T C E B TRIANGLE COALITION ELECTRONIC BULLETIN APRIL 12, 2001 VOL. 7, NO. 15 _____________________________________________________ Published by the TRIANGLE COALITION FOR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION _____________________________________________________ THIS WEEK'S TOPICS: SENATE EDUCATION AGREEMENT TO EXCLUDE VOUCHERS MATH, SCIENCE TEACHING PEGGED FOR MORE AID EDUCATION EXPERTS TO BRIEF CONGRESS ON REVOLUTIONARY SCIENCE, MATH, AND ENGINEERING INITIATIVES FOR K-12 CLASSROOMS SPACE SCIENCE EDUCATION RESOURCE DIRECTORY INITIATIVE TO HELP IDENTIFY FREE INTERNET-ACCESS SITES 100 HIGH-SCHOOL TEACHERS SOUGHT FOR DEVELOPMENT IN LATEST COMPUTING TECHNOLOGIES FOR SC2001 NCTM RELEASES NAVIGATIONS SERIES TO SUPPORT PRINCIPLES AND STANDARDS FOR SCHOOL MATHEMATICS ____________________________________________________ SENATE EDUCATION AGREEMENT TO EXCLUDE VOUCHERS (Source: USA TODAY, April 5, 2001) The White House and Senate lawmakers from both parties are near agreement on an education package that contains most of what President Bush wants -- but not vouchers that parents could use to send their children to private or parochial schools. The emerging compromise would include provisions to raise school standards and accountability, as well as require annual testing in grades 3 through 8. Vouchers, which Bush campaigned for last year and Democrats oppose, would be left out. Both sides expect the measure to be taken up by the Senate when lawmakers return from their two-week spring recess. The National Education Association, the nation's largest teachers union and a leading backer of Democrats, opposes vouchers because it fears they will jeopardize public school teachers' jobs. In place of vouchers, Democrats have offered a "supplemental services" plan. It would give parents of children in failing schools the option of sending their child to after-school mentoring programs run by public, private, or faith-based agencies and paid for with federal funds. The students would remain in public schools and only go outside for additional help. Among the provisions (of the deal): - Students in grades 3 through 8 would be required to take annual state and national tests measuring basic academic skills. The results would be used to measure each school's, and each child's, progress. - Schools that score high would get bonuses. Schools that don't make the grade would get extra money to improve and three years to meet standards. - Failure to meet standards after three years could result in overhaul of the school, or it could be closed and reopened as a charter school. ************************************ MATH, SCIENCE TEACHING PEGGED FOR MORE AID (Source: Education Week, April 4, 2001) President Bush and congressional Republicans are planning to increase the money available for math and science teachers' professional development, but advocates for the cause are asking: Is it enough? Mr. Bush has proposed providing up to $2.8 billion a year for teacher-development programs that would be available for teachers of all subjects. On top of that, he would finance statewide efforts to raise skills of mathematics and science teachers. House and Senate school improvement bills now working their way through Congress would put those ideas into law. But some champions of math and science education maintain that the programs fall short of the multibillion-dollar effort they say is vital to ensure that schools have the highly qualified teachers needed for those subjects. Under the Republican bills, programs for math and science teachers would be guaranteed around $400 million in fiscal 2002, but could receive much more if school districts considered them a priority, an administration official said. But advocates for math and science educators suggest that their subjects will lose out in local battles for funding. "If it says 'reading and math,' all the bucks go to reading," said Gerald F. Wheeler, the executive director of the National Science Teachers Association, based in Arlington, VA. "Science, especially at the elementary school level, is the forgotten topic." Teacher professional development is the second title in the mammoth House and Senate bills to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The bills include the heart of President Bush's "No Child Left Behind" education proposals. It would require states to assess students' reading and math skills every year from the 3rd through the 8th grades and start new reading programs to build students' skills. The House and Senate bills contain similar approaches to improving the quality of teachers in all subject areas. They differ mostly in the funding levels set for the programs. Both would dissolve the existing $250 million Dwight D. Eisenhower Professional Development Program, which focuses on mathematics and science education, and replace it with a program that would serve teachers of all disciplines. The Senate would authorize up to $3 billion to be spent on the project, about $800 million more than the House would. The authorization level sets an upper limit that the program can receive. Once a bill is passed, Congress can appropriate however much it wishes under the cap. Without specific set-asides for math and science, advocates for the subjects say, those fields would lose a crucial funding source that has been in place since President Reagan proposed the creation of