Margaret Mohr-Schroeder

The project aims to serve the national need of addressing STEM teacher shortages in rural communities. Staffing schools with high quality STEM teachers has been a persistent challenge for rural schools for the past century, however, to date, relatively few resources have been allocated toward the improvement of teacher education to prepare teachers to work in rural settings. Addressing STEM teacher workforce needs in rural America is critical for future student success. This project aims to address STEM teacher workforce challenges through a focus on how educator preparation programs (EPPs) address the unique contexts of rurality and teaching STEM in rural settings. Moreover, it seeks to identify the programmatic features of educator preparation programs that support rural STEM teacher recruitment, retention, and persistence. This project, led by Mississippi State University with thirteen collaborative partners (Texas A&M University, Stephen F. Austin University, University of Wisconsin River Falls, Fort Hayes State University, Clarkson University, University of Kentucky, University of Alabama Birmingham, Texas Tech University, Morehead State University, Texas A&M University- Commerce, Winthrop University, Alabama A&M University, and North Dakota State University) has three main goals. First is to investigate the impact of EPP features on program completers’ intention to teach as well as their persistence (continuing to teach at the same school) and retention (continuing to teach but at a new school) in rural STEM classrooms. Second is to engage in deep reflection leading to programmatic adjustments within collaborating partners’ educator preparation programs intended to increase equitable access to effective instruction for rural schools. Third is to share emerging knowledge about programmatic features of EPPs that support program completers’ intention to teach, their employment decisions after completing the EPP, and their persistence and retention in rural placements. The overarching hypothesis guiding this study is that EPPs that explicitly address rurality through programmatic features including context (e.g., addressing the strengths and challenges of rural teaching and stereotypes about rural places), curriculum (e.g., a focus on place-based instruction and rural field experiences), and conveyance (e.g., recruiting from rural or online delivery) will support recruitment, retention, and persistence in rural schools, which can lead to a more diverse and effective STEM teaching force for rural schools. Research is needed to understand the impact of these programmatic features in order to guide the design and delivery of educator preparation programs that serve rural schools and communities. This foundational research project uses a longitudinal, repeated-measures, mixed-methods research design in which 14 collaborating partners across the U.S. will identify programmatic features that address rurality and track program completers’ intentions to teach, persistence, and retention and thus produce evidence that will be disseminated both internally (to collaborating partners) and to broader audiences (e.g., STEM education, teacher education, and rural education communities). Data sources include curricular artifacts such as degree plans, course syllabi, field placement data, and assessment data; interviews with program faculty; and two surveys to capture demographic data, employment data, and the three outcome variables over time. The broader impact aim of this collaborative research is to create actionable knowledge to support rural STEM teacher persistence and retention. This Track 4: Noyce Research project is supported through the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program (Noyce). The Noyce program supports talented STEM undergraduate majors and professionals to become effective K-12 STEM teachers and experienced, exemplary K-12 teachers to become STEM master teachers in high-need school districts. It also supports research on the persistence, retention, and effectiveness of K-12 STEM teachers in high-need school districts. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

