The premise of STEM Students and Teachers Achieving Reform (STEM STAR) is that students and educators must collaborate on a new, higher level if the goals of the i3 program reforms are to be met, sustained and brought to scale. STEM STAR”™s student/teacher collaboration strategy is based on the Student Technology Leadership (STL) model developed by nonprofit Generation YES (with a previous 5-year ED Technology Innovation Grant) and on a set of five strategies: intensive professional development for STEM teachers, a Professional Learning Community, rural school emphasis, project-based inquiry, and student STEM leaders (SSLs).
STEM STAR is an exceptional approach to lasting and transformative improvements in STEM teaching and learning because it will seek innovative solutions based on a student-educator collaboration model. Supported by strong prior educational research evidence, the STEM STAR model will distinguish itself from previous work by emphasizing STEM learning in 53 rural middle schools in 26 states and building on previous studies to strengthen the evidence that when students and teachers are given the opportunity to generate change and take ownership of that change, academic success follows.
In each of 28 Washington state rural middle schools, a group of fifteen specially prepared SSLs will collaborate both face-to-face and online with STEM stakeholders (peers, teachers, scientists, researchers, content specialists, policy makers, and project administrators). In year 4 of the grant, one middle school in each of 25 different states will partner with an experienced Washington school to implement STEM STAR and establish a proven scale-up strategy.
To learn more, contact Dennis Harper.
