Science in School: Transforming K-12 Outreach Through Scientist Teacher Partnerships

Abstract

The Scientist in Every Florida School (SEFS) program was started in 2019 with a long-term vision to connect Earth systems scientists with public K-12 schools in Florida and therefore create long-term scientist-teacher partnerships. SEFS fulfills teacher requests to create personalized, meaningful, and impactful experiences to support teacher pedagogy and student learning. As part of our mission, we have a focus on mainstream, particularly Title I, schools and are committed to working with at-risk teachers. The major components of our program include scientist-teacher partnerships, focused professional development workshops on Florida's Earth systems (air, water, land, and life), classroom visits, and other web-based activities. Although still only in its first few years, the project and its more than 600 scientists have a wide reach with over 850 teachers and 53,000 students. Notably, the programs were delivered virtually in the 2020-2021 school year reaching nearly 60% of Florida's 67 counties. In this article, we describe our programmatic features and provide recommendations for others to implement similar programs. One recommendation, which has contributed largely to the program's success, is to invest in outreach coordinators. By doing so, scientists and teachers benefit by having a more streamlined process for classroom visits and teacher workshops.

Science communication: The link to enable enquiry-based learning in under-resourced schools

“…The first approach may involve formation of schooluniversity partnerships where teachers are paired with STEM postgraduate students to co-teach science classes (the collaborative apprenticeship model 81,82 ). Similar programmes in the USA 82,83 and Taiwan 84 have proven effective both in helping improve learner cognition in science as well as improving teacher science content knowledge and confidence in using enquiry-based pedagogy. [82][83][84] In addition, the presence of the graduate scientist in the classroom benefits the science teacher who can observe and learn new strategies of communicating science for their own professional development.…”

“…Similar programmes in the USA 82,83 and Taiwan 84 have proven effective both in helping improve learner cognition in science as well as improving teacher science content knowledge and confidence in using enquiry-based pedagogy. [82][83][84] In addition, the presence of the graduate scientist in the classroom benefits the science teacher who can observe and learn new strategies of communicating science for their own professional development. Already, the 2019 White Paper on Science, Technology & Innovation has provisions to encourage such partnerships through providing incentives to universities which adopt schools for STEM skills training.…”

Forskare som noviser inom vetenskapsfostran av barn

“…Därför har samarbete forskare och lärare emellan en betydelsefull roll i ordnandet av framgångsrik vetenskapsfostran av barn. Forskar-lärarpartnerskap har studerats i flera studier i samband med någon from av skolsamarbete (Abramowitz et al, 2021;Brown m.fl., 2014;Shein & Tsai, 2015;Ufnar m.fl., 2017;2020). The Scientist in Every Florida School -programmet SEFS är ett exempel på ett stort program inom vetenskapsfostran som utvecklades för att stödja högkvalitativ vetenskapsundervisning genom forskar-lärarpartnerskap i Florida (Abramowitz et al, 2021).…”

“…Forskar-lärarpartnerskap har studerats i flera studier i samband med någon from av skolsamarbete (Abramowitz et al, 2021;Brown m.fl., 2014;Shein & Tsai, 2015;Ufnar m.fl., 2017;2020). The Scientist in Every Florida School -programmet SEFS är ett exempel på ett stort program inom vetenskapsfostran som utvecklades för att stödja högkvalitativ vetenskapsundervisning genom forskar-lärarpartnerskap i Florida (Abramowitz et al, 2021). Abramowitz et al (2021) beskriver hur lärare som är med i programmet kan, genom samarbetet mellan lärare och forskare, bryta sig loss från den strukturerade miljön i klassrummet och uppmuntra förändringar bortom det individuella klassrummet.…”

Scientists benefit greatly from K-12 partnerships: the Panama Research Experiences for Teachers project

“…Likewise, the classic concept of scientist-teacher PD representing primarily an expert-novice learner model with a unidirectional flow of information and expertise is outmoded and has given way to non-hierarchical collaboration (Fig. 3 ; MacFadden 2019 ; Abramowitz et al 2021 ). Johnson ( 2017 ) rightly refers to this process as a community of practice (e.g., Wenger et al 2002 ), a well-known concept in learning communities and one in which there is a shared purpose and active interest in a particular topic among all stakeholders.…”