Preparing Science and Mathematics Teachers for Grades 7-12: a Community of Scholars at Work

Preparing Science and Mathematics Teachers for Grades 7-12: A Community of Scholars at Work

Peter Sheppard

LouisianaStateUniversity

Frank Cartledge

LouisianaStateUniversity

LouisianaStateUniversity

In response to the critical shortage of qualified science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) teachers, Louisiana State University(LSU) faculty from education, mathematics, and the sciences have collaborated to create a unique 4-year undergraduate program that allows participants to obtain both a bachelor’s degree in a STEM discipline as well as complete all the necessary secondary teacher certification requirements. This program, referred to as STEP thru STEM, represents unprecedented collaboration among STEM faculty, education faculty andthe East Baton Rouge Parish School System, among others. Preliminary data indicate the key components to the success of this nontraditional pathway to teaching include recruitment, effective mentor teachers, and continuous collaboration.

STEP thru STEM

STEP thru STEM (Secondary Teacher Education Preparation thru Science, Technology, Engineering, or Mathematics) is LouisianaStateUniversity’s new pathway to earning teacher certification in the STEM fields. Faculty from the Colleges of Arts and Sciences, Basic Sciences, and Education collectively redesigned secondary teacher preparation with the intention of a) meeting the critical need for teachers in these fields and b) producing graduates who are better prepared to teach. The end result is an intensive undergraduate degree program that allows students to earn a degree in their content subject while simultaneously meetingteacher certification requirements.

Specifically, this program introduces a concentration in education that leads to a teaching certificate. The concentration consists of 24 credit hours of Curriculum & Instruction (including student teaching) and 6 hours of field-concentrated subject matter courses. Ideally, students matriculate through the program as follows:

Semester/Year / Curriculum & Instruction Course / Subject Matter Course
2nd Sem. Sophomore / Education Schooling &Society / General Education (Intro)
1st Sem. Junior / Student Development & Diversity / Classroom Tutoring Experience
2nd Sem. Junior / Classroom Culture Learning Theory / Technology Instruction
1st Sem. Senior / Curriculum & Pedagogy / Devising/Practicing Lessons
2nd Sem. Senior / Student Teaching
2nd Sem. Senior / Capstone: Critical Issues in Education / Capstone, Inquiry Methods

The nation as whole has been experiencing a critical shortage of qualified teachers in STEM areas. In Louisiana, in particular, it is estimated that there will be a shortfall of 500 STEM teachers per year. This is a staggering statistic and one that is great cause for concern. LSU annually produces 16% of all Louisiana teacher graduates. Therefore, to fulfill its quota, LSU needs to certify 80 STEM graduates per year by the end of the decade [1]. To meet this challenge, the STEP thru STEM program offers teacher certification to all STEM majors. Since their subject degrees will not be sacrificed, it is hoped that the traditional STEM major will consider this a viable option that will enhance their career options.Moreover, the program makes teacher certification more attractive for traditional STEM majors and education majors by completing the major requirements and teacher certification within a traditional four-year 128-credit hour curriculum.

The STEP thru STEM program is also aligned with one of the core teaching requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind ACT. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 demands that states employ “highly qualified” teachers in all schools. The highly qualified standard requires teachers to have in-depth content knowledge equivalent to that of an academic major [2]. Graduates of the STEP thru STEM will inherently meet the highly qualified standard because they will be STEM majors. Moreover, the curriculum that a STEP thru STEM graduate receives is fundamentally more content intensive than traditional secondary education degree programs.

Funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF) has enabled this program to rapidly develop into a premier teacher certification program. The funding has allowed the university to: 1) hire a project coordinator whose primary duties include recruiting students, recruiting mentor teachers, and acting as a liaison among university faculty and other “stakeholders;” 2) provide scholarships for students involved in the program; and 3) implement a marketing campaign to increase awareness of the program. With funding in place, the program was implemented in its first stage in fall 2003.

Initial observations from the first semester of the program indicate the importance of three main factors: recruitment of prospective teachers,identification and development of mentor teachers, and collaboration among all participants.

Recruiting

Nationwide, it is projected that 2.2 million teachers will be needed prior to the end of the decade[3]. The problem is so prevalent in math and the sciences that they are often referred to as “critical need” areas in teaching. Moreover, competition for quality math and science students overall is fierce; lucrative fields including engineering tend to be popular choices for high achieving students who might otherwise choose a pure math or science discipline. Furthermore, with the public perception of teaching as an underpaid, poorly respected, and overworked occupation, recruiting for teacher education in STEM fields is difficult.

