college, I spent a year working, through Vassar, as an Outreach Program Coordinator at Poughkeepsie High School. I spent the following year teaching English at a state university in La Serena, Chile through a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant Fellowship. I am currently enrolled in Harvard’s Teacher Education Program, working toward my teaching license in biology at the middle- and high-school levels.
Why do you want to teach:
I want students to experience and understand the wonder and excitement of science, to believe in the power of their own ideas, and to build the critical thinking and reasoning skills that they will need to become active citizens and agents of change. I love working with students, hearing their ideas, and getting to know them. I believe that, as a teacher, I can help to ensure that my students have the support, skills, confidence and opportunities to succeed in school and beyond and the ability to achieve the excellence that they (and our country) deserve.
Describe a memorable teaching experience:
One of my favorite moments as a teacher came at the end of the summer I spent teaching at Breakthrough Collaborative in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Breakthrough is a summer enrichment program that prepares middle-school students who aspire to be the first in their families to attend college for a rigorous high school experience.
I had a wonderful group of students; and, at the end of the summer, one of them told me that, before my class, she hadn’t thought science could be fun but now knew it could be. I know that my students won’t remember every fact or piece of information that we study together. But I hope that they will leave with a sense that they can succeed in science, that they are worth the best efforts of their teachers, and that learning science is relevant and fun.
What does the Noyce program mean to you:
The Noyce program, along with the other generous scholarship I received from HGSE, has given me the means to pursue my dream of becoming a teacher in the program that I believe will best prepare me to do so. The Noyce program also provides me with a network of science-teacher colleagues and the support I will need as I graduate and begin my career.
