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She and the Sea: and Ocean Literacy?Coastal School for Girls?

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ocean_literacy_framework_130

The ocean is the defining feature of our planet. Ocean Literacy means understanding the ocean’s influence on you and your influence on the ocean. There are 7 principles of Ocean Literacy — ideas scientists and educators agree everyone should understand about the ocean.

First let’s talk about the ocean.

The ocean is the defining feature of our planet. Ocean Literacy means understanding the ocean’s influence on you and your influence on the ocean. There are 7 principles of Ocean Literacy — ideas scientists and educators agree everyone should understand about the ocean.

Here is a set of ideas about ocean literacy

  1. Ocean life ranges in size from the smallest virus to the largest animal that has lived on Earth, the blue whale.
  2. Most life in the ocean exists as microbes. Microbes are the most important primary producers in the ocean. Not only are they the most abundant life form in the ocean, they have extremely fast growth rates and life cycles.
  3. Some major groups are found exclusively in the ocean. The diversity of major groups of organisms is much greater in the ocean than on land.
  4. Ocean biology provides many unique examples of life cycles, adaptations and important relationships among organisms (such as symbiosis, predator-prey dynamics and energy transfer) that do not occur on land.
  5. The ocean is three-dimensional, offering vast living space and diverse habitats from the surface through the water column to the seafloor. Most of the living space on Earth is in the ocean.
  6. Ocean habitats are defined by environmental factors. Due to interactions of abiotic factors such as salinity, temperature, oxygen, pH, light, nutrients, pressure, substrate and circulation, ocean life is not evenly distributed temporally or spatially, i.e., it is “patchy”. Some regions of the ocean support more diverse and abundant life than anywhere on Earth, while much of the ocean is considered a desert.
  7. There are deep ocean ecosystems that are independent of energy from sunlight and photosynthetic organisms. Hydrothermal vents, submarine hot springs, and methane cold seeps rely only on chemical energy and chemosynthetic organisms to support life.
  8. Tides, waves and predation cause vertical zonation patterns along the shore, influencing the distribution and diversity of organisms.
  9. Estuaries provide important and productive nursery areas for many marine and aquatic species.

In my life I have met Dr . Valerie Chase , Dr. Valerie Chase is an educator with MAMEA. Her work is based out of the National Aquarium in Baltimore. You can take a virtual tour here.

Sylvia Earle and other women who  go down to the sea inspire us. They have been sharing their work with students nationally. Here is a look at Sylvia Earle at work.

There are other photos of Sylvia Earl  at work here.

What makes women study the sea? Art, music, poetry, and sea and she stories,and maybe the coastal school for girls. Their mission is to provides high school sophomores with an opportunity to excel in science and technology in a community defined by academic, experiential and inspirational learning. CSG students engage in scientific inquiry, leadership development, critical thinking and stewardship while developing their educational and career aspirations. CSG strives to create a diverse ethnic, geographical and socioeconomic community for students and staff who celebrate success. What a wonderful opportunity for girls.

But did you know about it? Do you know about Citizen Science? If we involve girls in experiences they will relate and know if they are interested in any of the subjects that are a part of ociean study.

What is an oceanographer? If girls do not have exposure to ocean science they will not choose it as a career track.

An oceanographer can be a biologist, chemist, physicist, geologist, engineer, mathematician, computer scientist, meteorologist, or you! As a relatively new frontier, oceanography is a wonderfully challenging and exciting field of study providing many career opportunities. It’s an important field of study because oceans encompass 70% of the earth’s surface, and they also have an important role in understanding global weather patterns.

Chemical, geological, and physical oceanographers investigate the physical aspects of the ocean, such as salinity, currents, and the ocean floor. Biological oceanographers study marine plants and animals and their processes within the context of their ocean environments. Ocean engineers provide the technology and instrumentation that allows oceanographers to explore questions and solve problems in a variety of ways.

Where can girls learn about oceanography? Ocean Literacy? How can they learn about possible STEM careers?
Earthwatch.org

Student Fellowships

Through the generosity of individual donors and foundations committed to global sustainability and learning, Earthwatch is able to provide sophomores and juniors with fellowship opportunities.

Earthwatch student fellows get to join one of Earthwatch’s expeditions around the world to work with top scientists and other students in the field, fully funded by various funders. On an expedition, students learn how to do field research and help find answers to the most challenging environmental issues of our time — all while making a difference for endangered animals and their habitats. Students use some of the latest technology (like GPS and radio-transmitters for tracking animals), learn about cutting edge research areas (like climate change), and work in places most people never get to see (like an Icelandic glacier or a Costa Rican volcano).

Students don’t need to have done anything like this before, and don’t need to have taken any particular science classes to go. All they need is curiosity, an ability to work hard as part of a team, a thirst for adventure, and a desire to make a difference.

Aquarium Outreach
 Some children have access to after school programs from aquariums.  Some children get to go to Summer camps. But at the high school level, what is there?There is Earthwatch. There is the Sant Hall of Science. Find your Blue in the Sant Hall of Science.

Coastal Studies for Girls is the country’s only residential science and leadership semester school for 10th grade girls. CSG is dedicated to girls who have a love for learning and discovery, an adventurous spirit, and a desire to challenge themselves


Coastal Studies for Girls is the country’s first residential science and leadership semester school for 10th grade girls.  We are the only single-gender residential semester school and the only semester school that focuses on science and leadership.  That intersection of science and leadership opportunities for girls is particularly valuable to our students and to society.  The mission of Coastal Studies for Girls (CSG) is to inspire, train, and empower girls to be scientists, environmental stewards, and leaders.

WCSH video

CSG girls featured in Portland, Maine television program

Why science and leadership?
Building on research in girls’ development, gender issues education, and best practices in pedagogy, CSG has been carefully designed to promote girls’ aspirations in the sciences and leadership.  On a societal level, we aim to help close the gender gap in science and to feed the “pipeline” that leads to qualified scientists in the workforce.  On an individual level, we aim to raise career aspirations for girls to pursue STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) fields and make it more likely that young women can achieve economic self-sufficiency in the future.  Yet regardless of career choices, the confidence and the ability to transfer their learnings in leadership is what makes the science powerful – or possible. There is also a strong emphasis on how girls view themselves, how they interact with others, and how they care for and steward the world. It is the intersection of all of these things that creates the magic here.

Why only girls?

Research has demonstrated the effects of societal beliefs and the learning environment on girls’ achievements and their interest in science and math and CSG provides an option that reverses negative trends.  Girls need supportive, stimulating programs and women role models that foster inspiration, self-confidence, concrete skills, as well as a strong understanding of science and the range of careers that involve science.  Our campus on a 626 acre salt water farm is a safe and supportive  place to explore the complexities of teenage life and to grow intellectually, to find their voices, and develop self-confidence.

What is the program?
The primary CSG program is either a fall or spring semester, (16 weeks) translating into 448+ academic hours of study and residential time.  The curriculum centers on three strands:  (1) science—classes on coastal marine ecology with significant field work and a major independent research project] (2) leadership—adventure-based, experiential learning opportunities to promote personal growth and engage students in physical activity; and (3) core academics—history, English, math, and languages.  During a typical week, a girl may have core classes in the mornings, and focused science and leadership classes in the afternoons.    On Fridays and weekends, students have academic field trips or enjoy the outdoors through kayaking, camping, snow shoeing, rock climbing, and other activities that teach leadership skills.  Students are exposed to a multitude of women scientists and leaders through our visiting guest and  lecture series.

Why sophomore year?
This is a pivotal time as girls are mature enough for a residential program, yet we hope to influence them early enough in their high school experience to impact decisions they make in their junior year about college and study options.  They return back to their home communities with enhanced leadership skills to make positive contributions.

Who attends?
CSG students attend the 16 week term during either the fall or spring of their 10th grade year.   Our first three terms have drawn students from 14 states, from rural Maine islands to the urban centers of New York City, Boston and Los Angeles, from the mountains of Vermont and North Carolina, to the heartland of Minnesota and the southern region of Tennessee. Whether they come from public, independent and home schooled environments, they are united in their love of learning and desire for challenge. We strive for a community that is ethnically, geographically, and socio-economically diverse; our first three terms represent have represented over 30% students of color.   Over 90% of our applicants have requested financial assistance and we have supported a significant number of applicants.


From the River to the Sea- and Ocean Literacy

bonniebraceysutton Leave a comment

 

The Chesapeake Bay

cbToday, the Chesapeake yields more fish and shellfish than any other estuary in the country, close to 45,000 tons annually.  But due to increasing acidity in some parts of the bay, the shells of young oysters are growing as thick as in the past, making them easy prey for crabs.

According to a study conducted at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science  , acidity is increasing in some parts of the Chesapeake Bay faster than it is occurring in the open ocean.  The study should be of interest to citizen scientists.

When I was a small child, long ago, the sea was where the beach was. I had no conceptual framework of the idea of the ocean.

The science that I was taught was not the kind of science I learned about in deep kinds of learning. I went to a Catholic school and we did not have much science. I was an adult before I understood much about the Chesapeake Bay. Because of fear, and segregation we rarely visited any but the “Black” beaches.  They were not the best. So when I was a new teacher and learned a lot about water, and specifically the Chesapeake Bay; I was fascinated to learn the history of the Chesapeake Bay. The book by Michener helped to frame my ideas of the region.

