Meet the Coalition: CalGirlS and Bay Area Science Festival

We are excited to be involved with two fantastic science after school events this week in the San Francisco Bay Area!

Tomorrow, November 1, we will be at the CalGirlS Kick-Off Conference in Berkeley, CA.  CalGirlS stands for the California Girls in STEM, and is the California state affiliate of the National Girls Collaborative Project.  

The Kick-Off is the launch of the statewide initiative to increase girls' involvement in STEM.  We are expecting over 100 program managers, guidance counselors, business partners, technical professionals K-12 teachers, parents and representatives from professional organizations and higher education.

Then on Saturday, November 3, we will be at AT&T Park in San Francisco for the Bay Area Science Festival Discovery Day.  This event is from 11-4 and is free to the public!  We expect 20,000 kids, parents, teachers and other folks who love science at the ballpark on Saturday.

We're thrilled to bring with us several of our local science after school partners: 4-H, the Bay Area Discovery Museum, 826 Valencia, the Alameda County Office of Education, HowToSmile.org and the brand new California Girls in STEM Collaborative (CalGirlS).  

If you are in the San Francisco Bay Area, we hope to see you at one of these events!

The National Girls Collaborative Project

I'm writing to share some of my experiences from  2012 National Collaboration Conference hosted by the National Girls Collaborative Project last week.  I had the opportunity to meet dozens of representatives from girl serving STEM organizations and discuss how we can collaborate to move towards supporting more women and girls in STEM.

Among the organizations I learned about at the conference was the National Center for Women and Information Technology.  The NCWIT website is full of information and resources for increasing the participation of girls and women in computing and IT.  They also sponsored the Collaboration Conference reception and the Coalition co-hosted some fun, hands-on activities along with our friends at CAISE and Techbridge.  Check out the fun we had!

We adapted an activity from the NISE Network and made edible gummy capsules out of cranberry and grape juices, using food grade sodium alginate.  The result?  Science you can eat!

 

Here's Kalie from CAISE talking about a few activities available on HowToSmile.org.  This website is full of fun, high quality, hands-on activities!

And here are some of the fabulous folks of Techbridge, including Executive Director Linda Kekelis.  One of the highlights of the Collaboration Conference for me was attending Techbridge's workshop on career exploration in engineering.  When designing engineering activities for girls, I learned that it's important for them to see real life examples of women who are passionate about their jobs and doing interesting things with their science training.  We watched a video from PBS' Design Squad that was great for prompting discussion and setting context for engineering challenges.

I left NGCP feeling inspired and motivated to keep looking for opportunities to collaborate and work towards a brighter future through science in after school!

Western Region 4-H Science Academy

The Coalition is at UC Davis this week for the Western Region 4-H Science Academy.  We are honored to be participating and learning with the 4-H leadership about curriculum, professional development, evaluation and partnerships for high quality science programs within the 4-H organization.  It is clear that 4-H is a leader in informal science learning, so we are very excited to be here!

The Academy kicked off today with Alan Friedman who gave a presentation called "What kids learn about science outside of school is a nice enrichment to what they learn in school - or is it actually the other way around?"

We're thrilled that Coalition Director Carol Tang will give the keynote talk tomorrow on quality science after school for all youth.  Her talk will be streaming live tomorrow at 8:00AM PST, so we invite you to listen in!

How Kids Learn Conference: CSAS Presentation

Coalition Director Carol Tang recently presented at the How Kids Learn Conference in Berkeley, CA.  She talked about why STEM and after school make such a great pair.  One of her central points is that both STEM learning and after school learning principles celebrate process, discovery, creativity and self-direction over product.  They also both rely on teamwork and mentoring relationships.

If you are an out-of-school time science educator, you will especially appreciate Carol's presentation of the best predictor of which students will become scientists.  And if you are an after school educator with little or no science background, hear about why you might actually be better at leading science learning than someone with a formal science background!

Part 1:

Part 2:

Another presenter at the conference was Erik Peterson, the  Policy Director at the Afterschool Alliance.  His presentation offered perspectives that parents, policy makers and educators have about after school learning.  He also talked about the tension between the importance of unstructured play and the pressure to map after school activities back to improved school performance and test scores.

Starting STEM: Picking low hanging fruit from science centers

Last week the Coalition for After School joined school districts, community based organizations, service providers and policy makers who care about quality after school programming at Beyond School Hours in Burlingame, CA.  We were excited to be in the great company of educators and administrators from around the country to share ideas, best practices and strategies for improving outcomes for youth outside of school time, throughout the year.

Many of the educators we spoke to at our booth expressed their desire to do more science with the youth in their programs, but were somewhat unsure about where to begin.  Luckily our presentation at BSH was crafted with providers like these in mind.  For organizations just starting to think about offering STEM after school we presented a panel entitled STEM After School: Getting the Most from Science Museums, Aquariums and Zoos.