This project aims to serve the national interest in high quality STEM education by establishing practices to enhance secondary mathematics teacher preparation. Teacher preparation programs are essential for long-term improvement in teacher performance and retention of effective teachers. However, current research is insufficient to support strong conclusions about the characteristics that define effective teacher preparation programs. This project proposes to study the use of a professional development framework to guide teacher preparation programs and improve teacher candidates' classroom practice. The project’s professional development framework will provide a common frame of reference for quality teaching in secondary mathematics teacher preparation across the four participating institutions. The project will support preservice teacher development through coursework, network improvement communities, and plan-do-study-act cycles. The project aims to impact more than 150 new secondary mathematics teachers and produce transformative improvement in mathematics teacher preparation programs. The participation of four institutions will enhance the generalizability of the findings to other institutions. This collaborative project involves partnerships with the University of Maryland Baltimore County (lead), Berea College, the University of Central Florida, and the University of Kentucky. The four-year project aims to structure undergraduate mathematics teacher preparation programs at these four institutions and study the use of the Professional Development: Research, Implementation, and Evaluation framework (PrimeD) to improve teacher preparation programs and teacher candidates' professional practice. Using design-based research, the project will follow a multi-group treatment-only longitudinal, triangulation mixed methods design. The study will position participants as researchers in their own classrooms to investigate well-defined problems of practice and refine their classroom innovations based on their findings. The use of network improvement communities to cycle between classroom implementation and whole group engagement is a key feature of PrimeD intended to help teacher candidates make stronger connections between field experiences and theories learned in their coursework. The project aims to explore research questions including: (i) How well does PrimeD improve program development of undergraduate teacher candidates? (ii) How well does PrimeD improve program development of undergraduate teacher candidates’ preparation to implement research-based teaching strategies? (iii) How well does PrimeD reposition stakeholders (e.g., classroom teachers, field experience supervisors, undergraduate teacher candidates, faculty) as partners, mentors, and co-learners in the program? Results of this research may provide crucial information for enhancing and transforming secondary mathematics teacher preparation programs, especially reliability and validity across programs. Results from this project are anticipated to provide a strong foundation for subsequent studies of how such teaching practices affect secondary student outcomes. The NSF Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: EHR Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. Through the Institutional and Community Transformation track, the program supports efforts to transform and improve STEM education across institutions of higher education and disciplinary communities. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

The Mathematics Teacher Education Partnership (MTE-P) is a collaborative of over 90 universities organized by the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities. It has worked to create solutions to significant problems in secondary mathematics teacher preparation. However, as noted in the Standards for the Preparation of Teachers of Mathematics prepared by the Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators (AMTE), creating programs that achieve the vision of well-prepared beginning mathematics teachers will be challenging. Such efforts will require a continuing focus that acknowledges the ongoing and cyclic nature of improving mathematics teacher preparation program. This project aims to address the challenges of transforming secondary mathematics teacher preparation programs to meet the recommendations outlined in the AMTE Standards. The project will address this challenge by weaving together two mutually-reinforcing areas of work using a networked improvement communities approach. A group of institutions involved in the MTE-P will develop approaches to effectively enact program transformation, drawn from research on institutional change and enacting the networked improvement communities design at an institutional level. The design of this project will thus be a network of networks, incorporating work across the institutions. Simultaneously, work will begin on developing a system to manage knowledge generated by the project and by the MTE-P more broadly. Through this project, a comprehensive approach will be developed to meet the national need of transforming secondary mathematics teacher preparation programs to meet the national vision of secondary mathematics teacher preparation. Over a period of two years, the project will build a basic infrastructure that has potential to be scaled up to support transformation efforts across the MTE-P and create a model that can be used throughout the nation. The project will engage secondary mathematics teacher preparation programs at five institutions (Auburn University, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, University of Kentucky, Mississippi State University, and California State University-Fullerton). Transformation of these five, diverse secondary mathematics teacher preparation programs has the potential to positively affect over 350 preservice teachers and over 25,000 K-12 students. The initial infrastructure created by this project will be the basis for future scale up to a larger number of sites. This project will also generate a knowledge management system to capture validated products and approaches useful in transforming secondary mathematics teacher preparation. Project leaders aim to extend access to the lessons learned and materials developed through this project to other institutions. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