My family has native American roots, so we were interested in the history of the people native to the region.

HISTORY

Back in the day, Blacks and Native Americans lived in Freetowns. ( where they were allowed to live.) That history and that of the people who helped slaves and Native Americans was interesting as well.

The storyline, like much of Michener’s work, depicts a number of characters over a long time period. Each chapter begins with a voyage which provides the foundation for the chapter plot. It starts in 1583 with American Indian tribes warring, moves through English settlers throughout the 17th century, slavery and tobacco growing, pirate attacks, the American Revolution and the Civil War, Emancipation and attempted assimilation, to the final major event being the Watergate scandal. The last voyage, a funeral, is in 1978.

First I studied at the National Aquarium in Baltimore with Dr. Valerie Chase, as we created the “Living in Water” curriculum.

IntroductionProcess-Orientated Science in the ClassroomThe Hands-on Approach: What Research SaysScience process skills used in theis curriculumTeaching hands-on science

http://www.forsea.org/LIWTOC.HTML

I had a lot to learn. Before working with Dr. Chase, my science learning about the Bay was reading science. What a wonderful experience I had learning ecosystems, and adaptations and all about The first several days were headache days, because I had never heard of most of what she was talking about and I had a lot of vocabulary, ideas, and information to review.

This is their mission.
Through transforming experiences, the National Aquarium Institute inspires people to enjoy, respect, and protect the aquatic world.

But hard science became fun science. I loved the work at the Aquarium and we were in the field, and behind the scenes at the Aquarium. I treasured the learning experience and became a better teacher.

Here is the home page of the Aquarium , http://www.aqua.org/http://www.aqua.org/

You can take a virtual tour here

http://www.aqua.org/virtual-tour-baltimore/

This is important because there is a cost associated with the visit and there were parents who did not want to pay it. So the kids and I applied for grants that would make this tour a part of our learning.

Ever hear of Anoxia Mae?You do know what Anoxia is , don’t you?

Here is a history tour of Solomon’s Island

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.470228176326.256778.593996326&type=1&l=9909fdada8

This is a tour of Wye Mills

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150350735691327.396859.593996326&type=1&l=0c6755aaf9

This is an awesome place on the Rhode River.

The Learning Lab at SERC.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.115870491326.129996.593996326&type=1&l=48b6eab680

SERC Canoe Trip

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.115866001326.129992.593996326&type=1

http://www.aqua.org/

Never mind that my principal was not into hands on science. I did it. It was wonderful. Parents loved the idea that we were being active scientists.

But now there are even better ways to study the Bay.

This from the National Geographic

http://www.fieldscope.org/

More?

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/field/projects/cbfieldscope.html

Sea Rise and the Chesapeake Bay

http://education.nationalgeographic.com/education/news/sea-rise-and-storms-chesapeake-bay/?ar_a=4&ar_r=3


Chesapeake Bay

The Chesapeake Bay FieldScope Project is a “citizen science” initiative in which students investigate water quality issues on local and regional scales and collaborate with students across the Bay to analyze data and take action. Chesapeake Bay FieldScope is a project of National Geographic’s Education Programs in collaboration with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and the NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office.

For more on the Chesapeake Bay FieldScope project, visit the National Geographic site here.

Chesapeake Bay FieldScope consists of four project-based learning modules that leverage the FieldScope tool:

  • Connecting to the Watershed with Maps
  • Field Investigation & Data Collection
  • Data Sharing and Analysis
  • Taking Action

I was one in a workshop at the University of Illinois when this project was shared as well as ESRI information.

I believe in STEAM, but it is a part of the way in which I teach.  I think Eat a Crab Lab is both science , and a culinary tour.

I know the songs of the Chesapeake Bay and we as teachers read the saga of the bay by Skipjacks and in children’s literature.

I went to the National Geographic for a Summer Workshop. I was lucky enough to be one of two people selected to participate  from the state of Virginia.

I had so much to learn. People talk about STEAM. Well I suppose if you have never been taught well, you have to insert the arts into your work.

I was taught to include a cross section of subjects into my work and we actually wrote lesson plans and tested them in front of an audience of our geographic peers. Years later I am still trying to repay that wonderful summer by teaching as best as I can and sharing the knowledge. I learned the history of, saw a wonderful film produced by the National Geographic and we actually traveled to several places on the Chesapeake Bay. With the National Geographic you take a look at many ways of thinking about a subject.

Maybe the reason most people have to think of STEAM is because they are not rooted in geography. A geo-literate population can make far-reaching decisions about their health, their environment, and their community.

Geography is the study of natural and human constructed phenomena from a spatial perspective. Geography has two main sub disciplines:

  • Human geography includes such subjects as demography, human settlements, transportation, recreation and tourism, resources, religion, social traditions, human migration, agriculture, urban systems, and economic activities
  • Physical geography  is concerned with the study of the Earth’s atmosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and lithosphere from theoretical and applied viewpoints.

Sometimes the disciplines of human and physical geography combine knowledge to create a more holistic synthesis.

Dr. Danny Edelson shared his ideas in this essay.

By Daniel C. Edelson, PhD

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Whether they realize it or not, every member of our modern society makes far-reaching decisions every day. A far-reaching decision is one that has impacts far beyond the time and place where the decision is being made. For example, when commuters choose between driving or taking public transportation, when corporate boards consider whether they should shift manufacturing from one country to another, and when troops in the field translate orders into actions, they are all making far-reaching decisions.

While the impacts of any particular far-reaching decision may be small, the cumulative impact of the decisions made by millions of people is enormous. The National Geographic Society is working to prepare our young people for the far-reaching decisions they will face throughout their lives. To be prepared for these decisions, they must be able to recognize the far-reaching implications of the decisions they make, and they must be able to take those impacts into account when making decisions. This requires that they have three forms of understanding:

  • How our world works. Modern science characterizes our world as a set of interconnected physical, biological, and social systems. These systems create, move, and transform resources. For example, in ecosystems, nutrients are created, transformed, and transported through food chains. Similarly, in economic systems, people transform natural resources into objects with economic value, which can be transported, used, traded, and sold. Every human decision is affected by these systems and has effects on them.
  • How our world is connected. Today more than ever, every place in our world is connected to every other place. To understand the far-reaching implications of decisions, one must understand how human and natural systems connect places to each other. For example, in the 1980s, scientists discovered that the prevailing winds that speed flights from Chicago to Boston were also carrying power plant emissions from the Midwest that were causing acid rain in New England.
  • How to make well-reasoned decisions. Good decision-making involves systematic analysis of outcomes based on priorities. For example, in deciding where to build a road, a planner will establish priorities for cost, capacity, and impact on communities and the natural environment. He will then predict the outcomes of different options based on those criteria, and will weigh the tradeoffs between these options based on values associated with the different criteria.

Geo-literacy

We call the combination of skills and understanding necessary to make far-reaching decisions geo-literacy. The three components of geo-literacy are understanding human and natural systems, geographic reasoning, and systematic decision-making.

  • Understanding human and natural systems: A geo-literate individual is able to reason about the creation, movement, and transformation of materials in human and natural systems.
  • Geographic reasoning: A geo-literate individual is able to reason about the characteristics of a location and its connections to other locations.
  • Systematic decision-making: A geo-literate individual is able to articulate decision-making criteria, project outcomes of alternatives, and evaluate those outcomes in terms of the established criteria.

To be geo-literate is to be able to combine these three abilities to make decisions in real-world contexts. Systems understanding and geographic reasoning enable a geo-literate individual to analyze the options in a decision. Systematic decision-making enables a geo-literate individual to weigh those options carefully.

But back to the Chesapeake Bay

Estuary? Do you know what it is? Most don’t. I read an essay about a

skip

Estuaries are bodies of water formed where freshwater from rivers or streams connect with salt ocean water. The mixed water is called brackish, and the salinity may fluctuate dramatically for example depending on freshwater input from rains and waves and tides influences from the ocean. Estuary areas include river mouths, bays, lagoons and salt marshes Source http://www.untamedscience.com/biology/world-biomes/estuaries-biome

Chesapeake Bay, Maryland, boundary map. (Source:NOAA)

The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States and is roughly divided between the states of Maryland and Virginia. In the Maryland portion there are some 6,945 miles of shoreline, encompassing a wide variety of habitats fromsalt marshes to riverine systems to tidal, freshwater marshes.

The multi-component Chesapeake Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve in Maryland reflects this diversity of habitat, geography, population and culture. Each component is unique, but the goals of research, monitoring, education and stewardship remain consistent throughout. Components (sites) are located at Otter Point Creek in Harford County, Jug Bay in Anne Arundel and Prince Georges Counties and Monie Bay in Somerset County.

A component is a part of the whole. In the Maryland Reserve there are three “components” which are listed above. Each component represents a different habitat found within the Maryland portion of the Chesapeake Bay.

The Maryland Reserve is one of 27 within the National Estuarine Research Reserve System (NERRS), forming a partnership between coastal states and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to protect valuable estuarine habitats.

A cooperative management approach is used involving the Maryland Department of Natural Resources and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which promotes long-term research, education and stewardship.

