NMSI in the News - June 2011

Nobel Prize winner Carl Wieman and Change the Equation CEO Dr. Linda Rosen kicked off a record-setting UTeach Institute-National Math and Science Initiative conference May 24-26 that drew 445 educators from around the country.

"There continues to be tremendous amount of interest and excitement about the UTeach program and the process for replicating it at other universities -- representatives from more than 50 universities attended the sessions this year," said Tracy Laquey Parker, Director of the UTeach Institute.

The UTeach Institute-NMSI Conference is an annual conference focused on the UTeach program, which is addressing the shortage of qualified secondary math and science teachers in the U.S.  Attendees included UTeach students from across the country, donors, foundations, universities already implementing the program and other universities interested in future opportunities for replication.

Dr. Carl Weiman, Nobel Prize winner, spoke at the 2011 UTeach Conference

In his UTeach plenary talk, "A Scientific Approach to Learning and Teaching Science," Dr. Wieman explained that students can learn to think scientifically just like they learn to play music or excel at sports  - by practicing.  "We need all students to think about and use science more like scientists," he said. 

Saluting the progress made by UTeach and NMSI, Dr. Rosen said. "We know what works. We've got to scale it and spread it across the economy."

"Everyone needs to be STEM literate," she said, pointing out that only four of the top 10 companies receiving U.S. patents in 2009 were actually U.S. companies.

Nobel Prize winner Carl Wieman and Change the Equation CEO Dr. Linda Rosen kicked off a record-setting UTeach Institute-National Math and Science Initiative conference May 24-26 that drew 445 educators from around the country.

In his UTeach plenary talk, "A Scientific Approach to Learning and Teaching Science," Dr. Wieman explained that students can learn to think scientifically just like they learn to play music or excel at sports  - by practicing.  "We need all students to think about and use science more like scientists," he said. Click here to downlad Carl Wieman's conference presentation.

Dr. Wieman, who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2001, currently is Associate Director of Science for the White House Office of Science and Technology.  He previously served as a member of the NMSI board and served as Director of the Carl Wieman Science Education Initiative at the University of Colorado at boulder and the Unviersity of British Columbia.

Wieman has most recently focused his research on science education, publishing a study in the May issue of the journal Science, for example, showing that undergraduates learn better through an active, iterative process that challenges misconceptions over traditional lectures. He speaks across the U.S. about research and improvement of methods in teaching undergraduates.

Saluting the progress made by UTeach and NMSI, Dr. Rosen said. "We know what works. We've got to scale it and spread it across the economy."

"Everyone needs to be STEM literate," she said, pointing out that only four of the top 10 companies receiving U.S. patents in 2009 were actually U.S. companies.

Dr. Rosen is leading Change the Equation (CTEq), a non-profit, non-partisan CEO-led initiative focused on solving America's innovation problem.  The new nationwide network  includes more than 110 CEOs who have pledged to connect and align their work to transform STEM learning in the United States.  The initiative was launched last fall as part of the Obama administration's "Educate to Innovate" campaign in response to forecasts that the U.S. will be short as many as 3 million high-skills workers by 2018 and two-thirds of those jobs will require some post-secondary education.

Dr. Rosen told the UTeach attendees that science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) disciplines hold the most promise for an American economic recovery and competitiveness.  She said STEM dependent careers have an annual growth rate of 6.2 percent, nearly four times the 1.6 percent growth rate for the total workforce.

In particular, she said, students who are the most needy aren't getting the teachers they need and UTeach can help fill that gap. Click here to download Linda Rosen's conference presentation.

Other speakers at the three-day event included Dr. Jere Confrey, Senior Research Fellow and Joseph D. Moore Distinguished Professor at the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation in the College of Education at North Carolina State University, and Dr. Alan Maloney, Senior Research Fellow and Extension Associate, also at the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation.

The UTeach Institute-NMSI Conference is an annual conference focused on the UTeach program, which is addressing the shortage of qualified secondary math and science teachers in the U.S. The UTeach Institute works in collaboration with NMSI to replicate the teaching program across the U.S.   Attendees at the Austin conference included UTeach students from across the country, donors, foundations, universities working through the RFP process, and states and other universities interested in future opportunities for replication.

More than 100 workshops were offered in addition to general interest sessions. Topics included UTeach replication, instructional sequence, adaptations being implemented to expand and strengthen the UTeach model at universities across the country, fundraising and sustainability, state policy issues, and parallel initiatives to support STEM education and teacher preparation.

UTeach replication is now being implemented at 22 universities nationally.  Ninety percent of students who enter the UTeach program go into public school teaching and 45 percent of UTeach graduates teach in high-need schools. Eighty percent of UTeach graduate hires are still teaching after five years, compared with fewer than 65 percent nationally.

This year's UTeach conference was held in conjunction with the Physics Teacher Education Coalition (PhysTEC) Conference and featured joint speakers and sessions. "Physics education is one of the areas of greatest need in the U.S.  Just one third of high school physics teachers hold degrees in physics or physics education. It just made sense to bring together the universities across the country currently implementing UTeach with the 17 PhysTEC institutions to share ideas and best practices related to strengthening physics education," said Kim Hughes of the UTeach Institute.

For more information on UTeach, please click here.

During the UTeach Institute's annual conference in May, NMSI conducted an informational session at the conference regarding the WeTeach Network, which is a professional network for students and graduates of UTeach affiliated programs funded by the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York. 

 An impressive and ambitious group of students and graduates have been elected to lead the network and held their first in-person board meeting at the conference.
 
NMSI also participated in the meeting for the existing WeTeach Student Association and were pleased to learn that the student association has decided to join the WeTeach Network. Students unanimously determined that the goals and objectives of the WeTeach Network and website will provide a useful infrastructure which will help in facilitating communication and collaboration between students, graduates, groups, and district partners. Student and graduate conference attendees were enthusiastic about joining and helping develop the WeTeach Network and the tools and resources it provides.  

WeTeach Network members will be able to:  

The pilot phase of the WeTeach Network website was launched at the UTeach Conference all students and graduates who attended the conference were invited to begin using the website during the pilot phase. The pilot phase is a beta testing stage in which users will fully utilize the website and report any issues concerning the functionality of the site to fine-tune the site. New features and updates will be added to the site regularly, during the pilot phase before the live site is launch in fall 2011.
 
To learn  more about the WeTeach Network, please visit: http://weteach-network.org/about-weteach/.