The central idea that Coalition Director Carol Tang presented is that after school providers don't need to dedicate an exorbitant amount of time or money becoming experts in science before offering rich learning experiences in STEM.  Science centers including museums, aquariums, zoos and national parks draw upon deep knowledge from the STEM fields and offer a wealth of workshops and classes that are a perfect match for out of school time programs.  These organizations are looking for ways to reach large audiences, and that is exactly what after school programs have to offer, so partnerships between the two can really be a perfect fit!

There is a spectrum of depth in partnerships between after school organizations and science centers.  On one end is something like a one-time visit, where your program takes a field trip or pays for an outreach group to visit your site.  On the other end is a long term investment over the course of months or years.  This can be inquiry into an issue of interest to the kids and the science center staff.

Check out these forms of partnerships after school organizations can have with science centers.  Which would work best for your organization?

A) External STEM program provider
Partner provides STEM activities directly to students at their institution, at after school site or outdoors. 

B) STEM partner provides staff development 
Partner may train staff or train program leaders who then lead and support their after school staff (train-the-trainer model). 

C) Materials-based partnership 
Partner provides equipment, curriculum and hands-on activities and could provide  training to support these. 

D) Partnerships with STEM providers
(1) Customizing the partner’s standard curriculum or
(2) establishing new partnerships to serve youth audiences. 

E) STEM educators as coaches 
Partner provides content and pedagogical expertise to support afterschool staff and programming. 

Guest Bloggers: The Young People’s Project and Oakland Science and Math Outreach

Recently I blogged about the Math and Social Justice Conference that I went to in San Francisco.  It was a great opportunity to learn about issues of equity in teaching and learning math, and to meet leaders in the after school arena who are focused on these issues.  Two of these leaders agreed to do a Q&A with me for the blog this week: Chad Milner, the National Director of Programs of the Young People's Project (YPP), and Sepehr Vakil, Program Director of Oakland Science and Math Outreach (OSMO).  Read on to learn more about their organizations and overlapping interests.

Coalition for Science After School: Tell me a little about the mission of your organization in your own words. 

Chad Milner of The Young People’s Project: The Young People's Project was founded in Jackson Mississippi in 1996 as an outgrowth of the Algebra Project.  I say an outgrowth in the sense of the sprit and vision of the work, as well as the actual individuals who took this work on.  The Algebra Project was started in 1982 by Robert Moses, a former Mississippi field secretary for SNCC (Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee) and later on MacArthur Genius grant awardee. Its vision centered around, leveraging Dr. Moses' ground up approach to voter registration in the civil rights era, and apply that to math education now.  He chose math literacy as a key to 21st century citizenship for poor and marginalized communities of color within the US.  Fast forward about 10 years, during the early 1990's the first students who came up through the program, including Moses' own children, had finished college and a few had decided to join him in Mississippi to work with AP in the schools down there. While there, the recent college grads started to work not just in the school, but outside of school and created a youth led "math lab".  It was through this and other relationships that YPP was born, as an out of school based response to the issue of promoting and enabling math literate communities of youth. 

Sepehr Vakil of Oakland Science and Math Outreach (OSMO): In 2009, while working as an engineer in Berkeley I organized the OSMO project with the help of teachers from Oakland Technical High School and the La Pena cultural center in Berkeley. My vision was to improve access to outside-the-classroom learning opportunities in mathematics, science and digital media to Oakland public high school students. Since 2009, OSMO moved to the Boys and Girls Club of Oakland, and I enrolled in the Education in Mathematics, Science and Technology PhD program at UC Berkeley.  The mission of OSMO is to build a powerful link between a community organization and the university in an effort to support deep math and science content knowledge for Oakland students. A secondary goal of OSMO is to advance research on equity in STEM fields.

These are some of the research questions being explored in the OSMO project:

• How can research in learning and cognition inform the design of an outside-the-classroom educational program in an urban context?
• What kind of an out-of-school support structure is necessary to improve educational outcomes for disadvantaged and historically underrepresented youth in STEM fields?
• If the goal of public education is to promote social change, what role does math and science education play?
• How can recent advances in digital media and open-source technologies be leveraged in after school contexts? How can science and math education take advantage of these technologies?
• What does math, science and digital literacy mean? How do we achieve it?

CSAS: What was your interest in the Math and Social Justice conference?  Why were you there?  Why is equity in math education an important issue to you?

Vakil: There are people in the education world interested in STEM. There are other folks interested in equity and social justice. It is a rare opportunity to meet researchers, teachers and community organizers that are thinking and working at the intersection between social justice and mathematics. I attended the conference to meet other people who are committed to connecting the dots between these two seemingly disparate fields.