Here is an exciting project for teachers to use. http://education.nationalgeographic.com/education/program/chesapeake-water-quality/

The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States and is home to unique biodiversity. The Bay plays an important role in local commerce, history, and is a critical environmental resource.

The Chesapeake Bay Water Quality Project is a project-based, citizen science educational initiative that engages students in 21st century investigations of watershed health using real-time geospatial technology. The project provides students with a dynamic experience that combines classroom learning with outdoor field experiences and technology-supported inquiry. Students useFieldscope, a web-based interactive mapping tool, to share and analyze data they collect on the health of the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Through this project, students will gain a better understanding of water quality issues and the interconnectedness between humans and their environment. Students are encouraged to embark upon their own projects to put their learning into action through watershed clean-up activities, participation in Bay restoration projects, and the like..

How we know that online technology works is that I can offer this to you and Google Maps, and ESRI resources to share observing the ocean.
Hopefully this will lead to Ocean Literacy.

The ocean is the defining feature of our planet. Ocean Literacy means understanding the ocean’s influence on you and your influence on the ocean. There are 7 principles of Ocean Literacy — ideas scientists and educators agree everyone should understand about the ocean. Join the Network to build a more ocean literate society!

Explore the Site

ocean_literacy_framework_130

Broadening Engagement, Educating for the Future , What Revolution?

bonniebraceysutton Leave a comment
"Future of Education - Trends"
According to Connected Principals
Let’s take a ‘T.R.I.P. into the Future’ looking at some changes that are shifting learning in a way not possible just a few years ago. Here are 4 trends that education is moving towards: Greater Transparency, greaterResponsibility, greater Individualization and greater Permanence.
Gil Scott Heron was wrong. The revolutions were televised.  Steve Jobs probably did not mean to start a revolution, but he did. I was one of the people who bought into his revolution and pushed for the use of technology in the schools. I was unstoppable. I could see the measure of difference in the students when we introduced technology by hook or crook.
Granted there were teachers who use movies and cut the movie on and off to explain things. Granted there were people who never adjusted to television in a classroom, not interactive enough they said. Granted there were , and are people who do not understand the reach of technology. That would not be me.
In the places of urban need technology came in , in musical ways. We were always taught to sign and dance. I refused.
I found it demeaning. Well, most black millionaires are in the music business. It is not that I can’t or could not sing, I felt that people had only represented one of the few talents of the race. So I read, studied and learned. Gil Scott Heron talked to the underclass. But his message resounded and they embraced it.
Those were interesting statements to those of us who did sit ins and demonstrations. What did he mean?What revolution will not be televised? But maybe he was speaking of those who are not a part of  a certain part of America.
Now I think I know. When I see the 99 Percent people in the streets, I see that he was talking to that other America and it is not just black. Who knew that America would diversify in the way that it has? It was a world of black and white. Now
I don’t even see color . Everyone is on television, as integral parts of the media business in most places. Regional tends to be less colorful. But there many be a reason for that.
 Since  Gil Scott Heron’s  time in the spotlight, we have seen a revolution that was indeed televised but fueled by social media titled the” Arab Spring”.  Etched in my mind is the camel rider with a long weapon going after a protesting citizen. Etched in my mind are the protestations of women who were gang raped by soldiers. Children soldiers, but most of this is not reported in the “news”. Etched in my heart was the fear of the people who dared to protest. I have lived in the Middle East and worked in the Med.The most surprising thing is that it is not really the way it is reported. I went to Egypt because I wanted to see the museum in Cairo. I wanted to go to Alexandria and I did. But don’t trust travel writers to share a place with you. The National Geographic does a good take on countries.  What really is going on in countries is often told by bloggers.
WHO DARES TO PROTEST?
Protesting is not an easy thing anywhere in the world , nor was it here. Movies about our Civil war, and our Civil rights protests are all over screens in the digital media. We are celebrating the 50th anniversary of the sit-ins.  Few talk about the separate but not equal schools. The change in those was very slow if change was made at all. Urban schools are probably worst because they lack well-trained teachers, and programs, and projects that are transitional for 21st century skills.More extraordinary is that the teachers who have stood in those places of need were targeted.
Who forgot to give them professional development, and to equip them with the tools to teach for the 21st Century? We know. We all know.
It was sad to see people targeting teachers who stood in those places and tried to teach no matter the conditions without very much support. I suppose people thought teachers could overcome, hunger, bad parenting, fear in the community, bullying, disrespect and bad economics.Sometimes we can.But it is not a given. Inspiration requires its own fuel.
I would like to say that I was one of those teachers who stood in harms ways, but I escaped to the suburbs.  So those who were the sheep were stuck with ignomy. They followed the dictates of the school system. I understand. It  probably seemed like a good idea at the time.
INTERNATIONAL Cultures have a different perspective… we must respect that too
But in the med, gender was a problem.” Why are you not married ?”, I was asked. There were societies that drew out single women as if we were diseased. At the time I was quite successful, flying all over the world, at home driving a Corvette my first experience with fiber optics, and working with a council after appointment by the President. Well, pardon me, but until I was able to display my knowledge, I was looked at as it I had a disease in Jordan and Egypt.. It was a total shock to me. When you read about other countries the PISA scores, you do not think about
the fact that there are women who never go to school.That women are sold as child brides. PISA does not report that information.
I have worked in India, and in Egypt where sometimes girls in the country were needed on the farm. I have traveled in China, where there were ” Black” children. The children did not exist according to the government, because they had no papers. We toured educational facilities and were often talking to people on the streets in China. Did you know that there are 57 groups of minorities in China? I went to 28 cities in China and did extensive reading and visiting. Most of the history of China is not told. I could share gender stories that would make you cry if you have feelings. Will technology help the child brides? The girls who never get to go to school in the world? In some countries perhaps, but technology is a long way in coming to many countries. Pisa scores don’t tell everything.
How Can You Complain about Technology on Technology if You Do Not Have Connectivity?
In my life, I go from Supercomputing, the best of everything in a conference, to podunk  places where dial up is even slow. On television, the people who sell and share, and create programs, seem not to have a clue that we are all not wired,the telcos protest that we all can be. I suspect that that means they think everyone in rural distant and difficult areas can afford satellite.  Not so. Not so.
It is if there are two Americans, beyond those who volunteer to fight, and those who are preyed upon by wall street, or who have a less than facilitative education or who unfortunately are located geographically as if they were living back in the day before technology made its mark. The people who need to complain to polls, and previews, and pollster are not
on line, or if on line are barely able to register their voices.
Why should people participate if they don’t get the importance of being left behind.. again.
How do people understand the importance of it all without being in the game?
In the US , in the world as we go to a flat world, there is a protest that cannot be made.
The digital divide still exists. There is a digital divide, an information divide, a social divide, and all sorts of gating factors. Did I forget to mention the owning of the technology necessary to tweet, Facebook, save music or do rudimentary Email? Did I forget to mention the support , the technical support that is SO important. I think I did.
Some think the mobile divide will solve the problem and it will if , if people invest in the mobile devices that they will need to be a part of the connected world. It works well in developing nations. Let’s hope that the mobile devices will help to equalize the world.
Two Americas
 We are still separated by class, race, the economy of our neighborhoods and states and the quality of our teaching force. While some are truly learning to be a force in the digital media, some are in love with the latest applications and do not see the whole picture. If the latest 2.o gadget is your celebration of technology, think again.
There is a technology revolution going on in Supercomputing. We all use Supercomputing in various ways. To help schools the Education Program is designed to introduce HPC and Computational and Data Enabled Science and Engineering (CDESE) techniques, technologies and resources to undergraduate faculty and high school teachers.
The sad thing about knowing the information is that there are still silos , and K-12 is not really in an awareness mode
in that there are few teacher trainings in this field. I think administrators and principals have their eyes closed to
HPC and the workforce initiatives  that the learning of the computational sciences will bring.
The  Supercomputing program assists educators in integrating HPC and CDESE into their classrooms. During SC11, the Education Program  hosted a four-day intensive program, focused hands-on tutorials and birds-of-a-feather gatherings, as well as formal and informal opportunities to interact with other conference attendees and exhibitors.
The Supercomputing Conference also involves in communities Broader Engagement.

Broader Engagement Program

Goals of the Program

The goal of the Broader Engagement (BE) Program is to increase the participation of individuals who have been traditionally underrepresented in high performance computing (HPC), including African-Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, Pacific Islanders and other underrepresented groups around the world, including women and people with disabilities. The program offers special activities to engage and support a diverse community of experts, newcomers and learners in the conference and in HPC.

