Texas High School Project Exemplar Grant

With funding through the Exemplar Grant, CISER is focusing our teacher professional development to address the challenge of historically low science scores on the state exam. We have chosen to work with the Lamesa ISD science teachers in order to implement CISER’s pre-established model of professional development. The immediate goal is to assess components in the program including student improvement in scores and increased teacher knowledge in content. We will also assess teacher attitude regarding professional development. This is also a foundation of systemic change.

Objectives of the Exemplar Program:

Demographics served within this grant:

CISER General philosophy on teaching and learning:

We address our mission with the strong belief that science is for all. We encourage, support and promote science through training teachers in content and pedagogy, and providing opportunities that will improve science education for their students. We also focus in equity and opportunity in science.

Needs Assessment:

Rural, lower socio-economic schools with approximately 45% or higher minority populations compose the majority of CISER outreach efforts. Lamesa TAKS Hispanic student scores (45) are lower than the state score (76).

Strategy and Implementation:

CISER encourages and supports teachers to grow as leaders through these methods:

1. Strategy : Provide training and equipment for Traveling Labs.
   Implementation : We began our Traveling Lab training this summer and will continue to work with teachers during the school year. Teachers will utilize the labs in their classrooms.
2. Strategy : Provide workshops for teachers grades 3-12 addressing the content standards and pedagogy.
   Implementation : We are involving teachers in workshops we provide in addition to other professional development opportunities offered in our region that are approved by our team. Some training is at the district and other trainings are at the Region 17 Educational Service Center and Texas Tech University.
3. Strategy : Teaching assistance in classrooms, including Traveling Lab curriculum, FOSS, GLOBE and other selected or approved topics.
   Implementation : We will send TTU science faculty, our outreach coordinators and Science Education Scholars to visit classrooms to assist in instruction.
4. Strategy : Facilitate teachers to participate in state and national conferences.
   Implementation: CISER is helping to support 12 Lamesa teachers to attend the 2007 Conference for the Advancement of Science Teaching (CAST), many as first-time attendees. We are also supporting 4 teachers to travel to 2008 National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) conference.
5. Strategy: Empower teachers through training and modeling to take leaderships roles in presenting at conferences.
   Implementation: Our program has a history of encouraging, supporting and assisting teachers and pre-service teachers at science conferences. This year we have 33 CISER teacher partners presenting at CAST, and 16 presenting at NSTA. We will model the process for teachers and encourage them to take leadership roles in presenting.
6. Strategies for implementation by other schools & districts
   1. We will create a virtual fieldtrip via web-based video to showcase professional development and Lamesa ISD teacher classrooms that shows implementation of our program. We believe a web-based video will better accommodate visitors and showcase implementation of our program rather than actual visits to Lamesa ISD classrooms since our strategies for the Exemplar Grant are professional development workshops, attendance at state and national conferences and other means of networking outside the classroom. We do engage in classroom participation, including traveling labs, yet this is a small component of our impact.
   2. CISER is in the process of developing the current outreach website to be a national resource, including the traveling lab curriculum, as well as strategies and activities incorporated in our training. The goal is to provide guidelines for groups developing programs for individual schools or for a traveling lab program. We will provide documents on professional development training, labs, and activities provided to teachers, as well as assessment documents.

Outcomes:

The impact we demonstrate through regional data leads to systemic change. Time is a limiting factor in demonstrating change so the following information will be provided and analyzed to demonstrate outcomes: 

1. Quantitative - Teacher content, student scores, teacher surveys, student benchmark scores and content.
2. Qualitative - interviews with administration, teachers and students, teacher journals. 
   

People involved in program:

• Leadership – Susan Talkmitt, Project Director
• Faculty – Dr David Lamp, TTU Physics Professor; Dr Jeff Lee, TTU Geology Professor
• Team members – Britta Codd, CISER Assistant Coordinator for Outreach; Mandy Biggers, CISER Outreach Coordinator; Lynn Schmidt, LISD Science Specialist
• Partners – Lamesa ISD, TTU/HHMI at CISER, TTU T-STEM, TTU College of Education, TTU College of Arts and Sciences, Texas Regional Collaborative, GLOBE (Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment), Institute for the Development and Enrichment of Advanced Learners (IDEAL at TTU)

Contact information: Britta Codd, Assistant Outreach Coordinator at CISER o Email britta.codd@ttu.edu

• Phone (806)742-1998 x426
• Fax (806)742-4514