In his book Radical Equations, Robert Moses asserts that math literacy is as important to democratic citizenship today as reading and writing was for African-Americans in the 1960s civil rights movement. Not only do I agree that literacy in math (and science and digital media literacy) is critical for active participation in our democracy, I would also say the critical thinking that is unique to mathematics is in itself an opportunity for student empowerment. In other words, the intellectual heavy lifting that is required in STEM fields, particularly in math, is necessary for tomorrow’s leaders who need to rethink and reimagine a society that is more just and more progressive than the one we find ourselves in today.

Milner: This was my 3rd Math and Social Justice conference.  The first two I attended were in Brooklyn.  I first got introduced to the conference by Jonathan Osler, a former Algebra Project student from Cambridge, MA, who initiated the vision for this conference while teaching math at a high school in New York.  Since then I have really enjoyed the intersection of education, social change, and community activism that have come to define the space of Creating Balance.  It was great hearing Lisa Delpit speak, an amazing educator whose work I have admired and has also been an ally to our work here at YPP.

CSAS: OSMO is based at the Boys & Girls Club in Oakland.  What kinds of youth do you serve?  What are the particular challenges these kids face in learning math and science?

Vakil: Currently we have 12 high school students from Oakland Technical High School and Skyline High School. We also have a student from Mcclymonds in West Oakland, another from Oakland School For the Arts, and an 8th grader from Bret Hart Middle School. Our students range in academic preparedness and motivation. Some of our students are already focused and participate in OSMO to really push their thinking and develop deep content mastery, while other students are really struggling to stay focused and motivated. So the challenges really vary student to student. And the great thing about an informal, after school environment is that we have the flexibility to customize the program based on each student’s needs.

CSAS: Chad, I had the pleasure of participating in YPP's workshop at the conference.  That was the most active math lesson I've ever had!  Can you describe a few more successful activities YPP has come up with to get kids excited about learning math?

Milner: “Flagway” is a sorting game, based on the Mobius function that kids can play from 3rd grade and up.  YPP has modified this game to be a running and physical game that can be played in community spaces such as a gym or playground.

“Road Coloring” was developed in partnership with Greg Budzban at Southern Illinois University. This mathematically based game involves building a city with roads and buildings.

“Algebra Labs” are targeted for 6-8th graders, and take students through a series of hands on activities that teach and reinforce understanding of core algebraic concepts.  The ultimate goal of the labs are to help enable students to complete Algebra 1 by the end of 8th grade.

There are a few others as well.  All YPP games and activities are built on our core pedagogical approach, modeled after Kolb's learning cycle.  It takes students through a shared experience and through reflection and deconstruction of this experience, the mathematics is drawn out.  We also call it the 5-step process.  

CSAS: At the conference I was excited to hear you two talk about a potential partnership [between YPP and OSMO].  Why would you partner with each other?  What would the partnership ideally look like for both of you?

Milner: YPP is working to broaden the reach of our model and work.  We have developed a program model called "YPP@" which is meant to serve as a sort of YPP lite.  This allows us to further our mission and vision as an organization and also enables communities and institutions across the country to embrace and customize the YPP model within their existing infrastructure.

Vakil: An ultimate goal of OSMO, beyond promoting deep science and math knowledge, is to cultivate and make available productive STEM identities for our students. This goes beyond “Oh, I think math and science are cool and I’m good at it!” What I’m really talking about here is what YPP really excels at: giving high school students the confidence and leadership to not only be good at math but also take on the task of promoting math literacy in their own communities. Now that’s what student empowerment is all about. Though there are no immediate plans for us to work together, the potential is definitely there. In the meantime, we are taking notes!

Math and Social (In)justice

When I told friends and colleagues last week that I was excited to go to a conference on Math and Social Justice, I saw a lot of curious and confused faces.  Many of them said that it sounded interesting, but what does math have to do with social justice?

Well, did you hear the one about the math teacher in Georgia who assigned slavery-themed word problems to a class of third graders?

The Creating Balance in an Unjust World 2012 conference brought together over 300 educators, youth and community members at Mission High School in San Francisco.  The conference featured 31 workshops and 50 workshop facilitators who engaged attendees in discussions of equity, justice, pedagogy and practices.  The keynote speaker was Dr. Lisa D. Delpit, the author of Other People's Children and Multiplication is for white people.

I quickly understood that this was a very hands-on conference, with most of the attendees being math or science instructors eager to learn about the intersection of math and social justice, forge partnerships, share best practices, discuss challenges and plan for advocacy.  The major themes of the conference were:

Social Justice in the Mathematics Classroom
Understanding the math around us is important for all youth, and perhaps especially for at-risk and marginalized populations.  At the conference, Jessica Hopson from Portland Youth Builders presented a powerful lesson she developed about the impact of gun violence on children and teens.  By using current events or historical information as a jumping off point in the math classroom, teachers shared new and culturally relevant ways to motivate students to understand graphs, charts, statistical trends, causal relationships, percentages and other math.

