Embargoed until 2 P.M., EDT
NSF PR 97-72 - December 4, 1997
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School Teachers to Train in Energy Labs
The National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department
of Energy (DoE) have joined forces in an unprecedented
program to make accessible DoE's extensive complex
of 15 national labs and science facilities to train
K-12 math and science teachers.
The teachers will be drawn from school systems participating
in educational systemic reform programs already funded
by NSF. Each DoE facility will make available its
significant resources and expertise from basic research,
applied science, technology development, and facility
design and construction.
According to Luther S. Williams, head of NSF's education
directorate, the effort to provide an infrastructure
and curricula for teacher training, which keeps pace
with the ever-advancing sciences and technological
disciplines, has up to this point primarily involved
partners in higher education.
"Such teacher development all too often has taken
place almost exclusively in traditional university
classroom lecture settings," says Williams. "What
is needed is a significant commitment to innovative
approaches to educating our educators in fields that
have long outpaced our schools' professional development
resources."
"This agreement gives teachers from across the nation
access to science and technology training facilities
that they could only have dreamed about until now,"
said Midge Cozzens, NSF's director of elementary,
secondary and informal education.
A prevailing sentiment among teacher organizations,
teachers and school administrators is that the infrastructure
for advanced teacher training in technology and science
has fallen seriously behind what is required to meet
the needs of students in an increasingly technical
and highly competitive global economy. This program
is designed to change this situation.
Teachers in NSF's rural, statewide, urban and comprehensive
systemic reform initiatives would be eligible to participate
in professional development, curricula and programs
that will be established at DoE labs.
U.S. Secretary of Energy Federico Peņa said of the
collaboration, "This inter-agency partnership will
serve as a model to our nation's education community,
demonstrating that by leveraging our resources and
capabilities we can provide the hands-on experience
and scientific knowledge necessary for our teachers
to meet the challenges of the 21st century in science
and technology. Especially in the areas of computer
technology, our labs, in partnership with NSF, will
help make science 'come alive' and develop teachers'
skills in integrating the tools of computer simulation
and modeling with science and math standards."
At the start of this DoE/NSF teacher-development initiative,
NSF will help identify cities, states and rural-area
participating school systems that could most benefit
by this innovative teacher enhancement program. Geography
will play a role in decision-making regarding the
identification of the initial set of labs that will
inaugurate this unique teacher education program.
Just as important, according to DoE officials, is
the ability of the labs to serve under-served schools
that show promise for benefiting from the teacher
enhancement aspects of this program.
"The opportunity to bring teachers into DoE labs equipped
with many state-of-the-art facilities and instrumentation,
could never have been provided by a single agent,"
said Williams. "With NSF and DoE collaborating on
this momentous challenge, we can bring an exciting
new dimension to teacher training."
Ultimately, the 15 DoE labs will each allocate resources
necessary to make a significant difference in curriculum
development and teacher training activities. NSF will
solicit teacher participation through its ongoing
systemic initiatives. Participating national labs
include: Ames (IA), Argonne (IL), Lawrence Berkeley
(CA), Brookhaven (NY), Fermi (IL), Lawrence Livermore
(CA), Los Alamos (NM), National Renewable Energy Lab
(CO), Oak Ridge (TN), Pacific Northwest (WA), Sandia
(NM), Sandia-Livermore (CA), Savannah Technology Center
(SC), Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (CA), and
Thomas Jefferson (VA).
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