NOTRE DAME’S EDUCATIONAL
OUTREACH INITIATIVE
A. Rationale
A structured program of Education
Outreach, especially in the direction of the local schools,
is of two-fold importance for Notre Dame. In the first
instance, such an outreach effort is consonant with the
university’s aim to have a positive impact on the local community as well as the state and the nation. Secondly, such a program can provide key support for Notre Dame's research activities, as virtually all successful responses to federal grant proposals need to make a case for "broader impact." Indeed,
a number of grant initiatives call directly for the effective
integration of research and education within the context
of the mission of the institution.
One purpose of this initiative is
to coordinate, energize, and expand the educational outreach
activities of the University. Until now about a dozen
such activities have been operating with little or no
connection with each other. Its second goal is to build
a structure of interaction between the School Systems
in the region, St. Mary's College and IUSB and to link
Notre Dame’s outreach activities to it. This is
to provide an important extension to the initiatives
of the recently established Notre Dame's Community Center
in South Bend.
Over the course of the past several
months we have formed a growing group of faculty members
and staff – henceforth referred to as the CENTER
(see APPENDIX A) - who share an interest in promoting
these efforts. The CENTER began to focus on two principal
aims: one to bring pre-college teachers and students
to Notre Dame for an intense work and research experience
in science and engineering; the other to spearhead an
outreach program to support the education of science
and engineering in the classrooms of the schools in the
region.
Initially, the organizational locus of this effort will be the Kaneb Center under the leadership of Gordon Berry, Professor of Physics and Alex Hahn, Director of the Kaneb Center and Professor of Mathematics. The Kaneb Center can provide both logistical support and a base for the financial oversight within Notre Dame. It is envisioned, after funding from the National Science Foundation, the State of Indiana, Foundations, the City of South Bend, and local businesses is secured, that the CENTER will become an independent institute within Notre Dame connected to a Northern Indiana Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Center, yet to be established.
B. Now and the Near Term
For the Spring, Summer, and Fall
of 2004, a series of round-table “partner-workshops” with relevant partners, ND, St. Mary’s, IUSB, and School Districts of the Northern Indiana region, was organized with a view to develop the long-range program and comprehensive proposals to the NSF, the State Board of Education, and local businesses. The first of these, held in March of 2004 at Notre Dame, had the dual purpose of identifying the science and mathematics needs of the local school systems as well as the areas of expertise represented by the local academic institutions, and to introduce the school-based initiative for inquiry-based learning. This meeting was attended by 40 representatives from Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s,
IUSB, and the St. Joseph County schools. It was followed
by a workshop for teachers at the LaSalle Academy in
South Bend led by personnel from the Teachers Academy
for Mathematics and Sciences of Chicago (TAMS). These
meetings will continue.
The CENTER’s activities for the Summer of 2004 included the Teacher Science Institute (TSI) program of workshops. Aimed at local elementary science teachers, this is conducted by Joe Bellina and Deborah McCarthy of the Department of Science at St. Mary’s, and Karen Morris, Department of Chemistry, Notre Dame. The goal of TSI, originally developed at St. Mary’s as part of a Lilly Foundation funded project, is to provide substantial professional development for teachers in the region. The focus is on improving student learning in science and mathematics by shifting the emphasis in the classroom to student-centered learning activities consistent with national standards. This is done via the method of guided inquiry in combination with standards-based science kits. The first TSI workshop took place at Saint Mary’s
in the week of June 21-26 for 10 teachers mostly from
the LaSalle Academy. This workshop generated an invitation
to conduct a similar one week long workshop for about
26 teachers of the Mishawaka school district in August.
Concurrently, there was an effort
to energize the program of research opportunities for
high school teachers on the Notre Dame campus. This resulted
in an expansion of Notre Dame’s QuarkNet program that has been in successful operation for six years. Under the leadership of Randall Ruchti, Professor of Physics, and his assistant Beth Marchant, QuarkNet has engaged dozens of physics teachers from the region as well as their students for two month, all day, research experiences in high energy physics. QuarkNet served as model for a new initiative in Nano-Science/Engineering conducted by Gary Bernstein, Marya Lieberman, and Wolfgang Porod, of Notre Dame Nano Science and Engineering Center. Three local high school teachers and ten students were engaged for a period of four weeks. Alexander Hahn, Department of Mathematics, led a one month, two hour a day, workshop on the topic of calculus of the trajectories of interplanetary probes for five local high school mathematics teachers and a minority participant in Notre Dame’s
McNair program.
The funding for the continuation
of these initiatives is now in place through the Summer
of 2005. This was made possible by The Siemens Foundation
and the Colleges of Engineering and Science, the Graduate
School, and the Provost’s Office of Notre Dame.
