Promoting STEM Education Access through Scholarships, Engineering Education Microcredentials, and a Community College Partnership

This project aims to serve the national need for recruiting, preparing, and supporting highly effective mathematics, science, and engineering educators in grades 7-12. The project will continue and build on prior efforts to recruit and support undergraduate mathematics and science majors to pursue pre-service teacher education certification. The project will strengthen a partnership with a community college to encourage more students to consider mathematics or science teaching as a profession, including those from ethnically diverse backgrounds.

There is increased interest in engineering at middle and high schools around the country. Responding to this interest, the project will provide students with experiences in engineering education through supplemental coursework and the opportunity to earn an engineering education microcredential. Finally, this project provides new graduates support via a summer bridge program designed to encourage first-year teaching readiness and promote continued growth and collaborative networking.

This project at Northern Arizona University (NAU) includes a partnership with Coconino Community College (CCC), Flagstaff Urban School District, and Sinagua Middle School. Several project goals will guide the work of the investigators for the next 5-years. First is to provide 30 undergraduate mathematics/science majors with up to two years of scholarships to pursue teacher certification.

Second is to support a partnership with CCC to increase recruitment of potential STEM majors from diverse backgrounds. Third is to support up to 48 students per year (after year 1) in an engineering education microcredential program. The fourth and final goal is to provide new graduates support in preparing for their first year of teaching through a summer bridge program.

All of these efforts will contribute to the long-term retention and success of mathematics and science teachers to effectively educate students from diverse backgrounds and provide expanded STEM experiences through incorporation of engineering education in high-need districts. Program efficacy for attracting, developing, and retaining effective science and mathematics teachers will be measured by determining to what extent scholars participate in STEM recruitment and teaching/learning activities, such as the engineering education microcredential and summer bridge programs, and to what extent the university/community college partnership broadens participation in the mathematics/science teaching careers.

This Track 1: Scholarships and Stipends 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 effectiveness and retention of K-12 STEM teacher 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.