The overarching goal of this Noyce Track 1 Scholars project is to serve as a sustainable regional and national model for the pre-service STEM education community in addressing the twin challenges of training STEM teachers for both rural and urban high-needs settings. The University of Kentucky is partnering with the Fayette County Public School to accomplish the project objectives, which include: (1) attract more diverse candidates to STEM teaching pathways, (2) strengthen collaborations between the College of Education and the Colleges of Arts & Sciences and Engineering to support a dual degree program in STEM education and a STEM discipline, (3) institutionalize wide-ranging support services to ensure student retention and success across the dual degrees, (4) increase the number of STEM education graduates, and (5) prepare STEM teachers in culturally responsive teaching and with strong content knowledge, including how to integrate energy and manufacturing challenges in the curriculum. The project aims to achieve these objectives through a three-pronged approach: (1) Recruiting--using a multi-faceted approach that will include promotion of a viral(readily accessible, engaging online) video, development of postcard brochures, social media ads, and collaborations with teacher pathway programs across the state; (2) Collaboration--staff and faculty across the three collaborating colleges will work together to provide candidates with support aimed at supporting the highest possible retention rates; and (3) Professional learning--academic year and summer professional learning opportunities will be provided to candidates while they are in the program and after they have gone into their own classrooms. The specific focus on underrepresented populations--both minority candidates and first-generation Appalachian candidates--will allow this project to align candidate placement with the demographics of either urban or rural school settings, enabling the new teachers to serve as models for success in STEM disciplines. This Noyce Track 1 Scholars project is designed to recruit 34 candidates (majors in any of the STEM disciplines) into STEM teaching careers. The goal is for 25% of those candidates to be in one or more of the following under-represented populations: (a) student of color; (b) first generation student as identified by the University of Kentucky?s definition; (c) student with a disability; and/or (d) student from Appalachia. Those candidates will be prepared to teach mathematics, science (biology, chemistry, physics, earth science) and computer science in high-needs secondary schools. Candidates will be afforded unique professional learning experiences within the program, such as work in informal STEM learning settings (e.g., the University of Kentucky SeeBlue STEM camp), industry externships (in partnership with Kentucky Advanced Manufacturing, KAM), and summer retreats with sessions focused on Common Cores State Standards in Mathematics or the Next Generation Science Standards. These experiences will be aligned with appropriate pedagogical approaches and real-world applications of content, including energy (in association with the Center for Applied Energy Research) and manufacturing (in association with KAM). Preparing candidates who can meet the needs of both rural and urban high-needs schools, meeting the increasing demand for qualified computer science teachers, and developing an undergraduate teacher preparation program with unique features such as informal STEM learning and industry externship experiences will be the most salient benefits of this project to STEM education in the United States. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

This Noyce Track 4 Research project is a collaborative endeavor to examine teacher induction as an aspect of teacher preparation that affects the way teachers become embedded within their professional community. It will look at how being a member of a specific Community of Practice (CoP) influences teacher identity, belief in their personal teaching abilities, and desire to remain in the profession related to teacher retention. The institutions (SUNY at Stony Brook University, University of Kentucky, Kennesaw State University, University of Minnesota, University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, and the University of Missouri-St. Louis) in this study span the U.S. and represent successful Noyce teacher preparation programs with a variety of recruitment strategies (e.g., career changers), induction support structures (e.g., online), and teacher placements (e.g., rural vs. urban). These six sites will also allow for a comparison of Noyce and non-Noyce teachers emerging from the different teacher preparation programs. The goal is to determine whether a core set of program features contributes to the success of each induction program, or if distinct program features are useful for unique populations (e.g., periodic face-to-face meetings for career changers, or online support for urban teachers). The project also seeks to determine which program features lead to different community structures (e.g., collaborating mainly with teachers inside or outside the school), and how that community affects a teacher's perception of the profession (e.g., teacher is connected to professionals across the state and wants to remain in the profession as a career). The primary research methodology used in this research study is Social Network Analysis, which will be used to determine with whom teachers exchange information related to their teaching. The study will benefit the field by highlighting induction strategies appropriate and effective for diverse teacher groups, and lead to a desire for increased retention in the workforce. The study will inform workforce issues in the organizational sciences, in which limited work has explicitly adopted a social network approach to explain human resource outcomes. The theory being examined in this project is the extent to which teacher identify formation linked to persistence in the profession can be detected in participants' social networks and correlated to Noyce preparation and induction features. The three-stage research design will include documenting the antecedents of network formation, teacher networks, and the outcomes of networks. In Stage I, information will be collected about the support structures present at each site, and which activities and demographics represent the participants' experiences during induction. Coherence between the planned focus of each program, and the experiences of the participants, will be examined. In Stage II, social network information will be collected from participants using an ego-centric network survey (with data focused on a given teacher's local community of ties, e.g. the CoP) of who each teacher exchanges information with related to teaching content and pedagogy, how frequently the interactions occur, and whether the contacts occur in the local school or across regional, state, or national levels. Survey data will be transformed into matrices needed to generate STEM teacher networks, and examined for size, density, strength of ties, and geographic proximity to the teacher, utilizing the latest social network analysis software packages. Network properties from Stage II will be modeled using Stage I data to determine which activities and support structures contribute to different structural CoPs. In Stage III, teacher perceptions of their teaching self-efficacy, identity within the profession, and outlook on remaining in the profession will be collected. Stage III data will be modeled using Stage II network data to determine which CoPs influence desirable teacher outcomes. In order to strengthen claims of causality from the quantitative analyses, teachers will be asked which activities influence their CoP network, and which portions of the network effect their outcomes. Stage I and III instruments will be aligned to NSF Annual Participant Surveys, and Department of Education Teacher Follow-up Surveys, respectively, so results from this study may be generalized to national data in future studies.