The BE program has several educational, networking and informational sessions which all SC11 attendees are welcome to attend. SC11 participants can add BE to their registration to also participate in BE social events.
Indeed there are places in which the Internet is still verboten, and a sign against the use of cell phones is posted on the door of the schools. Not like the cheery idea that students can bring their own technology. ( If they can afford it).
Here is what my husband Victor Sutton wrote:
“We we doing outreach to schools and communities.
It is pitch dark, and you can see all the stars. With my wife Bonnie, I am driving south on VA 40 from our overnight stay in Stony Creek, VA to get to Sussex Central High School.
Our task for the evening is to brief a small number of students and parents about the opportunities for students who follow studies in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM)
“Do you know where you are going?”, asks Bonnie. “Yes,” I reply. VA 40 will take us to the school. And so it does, after what seems like a lifetime.
Our colleague Anita Harris teaches at Sussex Central High, and is there to help round-up students and parents for our presentation. We meet up with our friend Manorama Talaiver, who is working in 35 school districts in South side Virginia to get technology into classrooms.
The sign on the main entrance of the school says ‘No cell phones’. That’s not because students could use them to chat, or to network. There are only enough towers in this part of Virginia to provide one reliable signal, from Verizon. And most students can’t afford to subscribe to phone service.They use their phones, if they have them, to play games.
Even if a Sussex Central High School teacher wanted to use computers in the classroom, they would face several obstacles. There is no broadband, no connectivity.( there is a  connection in the auditorium , way up high almost out of reach).
And moreover, just to make sure that students cannot access smut, most useful sites are banned.
While we wait for our audience to turn up, I try to access my Hotmail e-mail.
Hotmail is blocked.
Now, meanwhile the U. S. Department of Education is busy, through its Race to the Top scheme, funding initiatives in eleven states and the District of Columbia on a competitive basis. As if all schools did not need better online access
When we come to wind the meeting up, a black picture turns even blacker. Sussex County, in South side Virginia, we learn, is a county 45 miles long.
One half of the county has access to a public library (which closes at 5 p.m.).
The other half of the county has no public library.
So here are U.S. high school students, not so far from Richmond, with no public library, and no computer access.
Welcome to America in the 21st Century. And how, you wonder, are the students of Sussex Central High to acquire any 21st Century skills?” The brilliant people probably don’t have to think about the underclass?
There is Change
I think that Mano Talaiver is changing things with her computer grants from NSF and teacher workshops and parent workshops. Longwood does special seminars to unite people in the learning communities to think about ways to effect change.
Mano is creating possibilities with a College, Longwood,  supporting her efforts to transform the rural areas where tobacco used to be the cash crop. It is also the area of Brown vs the Board of Education , the schools were closed for about 20 years in some of the areas to blacks. There were private academies for the white population, supported by taxpayer funding.
My friend uses technology to weave these counties together and to create a force of learning using everything she can to effect change. Already , she has been to a country in Africa with a grant to link that country to the college in Virginia. This is October. She has already taught overseas and is now encouraging students in Virginia .
 After you drop down past Richmond, connectivity is an issue. Better not be using the iPhone for your GPS because, you will need a paper map. Interestingly enough all of the prisons, which are a part of the economy of this poor rural area are wired to the max.
Here in the US there is a protest going on about the lack of broadband Sadly some people don’t know enough to protest. The people who provide broadband tell is that we are wired everywhere and just in case you cannot get wired there is broadband from Hughes Net. We all know that there is a problem especially in the west. The National Broadband Map is a solution in a way. The National Technology Planpoints the way and gives a voice to everyone who needs to know where we are heading. Karen Cator goes one better with wonderful presentations and Powerpoint presentations that one can download to get the ideas and understanding of where we are going with the technology. Kudos to her. No kudos to the telephone companies that have strangled and put broadband in a choke hold.

Maximum Advertised Speed Available This map displays broadband availability by maximum advertised speed tier. The default view shows advertised download …

www.broadbandmap.gov/technology
But it is is a self reporting solution. The Telcos have not been all that accurate in their reporting. If you travel often to rural and distant places in America you will know that.
Peruse the Benton Foundation reports and you will understand that reporting a lot better.
Rural, Distant , West and Probably Forgotten
I left a Supercomputing Conference in Portland and went just outside of Olympia , Washington to work with Native Americas.
The native  fishermen had GPS, but the schools did not. More than that I stayed with one of my best friends in a lovely suburban home on a lake just outside of Olympia next . She only had dial-up. She is not poor, not black, and not living in an economically deprived area. She is not black either. Well to do.
She goes once a week to Olympia to download any messages that are not facile to dial-up. I was so frustrated when I stayed there for a week. I went from visualizations and modeling to AOL  dial-up. I had to go to town to do my work.
 What Can a Citizen Do?
Go proactive for the love of learning and the school community!
The Cloud is coming to  every place soon…
Here is a report on the Map to Nowhere. It could be funny , if you were not one of the people without the connectivity.
You could organize a roundtable of businesses , educator and parents and post questions.
Do this.
One can self report on the Technology map or/and  one can go proactive. M-Lab is interactive. You could share this with the local school board, the press, and parents. They might help put your place on the map.M-Lab is international as well.  They want to know about broadband for everyone.
Measurement Lab is an open platform for researchers to deploy Internet measurement tools. By enhancing Internet transparency, M-Lab helps sustain a healthy, …
Organize a meeting to share and to show the possibilities of the use of broadband in the community, in the schools, in health care  The Technology Plan from the US Dept of Education is very helpful with that effort and there is a downloadable presentation.
The broadband Map will make some people wake up and smell the lack of credible wiring access in their community.
. However, the stars seem to be finally aligning around the need for fundamental reform. Rural  , distant and urban may get some help. You know it as E rate.
THANKS  to the Supercomputing Conference, and their outreach for giving teachers who participate the possibility of making change and creating workforce readiness. We will create our own personal revolutions in the places where we work.

SETDA Leadership Summit- Leveraging Technology for Learning

bonniebraceysutton 2 Comments

Yesterday was the leadership summit of SETDA. It was a great event. For the first thing, it was located at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center, in National Harbor, MD. That made it easy to get to, and there was no hassle in parking. No rush hour traffic. Nice. The National Harbor is an inviting place to hold a conference and it is beautiful. It is near Washington , DC.

We signed in and got our resources. I had new sources of information that are also on line, If you go to SETDA.org you can access all of the publications and tools. Lots of information there. You can access the reports and research here. Doug Levin is the executive director of the group. What a wonderful day he crafted for us.

Arnie Duncan

Then there was the event itself. It was titled, ” Leveraging Technology for Learning” and it started with Lee Rainie from the Pew Charitable Trust, who shared ideas in the initial keynote. We got a review of the state of broadband, some ideas of where our students are in the use of technology and some Pew data on the use of mobility. You have probably already seen the Pew Reports. We enjoyed the mash up of data regarding their most recent findings.

Digital Learning Now,  is a report you will want to have.

Many  groups contributed to the report and you can access their information at the bottom of the document..Online access to the document and information about the ten elements of digital learning are on line at www,digitallearningnow.com. You want more than the PDF because the roadmap to reform that we talked about all day, is here.

Thomas G. Carroll, President, National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future was his usual perfect self in presentation. He talked about how we as artisans, in teaching needed to move on and collectivize . Karen Cator lead a very lively discussion on transforming teaching and learning and Tom was the star of that panel..
What you missed  by not being at the leadership conference was being with the movers and shakers in education from various areas and groups and geographical regions. NCTET, vendors, CSSO and the alphabet of educational group leadership was in full force. It was exciting,. We questioned, not much debating, but the discussions were lively.

Maine Shares its Excellence Technology Initiatives

SETDA members work nationally and collaboratively with a wide range of state and local colleagues and in public-private partnerships to address two core education leadership questions: (1) How can states deploy technology in meaningful, sustainable and scalable ways to help educators, schools and districts meet longstanding goals for education, especially those goals that have been most challenging for public education to meet?; and (2), what must the education system do to remain responsive to evolving expectations for what students should know and be able to do and for what students, educators, parents and the public expect of schools vis-à-vis technology?

Bob Gabrys was there from NASA, Stan Silverman from NYIT, Idit Caperton, Globaloria, Mike Haney, NSF, a bunch of Einstein Fellows, the most interesting characters and principal people from many leading educational organizations. Just walking around was a great networking event. A colleague reminded me that it was 25 years since I had been trained in geography by the National Geographic Society. that was Charlie Fitzpatrick  from ESRI. . So you can see that there wasconversation about all kinds of things going on. The state groups shared too.

A highlight of the conference is always the information shared with students, teachers and individual from a state. This year’s group was from Maine. You had to be there to understand the importance of their ability to use technology. It would be hard to explain as well as they did ,how technology influenced their lives.
Most of us know the effects of the One to One Computer Initiative in Maine. Jeff Mao gave us a perspective and shared the long range effects of the program. We heard from a high school, and students involved in technology. This part of the conference helps to frame the importance of the uses of technology.  We also talked about the initiation of the project in Maine way back when Angus KIng  started the idea and created the possibility for it to happen.

California shared Brokers of Expertise..

There was a plenary panel on the visions of the future of education. I know a little about analytics, but not enough to communicate what they were taking about. It was after lunch and maybe I was not paying attention as well as I should have. But I do know the Gates Foundation ideas, and have some ideas of what Gov. Wise , Jeb Bush and others are doing . I attend their workshops too.

Share.  Find.  Use. Amplify

The Learning Registry

Excitement was in the room. You have to go look at this project to see why.
Your investment of time will be well worth it. Explanations are at
info@learningregistry.org.

It won’t be as nice as the presentation by Steve Midgely, but it will work for your understanding.

The cheering began. The groups that participated in the project the Learning Registry shared their ideational scaffolding and the idea of the mission.
With Common Core, it is easy to create innovations for Learning through Sharing.
We had Arnie Duncen, sharing his ideas, with total enthusiasm and interest.