the Eisenhower program in the mid-1980s. The Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee approved its ESEA bill last month. The full Senate is slated to debate the bill at the end of this month. The House Education and the Workforce Committee is also scheduled to consider a bill late this month. ************************************ EDUCATION EXPERTS TO BRIEF CONGRESS ON REVOLUTIONARY SCIENCE, MATH, AND ENGINEERING INITIATIVES FOR K-12 CLASSROOMS Two university professors with novel ideas about how to teach math and science effectively in K-12 classrooms of the U.S. met with Congress and top Congressional staffers at a special breakfast April 4. Moderated by Michigan Congressman Dr. Vernon Ehlers, chair of the House Science Subcommittee on Environment, Technology, and Standards, "Engineering Our Future With Partnerships" was designed to inform House members and their staffs about the latest techniques for getting elementary, middle, and high school students interested in pursuing careers in math, science, and engineering. Ioannis Miaoulis, Dean of Engineering, Tufts University will discuss his innovative plan of "elementary engineering," that has already been adopted by the state of Massachusetts as a mandatory part of the pre-school through 12th grade education curriculum. Miaoulis wants to identify at least one engineering school in each state that would join Tufts in a partnership to bring engineering into a child's experience. Dr. Charles Lovas, Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering, at Southern Methodist University, will describe how he is implementing The Science, Math, Engineering, and Technology (SMET) program in Texas schools. SMET is a cooperative effort of industry, engineering societies, school districts, community, and K-8 teachers of English, math, science, social studies, and technology. Lovas' program uses the nationally acclaimed A World in Motion (AWIM) materials developed and classroom-tested by the Society of Automotive Engineers Foundation as the vehicle for introducing science, math, and technology. During the A World in Motion experience, students work together in "engineering design teams" as they explore mathematics and physics through a series of hands-on, inquiry-based learning activities. Seven different engineering organizations sponsored the briefing, including the American Association of Engineering Societies (AAES), the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the International Technology Education Association (ITEA), the National Society of Professional Engineers (NSPE), and the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE). ************************************ SPACE SCIENCE EDUCATION RESOURCE DIRECTORY The Space Science Education Resource Directory (http://teachspacescience.stsci.edu/) provides educators an entry point into the wealth of educational materials funded by NASA's Office of Space Science Education and Public Outreach Program. In 1996, the Space Science Advisory Committee Education and Public Outreach Task Force recommended that NASA space science educational materials be made widely available and easily accessible, using modern information technologies where appropriate. It will help site visitors locate Internet-based resources, such as web pages and Portable Document Files (PDFs). Resources are continually being adding as they are reviewed for science content. In the future, NASA plans to include ways to order hardcopy resources, such as CD-ROMs, videos, and posters. There are three ways to search in the Resource Directory: "Search by Keyword," "Browse for Topic," or "Advanced Search." Visitors are encouraged to log into the directory to save the results of searches, and to save criteria for future searches. Visitors can also select the option of receiving an e-mail alert when a new resource matching a particular search criteria is available. ************************************ INITIATIVE TO HELP IDENTIFY FREE INTERNET-ACCESS SITES (Source: Education Week, April 4, 2001) A coalition of libraries, foundations, nonprofit organizations, and corporations has launched an information campaign to help bridge the so-called digital divide. The initiative unveiled in Washington consists of a web-based directory of public Internet services, a toll-free telephone number, public-service announcements on television, and literature to be distributed to civil rights groups, local libraries, and youth centers. Organizers of the campaign said that people from poor communities who lack easy access to computers and the Internet risk missing out on job opportunities in an information-based economy. The phrase "digital divide" refers to disparities in access to information technology tied to such factors as income, race, or ethnic group. The new web-based directory of public Internet services has about 20,000 listings of services that help individuals get access to the equipment, connections, and skills needed to use computer and Internet technologies to pursue their goals. The free site has a bilingual Internet address: ConnectNet.org for English, and Conectado.org for Spanish. Visitors who type their zip codes into a form will receive the addresses of local libraries, community technology centers, and other sites that offer free online services to the public. People without Internet access can call a toll-free number, 866-583-1234, and