An effort currently being engaged is the creation of a central on-campus program of Research Experiences for local high school teachers and students in all suitable areas of science and engineering (and at the interdisciplinary interfaces between them) in consultation with relevant departments and centers at Notre Dame. QuarkNet and the newly established summer initiatives in Nano-Science/Engineering and Mathematics will serve as models. This will be done in interaction with existing graduate and undergraduate research programs at Notre Dame. The following Notre Dame Research Centers have expressed interest in exploring this possibility: UNDERC, The Environmental Molecular Science Institute, Environmental Sciences and Technology, Flow Physics and Control, Molecularly Engineered Materials, Nano Science and Technology, University of Notre Dame Environmental Research Center. The start will be made with an effort to take advantage of an NSF grant initiative that calls for Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) to be attached to existing grants, e.g., Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) programs. There are about a dozen REUs in science and engineering at Notre Dame.
The Joint Institute for Nuclear and Astrophysics (JINA) that sponsors outreach programs from kindergarten through graduate education under the leadership of Suzanne Coshow is already a partner in this enterprise. Conversations with similar ends have begun with: the Alliance of Catholic Education (ACE) directed by Joyce Johnstone, the McNair program that provides research experiences for minority undergraduates under the direction of Don Pope-Davis, the College of Engineering Introduction to Engineering Program (IEP) headed by Ramzi Bualuan. the Pre-College Programs directed by Joan Ball, the Lego League, a national program, with a Notre Dame operational center, and the Robotics League.
C. Longer Range
It is the goal to create a comprehensive,
coordinated, and sustainable CENTER that will coordinate
a multi-faceted outreach effort and provide a structure
for faculty to link education initiatives to their research
agendas. This should involve the active participation
of graduate and undergraduate students with a view towards
the enhancement of the training of the next generation
of scientists, engineers, and college teachers. Involving
these students as assistants - alongside Notre Dame's
faculty - as they engage high school teachers in guided
inquiry and research based active learning would add
a powerful element to such an effort. A number of research
grant initiatives - the VIGRE program is an example -
call for such integration. Such a structure would also
be a facilitating resource for science and engineering
faculty applying for smaller research programs with an
educational component - the initiation grants come to
mind - by allowing them to plug into an established structure.
They would not have to "re-invent the wheel" by
trying to create their own outreach context to add to
their proposals.
Such a framework of education outreach
can enhance Notre Dame’s research enterprise by putting it in a position of being able to compete for the larger center-type grant solicitations. A successful effort to attract some of the highly competitive (and prestigious) center-type research programs would put Notre Dame "on the map" in
areas of existing strengths, and bring these to the next
level. In sum, the existence of a central, coordinated
and ongoing education outreach effort - if successful
- would become a valuable resource for our research enterprise
and would add to Notre Dame's academic reputation. In
this context, the participation in university consortia
should be explored.
As part of a regional partnership of academic institutions, the school systems in the region, and the local business community, it is hoped that this effort will serve as a prototype for school improvement across the State of Indiana. We will be looking for financial support from all relevant sources: from Federal (the National Science Foundation, and the Department of Education), the State of Indiana, to Private Foundations (Siemens, Lilly, Noyce, etc), to Local institutions. Specific grant solicitations to be considered include the Siemens SMART Fellows Program, Graduate teaching fellows (GK12), Teacher professional continuum (TPC), Mathematics and Science Partnerships (MSP), Centers for Teaching and Learning (CLT).
APPENDIX A. NOTRE DAME SCIENCE, MATHEMATICS, AND ENGINEERING CENTER
Joan Ball
|
Director of Pre-College Programs |
| Kevin Barry |
Associate Director of The Kaneb Center |
| Gary Bernstein |
Associate Chair and Professor of Electrical Engineering |
| Gordon Berry |
Professor of Physics |
| Mario Borelli |
Associate Professor Emeritus, Mathematics |
| Ramzi Bualuan |
Professional Specialist, CSE, Concurrent Instructor
Management |
| Suzanne Coshow |
Professional Specialist, Physics; Director, JINA |
| Jeffrey Diller |
Associate Professor of Mathematics |
| Alexander Hahn |
Professor of Mathematics and Director of The Kaneb
Center |
| Paul Helquist |
Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry |
| Alex Himonas |
Associate Chair and Professor of Mathematics |
| Marya Lieberman |
Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry |
| Beth Marchant |
Director of the QuarkNet Program |
| Karen Morris |
Professional Specialist, Chemistry and Biochemistry |
| Joanna McNulty |
Administrative Assistant, Biological Sciences |
| Wolfgang Porod |
Professor of Electrical Engineering |
| Randal Ruchti |
Professor of Physics, Founding PI and Mentor of QuarkNet |
| Jackie Rucker |
Director, Community Relations, Public Affairs & Communication |
| Stephen Silliman |
Assoc. Dean, College of Engineering; Professor,Civil & Geological |
| Julie Turner |
Associate Professor, Department of Psychology and
Institute for Educational Initiatives |
| Michelle Whaley |
Professional Specialist, Biological Sciences |