Aneesh Copra guiding us through the thinking that created the project, and others shared the way in which they all worked together.  The military sharing with education and thinking of ways to help us access the resources that are available for us. Awesome.

The star of the show, Steve Midgely, demonstrated the project for us. We were enthused. We were excited.

It was a long day, with benefits. It was worth the investment of time, talent and
technology to learn with and from our educational leaders.

Bonnie Bracey Sutton

The Smithsonian, the Nation’s Attic , A Favorite Learning Place of Mine

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 I must confess that I have been learning at the Smithsonian museums forever.
My mother went to the Baptist Church which started at 10 A.M. p on Sunday, and I was getting on the bus at that time to get to Washington DC, to be at the Smithsonian when it opened on Sunday. There are many Smithsonian Museums  so I would do the dance of which one before I departed from Alexandria , Virginia , and run happily to the museum of my choice. Mind you there is one Smithsonian museum I have never been to, but it is in New York. I intend to go there to it some day. I have former students working in the Cooper-Hewitt Museum NYC and of the museums in New York, I have never visited the American Indian Museum Heye Center (NYC)
I live within walking distance of the Mall , and so I rarely need to think about parking , weather
exceptions for that statement.
Learning Abour the world at the Smithsonian Summer Camp

Smithsonian Summer camp

I used to have a funder who like me LOVED museums. But Jack Taub was in New York with a lot of different museums. Before he passed, we often shared the wonder of what museums can do as teaching institutions. I also had a friend John Scully who was at that time in charge of Apple and we thought a lot about museums as schools. What a wonderful thing that is. Often there are many people who never get to go to museums, or who get involved in the learning that is sustained , cultivated and nurtured by groups within the museum.
I attended the Summer Folklife Fesitval and found a way to infuse myself into a group going to India, on a Fulbright. Who knew a museum was a place to further learning and that it might be possible for me to go to India. I did and we visited about 26 cities officially, we also took a side trip to Nepal.
We were a group of teachers learning about the country of India. What a wonderful experience and extension of the exhibit that was about India on the mall. I think it was what made me geographically
interested in the rest of the world and it gave me a new perspective on cultures. We visited schools, and communities in many cities in India. We also absorbed the culture. In the mornings we read the newspapers and learned what was important in the news in India. We studied religions, yoga, the food and drink, and clothing. We learned history of India that is not a part of regular school teaching.
The Tiger of Mysore? The British influence on India. We visited museums and archeological places.
it was the experience of a lifetime for me. It is a huge country and transportation then was sometimes a bit difficult. Technology was not so widespread then. India
Our task was to collect information about the games and education in India. We visited many cities in various parts of India. I cannot tell you which was the most interesting part of India, and I cannot share my photos because I have not converted them into modern images. I was carrying a Nikon with eight lenses. I loved getting up in the morning early to go take photos before our classes, lectures and excursions. A group of us had guidebooks, and resource and we studied each city in depth before we arrived there. India is bigger than the imagination from the caves, to the architecture to the intricate weavings and the many religions.  I found the markets intriguing , and the things to buy amazing, arts and crafts, so intricate and beautiful.
The Smithsonian Taught me about Seeds of Change, two old worlds coming together.
Another stunning example of how the Smithsonian educates is the work that was done around the Columbus Quincentennary.

October 26, 1991 – May 23, 1993

Museum: Natural History Museum, Studying Seeds of Change

Examined the exchange of plants and seeds between the Old and New Worlds following Columbus’s discovery of America in 1492. Themes include the introduction of horses, sugar, and disease to the New World and the introduction of potatoes and corn to the Old World. Introductory film, on first floor, What a joy it was to be on a committee and work with Smithsonian researchers and to go to the Smithsonian for updates and involvement. Just the information about the origin of foods in the world  was quite interesting.  I even had a chance to teach and cook with kids in the museum as a teacher in the summer program and we actually had a garden, we were helped by gardeners , but we tended to the garden on the Smithsonian grounds raising traditional crops during that summer.

THere was history too, so exciting. There were real emeralds brought in and gold from the conquistadors, and the examination of the diseases that weakened the natives of America,

[Learning About Each Other]

Sharing Our Differences;
Learning From Each Other

From Two Worlds to One World

“In fourteen hundred ninety-two,
Columbus sailed the ocean blue…”

So what does that mean to people living in the world today? Why is Columbus an important person? Why do we celebrate something that happened over 500 years ago?

Here is a place that is of the Smithsonian, and is probably a surprise to most people the SERC Learning Lab. Parents and children happily studied on the dock, we were real scientists at work.

The Sant Hall of Science 

SERC  Smithsonian Research Center

The Smithsonian Information Center in the Castle is centrally located at 1000 Jefferson Dr., SW, Washington, D.C. Ten of the Smithsonian museums in Washington, D.C., span an area from 3rd to 14th Streets between Constitution Avenue and Independence Avenue, approximately 1 mile (1.6 km)
There are convenient places to rest, to picnic to , eat,  and to learn on the outside of the museums too. I was educated by Smithson’s legacy. My schools were not so good , but the museum staff people and their work gave me a world wide education.
There are busses to the far museums, but you have to metro to the Zoo.National Zoo
The National Zoo is at 3001 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Washington, D.C., approximately 30 minutes by car or public transportation from the National Mall. Public parking is available for a fee.
Zoo directions »Anacostia Community Museum
The Anacostia Community Museum is located in Fort Stanton Park at 1901 Fort Place, SE, Washington, D.C. Free public parking is available.
Anacostia Community Museum directions »Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center
The Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center is located at 14390 Air and Space Museum Parkway, Chantilly, Virginia, near the intersection of Rts. 50 and 28. Public parking is available for a fee.
Udvar-Hazy Center directions 
The mall is this wonderful green expanse of lawn that stretches from the Capitol to the Lincoln Memorial and I have footsteps all over that Mall. There are besides the museums, special events, and classes and outeach to teachers. So I was there a lot.  Sometimes I would go in and gaze at the tomb of the founder of the Smithsonian , James Smithson in the castle.
Here is the website to the Smithsonian. http://www.si.edu/ It has always been the A in STEM for me. So when people ask me what about the Arts in STEM I know that they have no idea of my background. The Smithsonian Museums are my learning landscape. I have taken countless children to the various exhibits, workshops and demonstrations at the museums.
My favorite thing to do in the summer used to be to take the workshops that are so powerful that they
give for teachers.My mother used to tease that she saw me standing in line in the snow for various exhibitions. Not true. Parent thought that I worked for the Smithsonian to get kids interested in traveling there. I did teach using the resources of the Smithsonian. Here is a link to the study of air and space by very small students who loved the whole experience.Air and Space

The Smithsonian seeks to bring content experts and educators together to help strengthen American education and enhance our nation’s ability to compete globally. The Smithsonian serves as a laboratory to create models and methods of innovative informal education and link them to the formal  education system.

Wireless.. Will it Help Us Solve the Digital Divide?

bonniebraceysutton 3 Comments

Wither Wireless… are you informed?

 
There is an underlying, fundamental reliance on the Internet, which continues to grow in the number of users, country penetration and both fixed and wireless broadband access.
Vinton Cerf

 

 

Quite a conference. It featured  some outstanding ways of communicating within a conference and there was a stellar array of presenters.  The United States has an opportunity to reform education in a way that will truly prepare our students to compete in the global economy. Mobile technology has a critical role to play in this effort by equipping students and teachers with 24/7 access to learning communities and information. We went to this conference to learn, to teach, to be informed and to network. The organizers did a wonderful job.

 

THere were three tiers of engagement, You can see this here.The conference was designed to break through existing barriers and coordinate across a diverse group of stakeholders including leaders in business, K-12, higher education and government. It is the first conference to focus on major issues in research, practice and policy that must be resolved to realize the full potential of mobile broadband for learning. For more information and to view the Program Guide, please visit the agenda page.  The conference even invited teachers and a student to present to be a part of the conference in outreach.

 

The videos here are available to show you the videos we were informed by.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBM7_zuSnPU&list=PL9F5548C8144B8…!

 

I particularly like this one;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxDHataguRE&feature=related

The one about students use smartphones in the classroom because Julius Genachowski, the FCC Chairman keeps telling us that we can solve the digital divide problem by use of mobile technology. He attended the conference and was interviewed as a part of the conference.

There were three tracks and you can see the richness of the conference here, Education was one track, Policy another and then there was the technology track. I especially liked the way that CoSn helped to inform the policy for this group.

http://wirelessedtech.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/EdTech2011_Pro…

There are some magic things about this conference. There is no cost. This is not a big box conference with bells and whistles and things you have to go to the exhibit hall to sign up for , or workshops you have to fight to get in. YOu sign up as a part of registration , but you can attend out of the track that you sign up for.

They also offer you the research that supports the conference , and people who are active in research as the participants. You may recognize some of the names, Tom Carroll, Chris Dede( who actually creates the conference) and Julie of Speak Up. Here is one of the Speak Up sets of research.

 

Speak Up

http://wirelessedtech.com/wp-content/uploads/Taking-It-Mobile-Repor…

2010 Wireless Research

Mobile Learning for the 21st Century: Insights from the 2010 Wireless EdTech Conference.http://wirelessedtech.com/resources/edtech-research-paper/

You have to enter your email to get this paper. The new paper from this conference will be on the site by January. and the good news is that you get updates and email regarding wireless , so you will be informed when the conference is next year. It’s a short conference, and they are planning some virtual involvement.