The Project Coordinator, a former mathematics teacher, is the chief recruiter for STEP thru STEM. Just as in most new ventures, one of the primary goals of the recruiting effort is to increase awareness of the program. To meet this goal, flyers, brochures, promotional items, a website, newspaper ads, etc. were developed. Due to bureaucratic delays, however, all of the items were not collectively finished until the end of the fall semester.

In the interim, the recruiting process shifted from marketing materials to initiating contact with students. First, broadcast emails were sent to STEM majors enrolled in math or science courses. Emails were also sent to STEM majors who were just admitted to their senior colleges. Next, requests to present program information to on-campus math or science organizations were tendered. The productivity of these initiatives was minuscule at best.

Consequently, staff developed the most successful recruiting strategy to date; class visits. The curricula of STEM majors were analyzed and several courses wereidentified that all sophomore and junior STEM majors were required to take. These courses became known as thetarget courses; that is, courses that were most likely to produce STEP thru STEM participants. Individual faculty were contacted to obtain permission to visit their classes. Visits were limited to 15 minutes and included either a brief presentation and brief survey or a just a brief survey about the program.

Although the survey has only four questions, the data collected from the survey have proven to be invaluable to the program. It has been a convenient way of obtaining large amounts of self-reported data, demographics included, in a short period of time. It also includes the major benefits of the program including the large number of scholarships available to participants. The NSF STEM-TP grant provides $500 per academic year ($1000 total) to a minimum of forty students per year. Additional funding from NSF via the Robert Noyce Scholarship Program offers larger scholarships of $7500 per year ($15,000 total) to six students per year.These features spark initial interest in the program and lead students to desire more information about the STEP thru STEM program. All students indicating an interest in the program are then personally contacted by the project coordinator who assists students in making the transition into the program.

Of the more than 500 sampled STEM students, 60% indicated “no interest in the program.” Thirty percent indicated they were “somewhat interested in the program” and 10% listed that they were “very interested in the program.” Subsequent interviews with the STEM students currently enrolled in the first two courses indicated that almost 90% of the participants learned of the program via the class visits and brief surveys.

While sophomore college students are truly the most coveted crop of students for inclusion into the program, community colleges as well as high schools have been contacted to broaden the recruiting pool. This outreach effort includes class visits to 1) the local community college; 2) high school counselors; 3) high school science fairs throughout the region; and 4) email/snail mail to all 68 school districts in Louisiana. An astounding statistic was that nearly 75% of the community college students surveyed were interested in engineering fields and thus would not be eligible for this program. High school counselors and teachers have expressed an interest in how the program, specifically financially, could benefit the students immediately.The recruitment of high school prospects (pre-freshman) will continue at campus events such as Spring Testing (placement testing program for outstanding high school seniors), state and regional science fairs, the department of mathematics’ annual high school math contest and freshman orientations, among others.

The goal of the program is to enroll 50 students by the fall of 2004. As of spring 2004,45 STEM majors have enrolled in our first two courses:22 biology students, 16 math students, five chemistry students and two physics students. Although, the goal seems well within reach, the complexities (academic, social, and cultural transitions) that seem to epitomize the college experience are likely to be the primary inhibitors of successful completion of the program.

The Lead Mentor Teachers

“Mentoring is a nurturing process, in which a more skilled or more experienced person, serving as a role model, teaches, sponsors, encourages, counsels, and befriends a less skilled or less experienced person for the purpose of promoting the latter’s professional and or personal development. Mentoring functions are carried out within the context of an ongoing, caring relationship between the mentor and the protégé.”[4]

The STEP thru STEM program is highly field-intensive by design. This places an increased responsibility on behalf of the mentor teacher in the preparation and training of pre-service teachers. Fortunately NSF, through the STEM-TP grant, has afforded LSU the opportunity to recruit and retain skilled, knowledgeable practicing teachers to serve as mentors. Thementor teachers are subdivided into two groups: Lead Mentors and Cooperating Mentors. Lead Mentors are practicing secondary teachers in STEM fields who will remain with the program throughout its duration. Their roles include participating in a mentor training course, conducting training for Cooperating Mentors, recruitingCooperating Mentors, hosting pre-service students and assisting in the development of field experience activities with university faculty. The Cooperating Mentor’s role includes all of the above activities with the exception of training other Cooperating Mentors. Seven Lead Mentors were selected in fall 2003 and have begun to work with the STEP thru STEM students. Additional Cooperating Mentors will be selected to participate in the 2004-05 academic year, with an anticipated total of 44 Cooperating Mentors in the program by spring of 2007.

