Nismec       News

Issue 5.1   Fall 2009

The Northern Indiana Science, Mathematics and Engineering Collaborative
NISMEC | ND Outeach | School Districts -> Mishawaka | South Bend | PHM | Elkhart | New Prairie | John Glenn |

Contents
Introductory Note
*Steps of Progress
*NISMEC Introduction
*HASTI 2009
*Next Step 2009
*Building Awareness
*George Rickey
*Football Hall of Fame

*Summer programs 2009

*Coming Events

*GI Science Learning
*Content vs. Pedagogy
*Students and Cows
*Charters drain finances
*ND Clear Domes
*Modeling
*Compadre Library

Newsletter Archives
Editorial info

Guided Inquiry is our Focus

2009
The Progress of Science and Math Education in St. Joseph County


Introductory Note
In April we entered our fifth year at NISMEC: we are excited about the progress over the past year of Science Education in the K-12 schools of St. Joseph County; however, we are worried about how the state of the economy will impact this progress, not only for science learning in the schools, but also for the economic development of the whole community. Clearly, the developments in both are closely interconnected - those of us involved particularly in outreach to the schools see the need to increase our efforts: coordination of the many disparate threads of outreach support will be vital to this progress.       The statewide testing in science of our students is still minimal, and has yet to impact the curricula in our schools; the era of no testing of science above 7th grade is about to come to an end, plus the new Superintendent of Indiana schools is promising action on those schools still on the "failing list" (which includes our high schools in South Bend).
      Our newsletter mission is to publicize important events and news in the world of inquiry based learning in science, mathematics and engineering at all grade levels K-12, college and graduate work. We report news and events most relevant to educators and friends of educators in Northern Indiana; Also, relevant national and international news, programs, and other internet publications are also included.

Use the hyperlink index at the left to reach the items of interest.

Steps of ProgressNISMEC has been helped by the Indiana Department of Education to begin support for the 7th-12 grade science teachers for utilizing a nationally-recognized hands-on modeling program. (see the article below).
       Several science-related community projects have recently begun in efforts to transform South Bend and St. Joseph County into becoming a "Twenty-first Century High Tech" area:
  • Innovation Park completed construction and opened its doors on Edison Street in the waning days of October 2009. This Notre Dame sponsored project will bring space and access for both start-up companies, and well-established companies in collaboration with the rich and varied academic science research at the University.
  • The City is preparing Ignition Park in the long-neglected Studebaker corridor on the near south-west side of South Bend - "Ignition Park signals that this site will spark the creativity of researchers and engineers into the commercialization of new innovative products that we have yet to imagine" said Mayor Stephen J. Luecke.
  • The collaborations of these facilities with the MIND (the Midwest Institute for Nanoelectronics Discovery) project with its cohesive financial support from the University, the City, the State and the Federal Government, make for a potentially extremely exciting time for science learning, local employment, and community development in our County.
  • Innovation: George Rickey Kinetic Sculptures: this year long exhibit of large kinetic sculptures in downtown South Bend and associated exhibits in our two local art museums - the South Bend Museum of Art, and the Notre Dame Snite Museum - show how deep are the connections between art and science, and how the two complement each other, and especially show the links we can all make (as one example) the production of electrical power from renewable energy sources.
  • Can the soon-to-be-vacant "College Football Hall-of-Fame" building in downtown South Bend become a mecca for visitors to see the resurgence of a modern twenty-first century community?? A group of us are working to create a vision for a science and technology center which will be a magnet for education and entertainment for all adults and children; see below for further details.
   
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NISMEC Programs
  • Introduction
     NISMEC is the Northern Indiana hub for I-STEM, the Statewide Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics network established at the beginning of 2008 - see our issue 3.2 for a brief history and update on the two organizations. The University of Notre Dame and Saint Mary's College have been responsible for running the NISMEC hub. Professors Joseph J. Bellina of Saint Mary's College and Gordon Berry of Notre Dame have dual tasks as members of the 11 member I-STEM Coordinating Committee, and as the directors of the NISMEC I-STEM hub.
            In August 2009, we hired Beth Marchant, previously the Director of the Quarknet program (see below for a more detailed bio), as our Operations Director. Her previous experinece, both as a science teacher at South Bend's LaSalle High School, and for her work with the nationwide Quarknet program, promises to enable NISMEC to extend our program to the areas of greatest needs in the schools and in the community.
            We receive I-STEM funding which comes from the Governor's office and a collaboration of Indiana biotech industry businesses, spearheaded by the Lilly Foundation to help us enhance all forms of STEM education in the schools and in the community. These past two summers, we have used this support to develop an expanded set of Teacher Professional Development Programs for the South Bend, Mishawaka and Penn-Harris Madison schools, for all K-12 grade teachers (see below for some of the details about the many successful 2009 summer workshops). We are planning a continuing completemnt of professional development program this coming year.
            It is an exciting period in the development of STEM education both statewide and locally: The I_STEM network is working closely with the Indiana Department of Edcuation, as well as with the Governor and the Legislature, and with financial support from the biotech industry around the state: the goals of this initiative are strongly in-line with the NISMEC "Guided Inquiry is our Focus" goal - hence, it is providing opportunities to bring research-based learning modules into the classrooms at all levels (P-16).

