Educational reformation has proceeded slowly despite the many calls to improve science and mathematics for our students. The acronym STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) has been adopted by numerous programs as an important focus for renewed global competitiveness for the United States, but conceptions of what STEM entails often vary among stakeholders. This paper examines the conceptions of STEM held by faculty members from a public Research I institution in the middle of a regional "STEM movement. " Faculty members responded to two open-ended questions: (1) What is STEM? and (2) How does STEM influence and/or impact your life? Although 72% of these faculty members possessed a relevant conception of STEM, the results suggest that they do not share a common conceptualization of STEM. Their conception is most likely based on their academic discipline or how STEM impacts their daily lives. STEM faculty members were likely to have a neutral or positive conception where non-STEM faculty members often had negative feelings about STEM.

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This article explores the vertical alignment of two high school classes, biology and chemistry, around the core concept of biodiesel fuel production. High school teachers and university faculty members investigated biodiesel as it relates to societal impact through a National Science Foundation Research Experience for Teachers. Using an action research approach, two high school teachers created and implemented biodiesel lessons in both biology (biochemistry algae focus) and chemistry (transesterification focus). This article describes the extent to which this integrated STEM biodiesel lesson, which is vertically aligned in one high school, affected the students' skills and attitudes in relation to STEM subjects. The lesson plans used and the student outcomes based on the biodiesel activities are provided on the basis of a year's implementation. Overall, student skill sets and attitudes improved based on pre−posttest data and classroom indicators, such as student questions. One implication of this work includes a stronger integrated STEM vertical curriculum that could be implemented in any biology and chemistry program, especially in advanced placement (AP) classes such as AP chemistry, to encourage and engage students in discovery, inquiry-based learning, problem-based learning, engineering design, and creating experiments that have a real-world applicability such as those with socio-scientific issues. The notion that science disciplines are an interconnected web of concepts is highlighted. This contribution is part of a special issue on teaching introductory chemistry in the context of the advanced placement chemistry course redesign.

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