This article presents the curricular framework for a social justice driven STEM curriculum (i.e., STEMJ) within an out-of-school time program for Boston Public high school students (i.e., College Bound) at Boston College. Starting with a discussion of the authors’ ideological positionality within critical social justice discourses, the authors share how Bronfenbrenner’s (1994) General Ecological Model provides a conceptual framework for operationalizing social justice inquiry with and through STEM. Positioning this curriculum within the College Bound program’s overall design gives readers a

Data gathered from 325 middle school students in four U.S. states indicate that both male (p .0005, RSQ = .33) and female (p .0005, RSQ = .36) career aspirations for being a scientist are predictable based on knowledge of dispositions toward mathematics, science and engineering, plus self-reported creative tendencies. For males, strong predictors are creative tendencies (beta = .348) and dispositions toward science (beta = .326), while dispositions toward mathematics is a weaker (beta = .137) but still a significant (p .05) predictor. For females, significant (p .05) predictors ordered

This article and my career as an educational researcher are grounded in two fundamental assumptions: (a) that research and practice can and should live in productive synergy, with each enhancing the other, and (b) that research focused on teaching and learning in a particular discipline can, if carefully framed, yield insights that have implications across a broad spectrum of disciplines. This article begins by describing in brief two bodies of work that exemplify these two fundamental assumptions. I then elaborate on a third example, the development of a new set of tools for understanding and

ITEST Data Brief Volume 3, Issue 2, July 2016 In 2015, 30 ITEST projects were awarded funding. STELAR surveyed these projects as part of the the Fall 2015 Management Information System (MIS) Survey and received a 97% completion rate. This data brief presents information from the 29 responding projects around the following questions: Which of the 7 ITEST Guiding Questions do projects choose to address? In what settings projects plan to conduct their work? What grade levels do projects serve? Who are included as project participants? In what locales do projects coduct their work? In what states

This report presents important takeaways from a one-day National Science Foundation (NSF)-supported Forum, “ Next Generation STEM Learning for All,” organized by Education Development Center (EDC) and SRI International through the STEM Learning and Research Center (STELAR) at EDC, the Community for Advancing Discovery Research in Education (CADRE) at EDC, and the Center for Innovative Research in Cyberlearning (CIRCL), working in close collaboration with NSF and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. The Forum engaged prominent scientists in STEM learning research and school

Within the context of NSF’s Dear Colleague letter that encourages innovative proposals for developing Smart and Connected Communities, speakers at the NSF-supported Next Generation STEM Learning for All Forum in November described how their work connects STEM learning with communities in need, how their work could shape schools of the future, and how to involve key systems and stakeholders in the development of these communities. View these presentation materials on the Forum website.

The development of analytical skills is a central goal of the Next Generation Science Standards and foundational to subject mastery in STEM fields. Yet, significant barriers exist to students gaining such skills. Here we describe a new “gentleslope” cyberlearning strategy that gradually introduces students to the authoring of scientific simulations via a Web-based modding approach called CyberMOD. Modding involves adding agents with predefined functionality to a simulation world to produce a unique combination whose behavior can then be visualized by running the simulation. This permits low

The Freedom Machines film, discussion guide, lesson plan, and resource guides are designed to dramatically broaden the concept of diversity for all students through telling the intimate stories of adults and children with disabilities who are using modern technologies to change their lives. Original Freedom Machines website

The Library contains uniquely interactive, web-based virtual manipulatives or concept tutorials, mostly in the form of Java applets, for mathematics instruction (K-8 emphasis). The ultimate goal of the library is to create a national resource from which teachers may freely draw to enrich their mathematics classrooms. The materials is also intended to be of importance for the mathematical training of both in-service and pre-service elementary teachers.