This five-year project is a joint effort among the colleges of Education, Arts and Sciences, and Engineering at the University of Kentucky. The goal is to increase middle school students' interest and motivation to learn Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) content through providing opportunities to develop identities as STEM learners and future scientists, mathematicians, and engineers. The project focuses on examining the effect of informal STEM learning environments on students in grades 5-8, particularly females and students of color, by engaging them in hands-on activities provided through summer STEM camps and academic-year STEM clubs. The model of increasing the STEM engagement and interest in middle school students in the Fayette County can be scaled, replicated, and adapted in other regions of Kentucky and across the nation. Intellectual Merit The project strengthens two existing programs: the See Blue STEM Camp, run during summer, and the See Blue STEM Club, offered throughout the academic year, by including the development of several hands-on activities. Examples include Crime Scene Investigation involving analysis of chemicals and dusting for fingerprints, model solar car designing and building, and robotics. Pre-service teachers and engineering students at the undergraduate and graduate levels from the University of Kentucky are also involved, contributing to and benefiting from the summer and academic year programs. The project evaluation includes formative and summative aspects and provides useful information on the effectiveness of the middle school student engagement in informal STEM clubs and camps. Broader Impacts The project provides solid, replicable, well-tested, and evaluated models for recruiting and conducting both a STEM Camp on a University campus and a STEM Club in an urban community that targets diverse middle school students. The project plans to engage over 700 middle school students, with at least 60% being from groups underrepresented in STEM. The summer camps include not only the students but their parents as well through social media (blog, Twitter) and nightly emails. All curricula and instructional materials will be made available online via Kentucky's public STEM education website so that they may be replicated, continually modified, and sustained beyond the life of the project. Research results will be made available through publications and conference presentations.

The University of Kentucky New Opportunities Yielding Classroom Excellence (UK-NOYCE) Mathematics and Science Fellows Program Phase II is designed to attract thirty (30) additional senior class students and practicing professionals, especially in underrepresented populations (women, minorities, and students with disabilities) in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) to become credentialed secondary mathematics and science teachers through a collaborative effort by the College of Education, College of Engineering, and College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Kentucky, and four local school districts--Fayette County Public Schools, Scott County Public Schools, Jessamine County Public Schools, and Woodford County Public Schools. The project involves Noyce scholars in a Masters of Arts in Education with Initial Certification program, an early classroom experience of 7-weeks duration, and a summer institute. The latter involves 41 Noyce scholars from the Phase I project, as well as Noyce recipients from three other projects in Kentucky. A product of this Phase II project will be a training manual for replication of the UK-Noyce program by others. The Phase II evaluation activities move beyond the required tracking of recipients to include indicators of the effectiveness of the program in attracting STEM majors to teaching, the impact of the program on departments and the institution, and the effectiveness of the NOYCE Scholars as measured by their performance in the classroom and their impact on student learning.