            Our NISMEC group includes many community partners - for example, The Memorial Hospital Foundation; The other higher education institutions of St. Joseph County now play important roles in developing the NISMEC programs: for example, the IUSB Department of Education with Dean Michael Horvath, the Ivy Tech Bioechnology Department with George Twaddle, and the Ivy Tech Education Department with Linda Taylor, have begun to play important roles. NISMEC's work is likely to be strengthened through the increasing coordination between the County's Higher Education Organizations, our technological and manufacturing companies, and the county's three major school corporations in coordinating solutions to our STEM needs and understandings. STEM education is likely to play a role at the new KROC center (to be built at Chapin/Western Avenue intersection), and several other joint Community STEM initiatives are underway (as mentioned above).
            The coming year of 2010 promises to be an exciting time for the progress of science learning in St. Joseph County.

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Coming events
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South Bend Tribune highights progress in science learing in our schools
    The program of guided inquiry learning was initiated 5 years ago
    as a joint program of NISMEC and Mishawaka School City.
    As the article states:
         ...........The third-graders at Beiger Elementary School were studying under an inquiry-based or project-based science curriculum. That means they do experiments themselves.
    A Different way of teaching:
    "In the old days, you read it and they write it down fast and furious," said Weber, the teacher. "Now we see a lot of interaction (between students).""They're a little more like a scientist," said Dan Towner, executive director of curriculum and instruction for School City of Mishawaka. "They observe and take notes, with teachers guiding them through the process." ....

    The rest of the article (by Sue Lowe, 8 Nov, 2009) can be found here.
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Charter Schools drain students and finances from the Los Angeles Public Schools
        
    One major drawback of Charter schools within poverty-stricken urban school systems is now becoming apparent - as researched by Howard Blume in the Los Angeles Tmes:
      "An apparent exodus of students to charter schools, combined with an overall enrollment decline, is disrupting Los Angeles-area schools and exacerbating an ongoing budget crisis.
      "Local independently run charter schools added more than 9,500 students this fall, a surge of almost 19% to more than 60,000. At the same time, enrollment is down more than 19,000 students, about 3%, at schools affiliated with the Los Angeles Unified School District.
      "Total district enrollment has fallen to 678,441, down from a peak of 747,009 in 2003.
      "The drop has long-term implications because school districts receive funding based on student attendance. Some ramifications are immediate: Schools simply cannot afford to employ more teachers than their student enrollment will pay for. The result is that many schools had to release teachers and distribute students into other classes a month or more into the school year...."

    The rest of the article can be found here.
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"Notre Dame Clear Domes"
New experiments for your class!!
Last summer's middle-school program included studies of the reflections and refractions
of laser light in a semicircular piece of plexiglass.


- Gordon Berry of Notre Dame and Kent Mikel of Discovery Middle-School (Penn-Harris-Madison) included them in a workshop at the HASTI meeting in Indianapolis. Since many of the workshop participants wanted the domes to use in their own class-rooms, we have persuaded the Notre Dame Physics Department Machine shop to make extras, so that we can sell them to you at cost. The pieces can be used at all grades, Elementary, and Middle School through High School and College. In more advanced classes they can be used to make quantitative measurements of the angles of reflection and refraction, learn about "refractive index",and to test Snell's law.
They work well with narrow beam white light sources, but especially with lasers of any color, red or green. The domes are half an inch thick, with a diameter of 4 inches, and all sides are polished. Our administrative assistant came up with the name "ND Clear Dome", to distinguish it from Notre Dame's "Golden Dome". (For a small extra charge, we can add a gold coating!)
Ordering "Clear Domes"
Our pricing is $5 for one, ($5 times N for N<15), $75 for 25, including postage - please send a check made out to The Physics Department of Notre Dame at the following address: Professor Gordon Berry, Physics Department NSH 225, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame IN 46556. Include your own shipping address - shipping (by USPS priority) will be within a few days.
Lasers are most easily purchased from The Laser Guy at http://thelaserguy.com. The red ER12 Executive laser-pointer costs $7.50 plus shipping; the green ER17 laser-pointer is $110 plus shipping.
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       ASU Graduate Program for High School Physics Teachers

    If you want to go somewhere warm for the summer, try this: Arizona State University offers High school teachers the chance to take its well-recognized peer-led modeling workshops:
    "Modeling Instruction is an innovative and successful pedagogy that structures inquiry around scientific models. It combines the learning cycle (5 E's) and a plethora of other research-based innovations in education. It develops in students the ability to analyze data, reach a conclusion and defend it; and it emphasizes experiment design." Most of the workshops last 3-weeks and thoroughly treat the pedagogy and content for the mechanics portion of a physics course. Content is organized around basic models to increase its structural coherence. Participants are supplied with a complete set of course materials and work through activities alternately in the roles of student or teacher.
    You can find further information at their website: http://modeling.asu.edu/.

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Newsletter Archives

 Editorial information, etc.

       The NISMEC electronic newsletter will be published at regular intervals throughout the school year.
    If you wish to be a subscriber (it's free), contact the editor, Gordon Berry, at: hgberry@nd.edu

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    Contact us at hgberry@nd.edu


    .........mathematics, engineering and the other sciences too!
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