 

Highlights of the conference for me are always the presentations of Dr. Chris Dede.

This year the Digital Promise Initiative was introduced to use by Shirley Malcom and  James Shelton of the US Department of Education. That piece speaks for teachers.

 

I was amused by the Superintendent’s section. Most of them were doing a commercial about how great their school system is . I loved it that the Superintendent from Fairfax acknowledged the problems with No Child Left Behind as a fact. The others ,were a little vague about their wireless use except for the Superintendent from North Carolina.

She also was upfront about the problems of rural, diverse communities and she shared the way in which wireless was used in her system.  Well , next time we ask them to define how mobile devices are used in their system. How about that?

So here is a little about Digital Promise. 

For more information, go to: www.digitalpromise.org.

To realize the potential of learning technology, Digital Promise will work with leading educators, researchers, technology firms, and entrepreneurs on three key challenges:

  • Identifying breakthrough technologies. For years, researchers have been working on developing educational software that is as effective as a personal tutor.  Preliminary results from a DARPA/Navy “digital tutor” project suggest that we can reduce the time required to become an expert in IT from years to months.  Achieving similar results in subjects such as math would transform K-12 education.  Digital Promise will begin its work by partnering with technology firms and researchers to map the R&D landscape,identifying opportunities for breakthroughs in learning from the cradle through a career.
  • Learning faster what’s working and what’s not. Internet startups do rapid evaluations of their sites, running test after test to continually improve their services. When it comes to education, R&D cycles can take years, producing results that are out of date the minute they’re released.  Digital Promise will work with researchers and entrepreneurs to develop new approaches for rapidly evaluating new products.
  •  Transforming the market for learning technologies. With more than 14,000 school districts and outdated procurement systems, it’s difficult for entrepreneurs to break into the market and it’s also tough to prove that their products can deliver meaningful results.  Meanwhile, the amount we invest in R&D in K-12 education is estimated at just 0.2% of total spending on K-12 education, compared to 10-20% of revenues spent on R&D in many knowledge-intensive industries such as software development and biotech.   Digital Promise will work with school districts to create “smart demand” that drives private-sector investment in innovation.

Other Initiatives Being Announced with the Launch of Digital Promise

Creating a League of Innovative Schools:In partnership with Digital Promise, leading schools, school districts, and networks such as the District of Columbia Public Schools; Mooresville Graded School District, North Carolina; High Tech High in San Diego, California; York County School Division, Virginia; E.L. Haynes in Washington, DC; Malden High School, Malden, Massachusetts; and the New Tech High Network, are coming together to launch a League of Innovative Schools. The League will be a coalition of schools dedicated to innovation in learning technologies and significant improvements in educational outcomes. The League will explore key steps it can take to help the learning technology market, including:

  • Rapid testing of promising new technologies.Internet companies like Netflix and Amazon don’t make decisions on the basis of hunches.  They use rapid, low-cost experimentation to continually improve their products.  Similar opportunities exist for learning technologies. Schools with the flexibility to try new things and the data systems to capture the results offer opportunities for trials, both identifying what works and doing rapid prototyping to refine new tools. Working together, these schools can accelerate the pace of learning and innovation.
  • Creating a buyers’ consortium to demand better prices and higher quality.New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, and Maine formed a consortium called the New England Common Assessment Program to buy testing materials together, getting a higher quality product at a lower cost.  Members of the League can band together to improve their purchasing power for emerging solutions.
  • Encouraging entrepreneurs to develop game-changing innovations by promising to buy them.By using what’s called an “Advance Market Commitment,” five countries and the Gates Foundation agreed to purchase large quantities of a vaccine that hadn’t been developed yet – a vaccine to immunize kids in developing countries against diseases such as pneumonia and meningitis. The private sector responded, and today that vaccine is on the market and could help save the lives of 7 million children by 2030. Similarly, a consortium of schools and school districts could encourage entrepreneurs to develop new solutions that deliver dramatic improvements in student learning outcomes.

New Investments by NSF on Cyber-learning:  In support of the Administration’s initiative, the National Science Foundation will announce $15 million in new awards to support research that is developing next-generation learning environments.


Bonnie Bracey Sutton

“A Teacher’s Essential Guide to Engaging in STEM Learning: Practice-Proven Projects and Programs.”

bonniebraceysutton 2 Comments
Community Outreach to Girls, at a Special Conference in Washington DC

In the nation's capitol, there was held a conference to share workforce ideas with girls

This is going to be an e-book. I am sharing the chapters as I develop them hoping for feedback and enrichment from interested others.

.Bonnie Bracey Sutton, Teacher Agent of Change

This is a difficult time for teachers , there is a ground swell for STEM , transformational teaching and new practices in all teaching involving media in the United States. There have been more than 22 major meetings to address the STEM problem the most important meeting being the:

The Convocation on Rising Above the Gathering Storm


National Academies Press, 2007  ( nothing much has happened in spite of this)

This  NASbook is on line free of charge for online use


In a world where advanced knowledge is widespread and low-cost labor is readily available, U.S. advantages in the marketplace and in science and technology have begun to erode. A comprehensive and coordinated federal effort is urgently needed to bolster U.S. competitiveness and pre-eminence in these areas. This congressionally requested report by a pre-eminent committee makes four recommendations along with 20 implementation actions that federal policy makers should take to create high-quality jobs and focus new science and technology efforts on meeting the nation’s needs, especially in the area of clean, affordable energy: 1) increase America’s talent pool by vastly improving K-12 mathematics and science education.

  1. )Sustain and strengthen the nation’s commitment to long-term basic research.3) Develop, recruit, and retain top students, scientists, and engineers from both the United States and abroad. 4) Ensure that the United States is the premier place in the world for innovation. Some actions will involve changing existing laws, while others will require financial support that would come from reallocating existing budgets or increasing them. Rising Above the Gathering Storm will be of great interest to federal and state government agencies, educators and schools, public decision makers, research sponsors, regulatory analysts, and scholars.

More »

Norman R. Augustine, Chair of the “Committee on Prospering the Global Economy of the 21st Century” that produced the influential 2005 National Academies report, Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future, met with members of the NSB Commission on 21st Century Education in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics during their first meeting, August 3 – 4, 2006.

http://www.pkal.org/documents/RAGSConvocation.cfm source

This is a difficult time for school systems, funds are limited, resources are stretched and professional development needs a recharge, a transformation.There is not a depth of knowledge about STEM at grass roots.

Online, teachers are still asking me what is STEM? The reason for transformational change has not gotten to the grass roots level. We know that everyone is not online. I also know that STEAM is the attempt to infuse the arts into STEM. I am a DaVinci teacher, always have and that is another chapter coming up. For those who cannot wait, go to the Exploratorium site. 

“ Most of the meetings did not involve teachers, but rather cast the blame on teachers. Many teachers are working in a “culture of fear, intimidation and retaliation” and the gating caused by NCLB.

. This discussion will give credence to the search for change, provide referenced research and case studies of good practices, and new resources. It is a loving guide to what works. Teachers can help save our schools and help enrich the community by involving citizens in the transformational change.

Computers and “connected” mobile devices may be ubiquitous, but there are still many people who do not know how to turn on a laptop, create an email account or open Internet Explorer, says Stuart Freiman, director of the R.I. Economic Development Corporation’s Broadband Rhode Island project.

Some children own the tools to transform their thinking and learning.

“The notion of the digital divide truly exists,” said Freiman, who estimates 30 to 35 percent of Americans do not use the Internet. “As we move into the 21st century, that’s going to be more and more important in every aspect of our lives: access to health care, the government and public-safety issues.” Teachers know what reseachers get paid big money to find out. Many learning communities are not connected .Sadly the groups that used to be teacher advocacy groups are turning commercial and becoming a part that widens the digital divide.

We have a lot of people who are NOT connected in communities. Here is a state model that was developed to help people in Iowa understand the problem.

 SHIFT HAPPENS – a media presentation A State Model

Here is an application of those ideas toward state policies.

Iowa, Did You Know?8/4/2011Once again XPLANE | Dachis Group has teamed up with Dr. Scott McLeod of Iowa State University to create a thought-provoking video. The brand-new “Iowa, Did You Know …http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1JyLYphevc

Research is a component of this work, citations, case studies urls, and references will be a part of the last chapter for reference, grant writing, ideas that teachers use to prepare presentations.

These teachers, and administrators can share with school boards, and invite the community to help them with STEM..The ideas are important because many teachers are without broadband and cannot search fully for the resources they need. The work that is being shared has been vetted by teacher national organizations or the National Academy of Sciences. Most of the many, many papers, books and research ideas are not about practice.

There is a lack of known resources or knowledgenetworks,for many US teachers based on budget difficulties , and there are teachers who have little or no professional development in how to effectively use new media. Much of the instruction for the use of new media is online and those who are uncomfortable, cannot rely on the sources to give them the help they need for academic reasons. The lack of online content access for low-income and underserved American’s is one of the digital divide’s frontiers. 