This project is developing a team-taught cross-disciplinary course to promote systems thinking as a way to understand the various engineering, design, and economic issues of sustainability. Team projects form the basis of a problem-based learning approach and are drawn from four different colleges: Engineering, Design and Architecture, Education, and Business-Economics. Learning goals for students and faculty include: i) a better understanding of the complex cross-disciplinary socio-technical issues of sustainability, ii) an understanding of and ability to use "systems thinking" approaches to better explore these complexities, and iii) enhanced ability to communicate and collaborate successfully in cross-disciplinary projects. The intellectual merit of the project lies in the co-mingling of disciplinary perspectives that offers students and faculty new and challenging opportunities for learning, communication and collaboration. In addition the "systems thinking" framework enables students to see their learning as integral and functional, rather than as a set of discrete "tacked on" features. Finally, problem-based learning demands active engagement by students in making their assumptions explicit, formulating hypotheses and models, and testing those ideas against those of their peers. The project envisions "Systems Thinking for Sustainability" as a catalyst, first for similar cross-disciplinary courses at the PI's institution and then at other institutions. By developing and disseminating a set of learning outcomes useful in cross-disciplinary courses that bring together core STEM fields with related areas, the project is broadening its impact.

The UK-New Opportunities Yielding Classroom Excellence (UK-NOYCE) Mathematics and Science Fellows Program is recruiting senior science, mathematics, engineering, and technology (STEM) majors and STEM professionals to become credentialed secondary mathematics and science teachers through a collaborative effort by the College of Education, College of Engineering, and College of Arts and Science at the University of Kentucky. UK-NOYCE recipients are expected to teach secondary mathematics and sciences in selected districts which meet high need criteria because they lack qualified mathematics and science teachers. The 52 targeted high need districts have long-standing partnerships with UK through the ongoing Appalachian Math Science Partnership and former Appalachian Rural Systemic Initiative. The program objectives are to: (1) Attract students and practicing professionals in the STEM disciplines into Secondary Mathematics and Science Education; (2) Make available to these students an integrated range of support services designed to enhance academic success, for example, collaborative advising from the College of Education, College of Arts and Science, College of Engineering, and College of Agriculture; and (3) Increase the number of graduates in Secondary Science and Mathematics Education. Specific aims to achieve these objectives include: (a) Ensuring scholars are of high academic ability by requiring a GPA of 3.0, which is maintained throughout their participation in the program; (b) Making a strong effort to recruit traditionally underrepresented groups in the STEM disciplines (women, minorities, and disabled students) into the UK-NOYCE Scholarship Program; (c) Encouraging all UK-NOYCE scholars to complete their degrees within one calendar year of entering the Masters of Arts in Secondary Education with Initial Certification (MIC) program; and (d) Assisting UK-NOYCE scholars in obtaining Secondary teaching positions in the targeted regions of Kentucky (including Appalachia). In total, 40 fellowships (minimum 25 new students) are being provided for both senior and graduate level students. The MIC program is an intensive one calendar-year program that leads to both a master's degree and initial Kentucky teacher certification (grades 8-12). Emphasis is on strong math/science background content. The UK-NOYCE Fellows are members of two, concurrent cohorts: a pedagogical foundations cohort and a math or science content cohort. A cross-college team of faculty designs and supervises integrated experiences for students. Partner-schools provide apprenticeship experiences for MIC participants. In terms of the impact to the K-12 mathematics and science pipeline, if each UK-NOYCE Fellow has an average of 100 students, over 4000 secondary mathematics and science students will be educated each year by a highly qualified teacher trained in real-world applications of STEM through their content preparation and in effective pedagogy through their pre-service teacher training.