ask an English- or Spanish-speaking operator for information about local public-access points. The AOL Time Warner Foundation is picking up the tab for that service. In addition, the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation has produced a series of public service announcements, in English and in Spanish, to encourage teenagers to become more computer literate. Those spots will be aired across the country on the major broadcast television networks, Time Warner-owned cable systems, and the Spanish-language Univision network. ************************************ 100 HIGH-SCHOOL TEACHERS SOUGHT FOR DEVELOPMENT IN LATEST COMPUTING TECHNOLOGIES FOR SC2001 The National Science Foundation awarded a $1.03-million grant to a consortium of nine educational institutions to train 100 high school math and science teachers in the latest computer technologies. One hundred teachers will begin the program at SC2001, the annual conference on high-performance networking and computing, to be held November 10-16 in Denver. Consortium members include the Association for Computing Machinery, IEEE Computer Society, East Carolina University, Krell Institute, National Center for Atmospheric Research, National Center for Supercomputing Applications, NPACI/San Diego Supercomputer Center, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Ohio Supercomputer Center, Shodor Education Foundation, Inc., Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, and University of Alabama-Huntsville. Teams with two science teachers, one mathematics teacher, and one school administrator from the same school district or cooperating districts will be selected from a national pool of applications. Teacher teams can learn more about the program and submit applications through the "SC2001 Teacher Team Application" link at www.sc2001.org/education.shtml. Applications are due by Monday, May 28, 2001. Jeffrey C. Huskamp, SC2001 Education Chair and principal investigator for the grant, explained that the first step will be to instruct the teachers to use the tools, techniques, and technologies of computational science at the SC2001 conference, as a way to spark interest and pursue scientific methods in their classrooms. After the SC2001 conference, selected teachers will refine their new teaching methods and incorporate them into their daily lessons over the next 18 months. The following summer, teachers will attend a two-week program at the University of Alabama at Huntsville. In between, monthly on-line seminars and teleconferences will provide ongoing support and additional topics. ************************************ NCTM RELEASES NAVIGATIONS SERIES TO SUPPORT PRINCIPLES AND STANDARDS FOR SCHOOL MATHEMATICS The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) has released the first four volumes in its Navigations series to support the "Principles and Standards for School Mathematics" released a year ago. The Navigations titles are designed to guide teachers through the five content strands of "Principles and Standards for School Mathematics" and to illustrate the growth and connectedness of content ideas from prekindergarten through grade 12. When the series is complete, there will be more than 30 titles to guide teachers and others through Principles and Standards and help to translate ideas into action. There is one Navigations volume on teaching algebra in each of four grade bands: prekindergarten through grade 2, grades 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12. The next Navigations volumes, on geometry, will be published in the fall. Future volumes on discrete mathematics, and data analysis and probability will be published in 2002. For more information visit www.nctm.org. _____________________________________________________ This TCEB is made possible by a grant from E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company. Please visit their web site at www.dupont.com for more information about their educational support programs. The TCEB is a newsletter provided to members of the Triangle Coalition. Members may forward individual articles or the issue in its entirety providing that credit is given to the Triangle Coalition, and all of the following contact information is included in any republication. For TCEB subscription or membership information, contact: Triangle Coalition for Science and Technology Education 1201 New York Avenue, NW, Suite 700, Washington, DC 20005 phone: 800-582-0115 fax: 202-289-1303 e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.triangle-coalition.org To submit information for possible inclusion in TCEB, contact: Joanne Van Voorhis, Target Marketing, Editor [EMAIL PROTECTED] ************************************ THE MISSION OF THE TRIANGLE COALITION IS TO FOSTER COLLABORATION AMONG LEADERS IN EDUCATION, BUSINESS, AND GOVERNMENT TO IMPROVE SCIENCE, MATHEMATICS, AND TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION. The Triangle Coalition membership includes business, labor, education, science, mathematics, technology and engineering organizations, and community and state-based alliances. ************************************ -- This is the CPS Science Teacher List. To unsubscribe, send a message to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For more information: <http://home.sprintmail.com/~mikelach/subscribe.html>. 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