The Lead Mentors were chosen through a rigorous selection process. First, recommendations were solicited from the East Baton Rouge Parish School System Deputy Superintendent and Assistant Superintendent of Secondary Schools. This list included 20 teachers within the school district and was combined with a list of another 15 teachers recommended or observed by LSU personnel. The list of 35 teachers was reduced to a final list of 15 who were identified as exemplary teachers. Preliminary distinguishing factors included educational attainment, teaching experiences, and school proximity from the university campus. Each finalist received three visits from the project coordinator: the first visit was an introduction to the program; the second visit was an informal classroom observation; and the final visit was a formal class observation with evaluation. The evaluation instrument assessed the teacher’s ability to use standards-based reform teaching practices during instruction. The project coordinator also assessed the teacher’s use of the Louisiana Components of Effective Teaching.

The seven Lead Mentors are accomplished in the teaching profession and have a strong command of their subject areas. All of the lead mentors in the program have advanced degrees. Five of the lead mentors are department heads and many have won awards such asEast Baton Rouge Parish Teacher of Year, earned National Board Certification and/or taught in a nationally recognized NCLBBlueRibbonSchool.

The expectation is that theMentor Teachersserve asmodel educators, facilitators, content specialists and critical friends to the pre-service teachers [5]. They also elicit valuable reflections from the students in an informal manner that might otherwise be inhibited when addressed to university faculty. As a result of the various interventions and support structures, the pre-service teacherswillpossess not only deep content knowledge of their subject area, they will alsohave the skills to be effective practitioners. Even though this is the just the beginning of the STEP thru STEM program, it is already evident that the lead mentor teachers have met or exceeded program expectations.

With the duty of teaching field experience courses transferred to content area faculty (from math and the sciences), these individuals have relied on the expertise of our Lead Mentors for guidance. Subsequently, the contributions of our Lead Mentors have been described as indispensable. Through direct conversations during our Lead Mentor training seminars, these master teachers have been able to provide significant input on the design, development, and restructuring of our field-based courses. However, our LeadMentors have expressed a need for more consistent communication. One Lead Mentor explained, “The meetings at LSU have been the only method of communication. The time limits of both teachers and faculty hinder greater communication.” In field-based programs such as STEP thru STEM, in which the parties involved are distributed over large distances, adequate communication between all of the role groups is essential [6].

Collaborations

By definition, collaboration means to work jointly with others, especially in an intellectual endeavor. This program is a result of an unprecedented level of collaboration among faculty from the Colleges of Arts and Sciences, Basic Sciences, and Education in partnership with local school representatives working together with guidance and input from the Louisiana Governor’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Teacher Quality, the Louisiana Board of Regents, and the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education [1]. To this end, it is apparent that the responsibility of preparing STEM teachers will be shared among all the aforementioned entities.

Furthermore, bi-weekly meetings have been incorporated to ensure that the partnerscommunicate frequently to better understand and define their roles. Each of the colleges is represented by at least two faculty members. Consequently, results from dialogue at these meetings have offset many of the possible pitfalls that could have occurred in a new, inter-departmental program such as this. Although the program has not been immune to such difficulties, the collaborative approach hasinsulated and protectedit from being unduly disrupted by outside influences.

One might conclude that collaboration is embedded even in the logistics of this program. As opposed to being housed in one of the three vested colleges, the hub for the STEP thru STEM program is the Gordon A. Cain Center for STEM Literacy, a unit of the Office of Academic Affairs. The mission of the CainCenter is to provide leadership in interdisciplinary educational research and practices in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. In an early fall semester academic gathering hosted by the Cain Center, faculty from the chemistry, education, mathematics, physics, and biological sciences pledged to regard the success of the STEP thru STEM program as their number one priority.

Despite the extensive collaborative effort, a challenge still presents itself in making the STEP thru STEM program a top priority of the majority of members of the math and sciences departments.Even though faculty aspire to see the program flourish, their own teaching and research interests dominate their time and therefore takes precedent. On several occasions faculty have ignored frequent correspondence related to STEP thru STEMbusiness especially when it involves visting their classrooms for recruiting purposes. Likewise, some faculty members are not even aware that such a program exists or still believe that this program is the tradional secondary education program. This indeed has impeded the progress of the program; however it has also forced us to be more creative in order to ensure that the impediments are temporary, and that faculty, as well as students, take ownership of the program.

Participant Perspectives

Formative assessment procedures have elicited initial feedback from the STEP thru STEM participants.The information provided will be used to improve the program, and improve the participants’ experiences as well as to establish a basis for future formal assessment which will include both qualitative and quantitative methods. Below are responses from three of the participants who are currently enrolled in the program.