Engineering

In this project, we developed and implemented a ninth/10th grade neural engineering unit—an emerging field that integrates neuroscience, engineering design, and programming—to explore how computational thinking (CT) and engineering can be incorporated into a core biology high school course. We are examining the changes in students’ CT, engineering design processes, and attitudes towards STEM throughout their participation. We are also exploring what supports biology teachers need to effectively foster CT and engineering.

Although most teachers recognize the importance of taking investigative, open-ended approaches to students’ learning experiences, implementing them in high school classes can be challenging for teachers.

The ECUITY project aims to develop and utilize a multi-agency partnership to design, implement, and test a research-based professional learning (PL) approach that will ensure that teachers and their students have actionable knowledge on how to protect and enhance the biodiversity in their communities.

This project provides a year-long professional learning experience for high school counselors to enhance their efficacy in and dispositions toward advancing engineering career counseling. Through hands-on design activities and an action-oriented community of practice, counselors will connect with engineering education stakeholders, develop a deeper understanding of engineering disciplines, and identify and implement advancing counseling practices.

This project is developing a standards-aligned engineering professional learning model for elementary teachers of multilingual learners. Using a participatory and collaborative approach, experts in literacy, language, and engineering will work with elementary teachers to develop strategies for how teachers can view students’ multilingualism as an asset to engineering.

This project explores the influence of elementary teachers' curricular context knowledge, developed over multiple curricular enactments, to adapt curriculum materials in ways that are culturally respsonsive to their students. The project utilizes Explore the Salish Sea, a place-based curriculum that braids together Western and Indigenous science. Students learn about their local ecosystem and and partner with community members to engage in stewardship. Our research follows teachers through four different cycles of curriculum enactment to develop robust case studies.

We are investigating factors that influence elementary teachers’ professional learning (PL) in science and engineering. The intervention and ongoing supports are offered at a distance to participants teaching grades 3-5 in rural school districts. Overarching research objectives include examining: (1) the impacts of online science and engineering PL; (2) the effectiveness of modest supports on the sustainability of PL outcomes; and (3) the changes to teachers’ engineering instructional practices.