Prior Resource

The resources in this chapter are the kind of support, help and sharing that Marc Prensky talked about in his recent book. He did the hard work of helping teachers organize their practices to prepare for change..He created a wonderful road map to getting to the nuts and bolts of what kinds of essential changes, behavior modification and partnering that can happen to provide transformational learning.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/16594116/Marc-Prenskys-Essential-Skills-for-the-21st-Century. There are some initiatives widely scattered around the Internet.

There are about 19 documents on various subjects that are on line at the National Academy of Sciences

  •    
    STEM Education Innovation & America’s Economic Success

Depend on the awareness of the problem, change and creating connectedideas in learning communities

Important Ingredients to Come

  • Engaging and Broadening Engagement in STEM for Underserved and underexposed populations
  • Successful Models for Innovating Change in STEM Education
  • A First Look at the New Science Education Framework
  • A look at Common Core Standards and their significance
  • Educational Organizations and Connected Communities
  • Workforce Readiness,Career Pathways


Legislation Introduced to Fund Nontraditional STEM Programs

Congress is currently considering legislation that would provide funding for nontraditional programs in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, or STEM. The Innovation Inspiration School Grant Program is intended to broaden student access and interest in STEM careers in order to grow the pipeline for a globally competitive workforce. We must demystify the STEM problem.

The initiative would provide competitive grants to districts and high schools, giving priority to rural, urban, and low-performing schools, or those that serve low income students. The Innovation Inspiration School grants would fund nontraditional STEM programs, like robotics, in high schools. Districts would be required to partner with the private sector for 50% matching funds and to recruit STEM mentors to serve as role models.

The bill, H.R. 2247, was recently introduced in the House by Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) and Rep. James Langevin (D-RI)For more than four years now the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, originally passed by the Johnson administration in 1965, has been overdue for congressional reauthorization. That’s due in no small part to provisions in the act’s latest incarnation, 2001’s much-maligned No Child Left Behind act.

No Child Left Behind is still with us.(since President Barack Obama’s announcement last month that he would begin allowing states to individually opt out of some of NCLB’s requirements, more than half of U.S. states have taken the offer, with 27 now either in the process or strongly pushing for such an opt out.)

It’s Everyone’s Job to be a “Job Creator”

allanjones67 Leave a comment

I am tired of hearing about jobs programs and job creators. There is something in these terms that implies that there is a small, elite group of people who serve as the job creators, while everyone else prepares for and competes to work for these people and their jobs. In my opinion, that is a deeply flawed view of what makes the American economy great. America became great because everyone has the potential to be a job creator. What we are doing in our Tracy Learning Center (TLC) program is creating a new generation of job creators, not just workers. But frequently, when I tell people about what a great impact the TLC program is having on its students, people look at just their academic performance numbers to validate my claim. Our students do very well academically, but that is only a small part of the overall impact of the program.

To use an analogy; life is like building a house. TLC provides an education that prepares the person to be able to build the whole house, and even be the developer who builds the community. A traditional school focuses only on teaching students how to drive a nail. Clearly our students will be able to drive a nail, and remarkably, they will do it very well. So, if getting a job means being able to drive a nail, we’re good. But we’re much more than good.

Students in our program are taught how to get a job. But they are also taught how to start a company. The career program includes a unit where they work in small teams and have to take an idea and build a business around it. In other courses, TLC students work in small teams solving problems. Tis model of learning ensures that they master the traditional academic content, but it also does much more than that. As a result of their team problem-solving approach, the students learn a broad assortment of high performance skills such as teamwork, communications, problem-solving, researching, creativity, responsibility, reliability, innovation, planning, etc. Our program gives students the confidence and skills to create their own jobs, and potentially jobs for other as well. Every student coming out of school has to feel like he or she is a job creator, not just a worker. The TLC model does that very well.

On one of my trips to the school, I happened to be there on the same day that one of their graduates had chosen to return and thank the school for what it had done for him. He had transferred to the TLC as a high school student because he was having all kinds of problems in his old school – not just academically, but behaviorally and even problems with substance abuse (possibly including dealing drugs to other students). He had come back to the school that day to thank the teachers for not giving up on him and to tell the next generation of students to listen to the teachers because they care and they are right.

A couple of years earlier, he was coming to the end of his senior year and because he lacked the credits to earn a diploma was not going to graduate. As a result of the work with his teachers at the TLC, he realized how important getting the diploma was, so he asked for permission to spend another semester at the school to earn the diploma. Permission was granted, and he did earn it. He worked with the teachers and counselors, wrote letters, and got scholarships that allowed him to attend a local vocational school to learn the HVAC trades. He now has a job in the field, is seeking additional scholarships to further his education, and is already planning to start his own business. All of this success was directly related to the program and teachers at the TLC.

At the other end of the spectrum, I should also mention the story of the young female student who earned her associates degree at the local college while attending the TLC and then enrolled at UC Berkeley as a junior the fall following her high school graduation.

These are just two examples. If you take the time to sit down and talk with virtually any student at the school, you will hear some variation of these stories. The program reaches every student in some individual way. It gives them the knowledge and skills to be successful. But more importantly, it gives them the self-confidence to try.

All Things Considered , A Digital Promise for an Education Nation, Broadband Please!!

bonniebraceysutton Leave a comment

The White House and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan  launched “Digital Promise” this Friday at 10 a.m. “Digital Promise” is a new national center created by Congress to advance breakthrough technologies that can hopefully  transform teaching and learning. I will gently say that without broadband for all. The Promise is yet to come in a meaningful way. But it is a  great start. Here was a start that was initiated by the NEA. after the death of Christa McAuliffe, in 1992 where we discussed some of these ideas how wonderful to find that in the crucible of ideas that can cooked up that many of the ideas have come to fruition. I am excited that Shirley Malcom is a part of this initiative..

This initiative was also discussed around the table at the George Lucas Educational Foundation

Bonnie Bracey , Chris Dede, Seymour Papert at NEA , NFIE workshop for digital equity

The beginnings of ideas to vault the digital divide

At the end of NIAC the ideas were started , creating the possibility of this project. many long years later Founded after more than a decade of effort, including a 2004 report to Congress, Digital Promise has been endorsed by virtually every major national association of educators and educational institutions, libraries, and museums. The project that gave rise to Digital Promise was launched by the Carnegie, Century, Knight, MacArthur, and Open Society foundations, sustained by the Federation of American Scientists, and championed by a coalition of Republicans and Democrats, civic and business leaders, who came together on its behalf so that the dream of a greenhouse, a place to share ideas and promising practices finally is established, online, instead of in regional centers, and or demonstration projects that are geographically based.

GPS, GIS comes to urban students in a neighborhood setting

ESRI , and National Geographic provide resources for all.

This has been a work in progress.  For the Digital Promise Project, The George Lucas Educational Foundation has produced a short videoto share the potential of new technologies in learning for schools, universities, and the workplace. Digital Promise is a project advocating the establishment of a major federally funded educational trust fund to support the use of digital technologies, especially the Internet, to transform education, training, and lifelong learning.

Being involved in transformational education through NASA

We never mentioned the word Supercomputing, we just did it.

The focus in education for the last couple of weeks has been all STEM and all about Digital Promises

 No Child Left Behind has Left the Building, Following the path of  Little Red Schoolhouse 

As No Child Left Behind is being escorted out of the building of the Dept of Education, Common  Core, new ways of assessment are being escorted in , and there is a sea change in that we can now acknowledge STEM/. The Brookings Institute held an exciting meeting,

 At the meeting, the Department of Commerce shared the last of the three reports
Education Supports Racial and Ethnic Equality in STEM. that report is one of three.

Experts in all fields discussed promising practices and then accepted querys and questions from the audience.

Science, mathematics, engineering, and technology (STEM) are said to be fundamental aspects of everyone’s lives as citizens, consumers, parents, and workers. Here is a infographic to help visualize the ideas.

Providing all students with access to high-quality education in STEM is important to their futures and that of the U.S. What can schools do to meet this goal for their students?

How about realizing the problem of Broadband for all.? We have a National Broadband Plan.You can learn more about it here.

There is more, but I am a teacher , semi technology literate. So look down the site and see things like windrider.  See other technology applications here. http://www.measurementlab.net/resources

You can see if your community is broadband ready  here.

If you are an activist and you want to check your connections and contribute to data, you may want to involve yourself in the M-Lab Project.  When you take a first look it looks like a site only for researchers.M-Lab.

It will be helpful to you if you use the site to test your Internet connection. Do it here. It is easy.

There are explanations, so you will know that your privacy is not compromised.

Here are the tests.

Network diagnostic tool

Test your connection speed and receive sophisticated diagnosis of problems limiting speed.

Glasnost test

Test whether certain applications or traffic are being blocked or throttled on your broadband connection.

Network path & application diagnostics

Diagnose common problems that impact last-mile broadband networks.

Bandwidth test

See how much bandwidth your connection provides

Traffic shaping test

Determine whether an ISP is performing traffic shaping.

Bismark Gateway

Apply to host a router device to test Internet connectivity over time.

Mobile traffic test

Detect whether your mobile broadband provider is performing application or service specific differentiation.

 

STEM , Education Supports Racial and Ethnic Equality in STEM

bonniebraceysutton Leave a comment

I attended a workshop at the Brookings Institute on this subject. The press reported it , but they did not give it much space or report some of the new ideas that are in place in thinking about STEM education. It is not just the US that has this problem. I know this from working in many countries as a part of WSIS, and the role of science in the information society.

While we have many kinds of new technologies that people take time to learn, the culture of learning in the US is not about STEM , so far. Robotics have made a leapfrog, but since most teachers in the lower grades are women, you cannot take that as a step to engineering for granted.

Here is the link to the report.  US Dept of Commerce   www.esa.doc.gov

There are actually three reports within the esa site. You can also read this blog.

http://www.esa.doc.gov/Blog/2011/09/13/education-promotes-racial-and-ethnic-equality-science-tech-engineering-and-math-jobs

Three important things to learn from the data.

K-12 all through K-12 we should be teaching and giving examples of STEM initiatives.

We used to say, or the people in charge used to only mostly targer students in the higher grades.

That does not work. Remarkably this is now being understood.

Teachers deserve respect for their jobs and interestingly enough in math there is a group that compensates math teachers  for being math teachers.

Math for America is the project he founded. I put the link here for those without broadband.

Math for America (MƒA) is a nonprofit organization with a mission to improve mathematics education in US public secondary schools by recruiting, training and retaining outstanding mathematics teachers. Founded in New York City in 2004, MƒA also has sites located inBerkeley, Boston, Los Angeles, San Diego, Utah and Washington, DC. MƒA offers Fellowships for new and experienced teachers and school leaders, including: the MƒA Fellowship, which aims to increase the number of mathematically talented individuals entering the teaching profession; the MƒA Early Career Fellowship and the MƒA Master Teacher Fellowship, which support outstanding mathematics teachers already in the classroom; and the MƒA School Leader Fellowship, which is designed to support experienced mathematics teachers who have moved into administrative positions and oversee mathematics instruction in their schools.

Engineering

Dr. Charles M. Vest is the president of the National Academy of Engineering and president emeritus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He shared this from the National Academy of Sciences.

 A report released in July  by the National Research Council presents a new framework for K-12 science education that identifies the key scientific ideas and practices all students should learn by the end of high school.  The framework will serve as the foundation for new K-12 science education standards, to replace those issued more than a decade ago.  The National Research Council is the operating arm of the National Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Engineering; all three are independent, nongovernmental organizations. The committee that wrote the report sees the need for significant improvements in how science is taught in the U.S.  The new framework is designed to help students gradually deepen their knowledge of core ideas in four disciplinary areas over multiple years of school, rather than acquire shallow knowledge of many topics.  And it strongly emphasizes the practices of science – helping students learn to plan and carry out investigations, for example, and to engage in argumentation from evidence. 

 

The overarching goal of the framework, the committee said, is to ensure that by the end of 12th grade, all students have some appreciation of the beauty and wonder of science, the capacity to discuss and think critically about science-related issues, and the skills to pursue careers in science or engineering if they want to do so — outcomes that existing educational approaches are ill-equipped to achieve.

 

“Currently, science education in the U.S. lacks a common vision of what students should know and be able to do by the end of high school, curricula too often emphasize breadth over depth, and students are rarely given the opportunity to experience how science is actually done,” said Helen Quinn, committee chair and professor emerita of physics at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in Stanford, Calif.  “The new framework is designed to address and overcome these weaknesses.  It builds on what is known to work best in science education, based on research and classroom experience both in the U.S.and around the world.  It provides a blueprint that will guide improvements in science education over many years.”

 

From NIST Tech Beat ( Last summer’s offer)

NIST Summer Institute for Middle School Science Teachers Accepting Applications

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is soliciting nominations of middle school science teachers from eligible U.S. public school districts or accredited private educational institutions to participate in the NIST Summer Institute for Middle School Science Teachers. The NIST Summer Institute provides hands-on activities, lectures, tours and visits with scientists and engineers in NIST laboratories.

The Summer Institute will be held at the NIST campus in Gaithersburg, Md., from July 18 to 29, 2011.

The two-week workshop is designed to increase teachers’ understanding of the subjects they teach through exposure to the cutting-edge measurement science research pursued at NIST. The workshop provides teachers with instructional materials and ideas to use in their teaching, experience in how scientific research is carried out, and an opportunity to develop an ongoing network with the scientists and engineers at NIST. NIST provides a $2,000 stipend for teachers attending the workshop and travel and lodging funds for those traveling more than 50 miles to the workshop.

U.S. public school districts or accredited private educational institutions that offer science courses such as earth science, physical science, chemistry, physics and/or biologyat the middle school level (Grades 6-8) are eligible to nominate no more than one teacher per school for the program. Applications are due by 3 p.m. Eastern Time, on Thursday, March 24, 2011.

NIST also is soliciting nominations from school districts or educational institutions of middle school science teachers who have successfully completed the NIST Summer Institute to participate in the NIST Research Experience for Teachers (NIST RET) program. The NIST RET will allow the selected teachers to participate in scientific research with NIST scientists and engineers at the NIST campus in Gaithersburg, Md., that will encourage the teachers to inspire their students to pursue careers in fields of science, technology, engineering or mathematics.

So you can put that on your agenda to look at for the offerings next year.

If you are interested in the elementary level, or the new standards, look here.

A Framework for K-12 Science Education  for those without broadband http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13165

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13165

Charles Giancarlo sahred with us the concern of meeting the needs of the businesses that do not have

the degrees and knowhow that is needed. He said that companies have to go abroad to find these workers. We had a long discussion on the lack of diversity and the rationale for companies to seek employees outside of the US and the problems that it causes and the  current problem is that the workers cannot stay and that others come, learn and then go home and earn, also taking their new ideas to their countries.

The H-1B is a non-immigrant visa in the United States under the Immigration and Nationality Act, section 101(a)(15)(H). It allows U.S. employers to temporarily employ foreign workers in specialty occupations. If a foreign worker in H-1B status quits or is dismissed from the sponsoring employer, the worker must either apply for and be granted a change of status to another non-immigrant status, find another employer (subject to application for adjustment of status and/or change of visa), or leave the United States.

The regulations define a “specialty occupation” as requiring theoretical and practical application of a body of highly specialized knowledge in a field of human endeavor[1]including but not limited to architecture, engineering, mathematics, physical sciences, social sciences, biotechnology, medicine and health, education, law, accounting, business specialties, theology, and the arts, and requiring the attainment of a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent as a minimum[2] (with the exception of fashion models, who must be “of distinguished merit and ability”

Great teachers and great schools have the ability to transform the living standard of Americans.  Over the past century, investments in education have boosted the productivity and earnings of American workers, forged a path out of poverty for many families, and developed a productive and innovative workforce.  However, those gains have stagnated and even declined in recent years.  Despite one of the highest rates of per-pupil spending among industrialized countries, the United States ranks as mediocre on most measures of student achievement.

We spent more per person on incarceration than education per person.

Here is the Brookings Institute summary of the event.

The need for better science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) teacher training and investment was emphasized today at a Brookings Institution forum on the topic. Dr. Rebecca Blank, the Acting Secretary of Commerce, presented several Commerce reports showing the importance of STEM education for job creation and economic development, and significant underrepresentation in the field for women, African-Americans, and Hispanics. Its report on “Women in STEM: A Gender Gap to Innovation” found that STEM workers were 76 percent male and only 24 percent female. A new report released today on “Education Supports Racial and Ethnic Equality in STEM” noted that 74 percent of STEM workers are male, compared to 6 percent who are Hispanic, 6 percent African-American, and 14 percent Asian-American. She noted the importance of the United States doing a better job attracting students into STEM fields and the need to reach out to under-represented communities. Since STEM workers earn a premium of 25 percent over other workers and have only a 5.5 percent unemployment rate, there are strong economic incentives to get more people into STEM fields.

Jim Simons, the founder of Math for America and board chairman of Renaissance Technologies, discussed his non-profit’s interest in improving teacher training in high school STEM courses. He said we need “knowledgeable and inspiring teachers” and that today we have a “shortage of such teachers”. The way to make STEM teaching more attractive so instructors do a better job introducing students to science and math is “higher pay and better working conditions”. Math for America proposes bonuses and stipends for high school STEM teachers and has provided funding for this across the country. The organization helps 350 math teachers in New York City and hopes to raise that figure to between 700 and 800 in the near future.

Charles Vest is president of the National Academy of Engineering and MIT president emeritus. He pointed out that South Korea graduates more engineers than the United States and the China graduates 10 times as many as America. In many Asian countries, 21 percent of college graduates are engineers, compared to 12 percent in Europe and 4.5 percent in the United States.

Charles Giancarlo is managing director and head of value creation for Silver Lake Partners. He noted that Cisco (where he used to serve as executive vice president) employs 24,000 engineers and Silver Lake Partner’s companies employ 87,000. Yet the United States graduates only 86,000 engineers, indicating a mismatch between supply and demand. He also explained that 35 percent of graduates are foreign born, yet we only provide 85,000 H-1b visas for scientists and engineers so many foreign students who would like to stay in the United States are forced to return to their home country. This robs the United States of valuable talent and sources of future innovation and job creation.

ADD YOUR VIEW

My view is at the top of the event and I believe that urban, rural, distant and gender .. we have a lot to do to change the face of education.

Bonnie Bracey Sutton