Additionally, educators interested in incorporating a social justice component in their classroom or after school programs presented how to convey concepts and information through math.  Teacher educators who believe that mathematics courses for preservice teachers should have a social justice and equity focus met at the conference to design courses with social justice-oriented lessons.

Mathematics literacy as a "gatekeeper"
We already have a good sense that the mastery of math, and the corresponding test scores, act as a gatekeeper for higher education and better jobs.  But a good understanding of math is also the key to some basic "gatekeeping" life skills.  Teachers from El Puente Academy for Peace and Justice in Brooklyn, NY presented a 9th grade math unit called "Finance My Life" which gives students a basic understanding of budgeting, loans, taxes and savings.

Gatekeeping also comes into play in the sense that a student gets 'locked out' of higher math, and therefore related science, engineering and technology fields, without a solid base of knowledge.  A presentation by the Boston Public Schools' Secondary Math Department and MathPOWER, a Boston-based non-profit, described an innovative partnership to attempt to keep the 'gates' open under new district demands on the 8th grade algebra requirements.  In this partnership, teachers and students elected to spend 3 or 5 weeks in the summer to focus on pre-algebra skills and prepare for the school year.

Ethnomathematics
It may seem as though math is an international language, but math instruction can be alienating without equitable teaching practices.  The term "ethnomathematics" was used first used by a Brazilian mathematician named Ubiratan D'Ambrosio to describe the mathematical practices of different cultural groups.  He said,

Mathematics is absolutely integrated with Western civilization, which conquered and dominated the entire world. The only possibility of building up a planetary civilization depends on restoring the dignity of the losers and, together, winners and losers, moving into the new. [Ethnomathematics, then, is] a step towards peace.

By far the most heady and philosophical theme of the conference, being introduced to the idea of Ethnomathematics was the highlight of the conference for me.  To explore further, I recommend watching this video, which I watched as part of a discussion by Professor Anita Bright of Portland State University.

The Dot and the Line won an Academy Award in 1965.  As you watch, think about how this short cartoon uses mathematical terms to express social and cultural values.

Overall, it was an incredibly inspiring and eye-opening conference.  In light of horrifying international social injustice in the STEM field, it is up to us to move discussions about math and social justice from theory into practice.  Check out the complete list of 2012 conference presenters to find out who the leaders in this area are, and get your literature review and background from Joan Kwako's article in the Journal of Urban Mathematics Education.

Please comment what your organization is doing to address issues of social justice with math and science, or how you ensure the youth you work with are receiving an equitable STEM education!

Building Effective Community Partnerships for Science After School Part II: Finding STEM Resources in Your Community

This is the second part in a two-part series on Building Effective Community Partnerships for Science After School, a workshop we recently hosted at the Up Your Game conference. Read Part I on Including Science Volunteers in Afterschool Programs for more information.

In the second half of our workshop on partnerships for afterschool science, our panel of speakers focused on finding and using community resources. Our first speaker, Leslie Lowes, is an informal education specialist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). NASA has a great many resources available for supporting informal science education (as well as lots of resources for in-school learning), and Leslie helped us navigate where to find them.

NASA has a number of education centers around the country--if you live nearby, contact your center to find out about the availability of public tours. The education centers may also have a representative available from NASA's Speakers Bureau (a great way to find scientists with public communication skills!) or a chapter of the Solar System Ambassadors program, a national program of volunteers that specialize in JPL's work.

NASA also offers customizable curriculum just for out-of-school learning. For elementary school students, the Out of School to Outer Space program offers 15 hours of NASA/solar system science and engineering activities, including teacher training and ongoing support. This program is designed to get 4th and 5th graders "thinking like a scientist." The Space School Musical program, featuring downloadable videos, songs, and a guide to putting on a space-themed musical production, gets kids excited about STEM through song and dance.

For middle school students, NASA focuses on developing science skills through programs like the Summer of Innovation. Programs for high school students are geared toward research and preparation for STEM careers through internships and innovation challenges, like the Real World In World engineering challenge.

Not everyone is close to a NASA center, but many people have a museum or science center in their community. Katie Levedahl, Director of Out-of-School Programs for the California Academy of Sciences joined the panel to talk about how to partner with science centers and museums to bring STEM content to afterschool environments. Katie highlighted the Careers in Science (CiS) program, a multi-year internship program for high school students. CiS interns, along with an Academy scientist, bring science activities to afterschool programs in their communities. Because the interns often come from the communities they visit, they become role models for the afterschool program students. Because museum workers are science content experts, they can be great sources of high-quality STEM activities. Katie talked about other ways that afterschool programs can partner with science museums, including:

• Using the museum as a field trip site
• Connecting with older youth programs (like CiS) to find science mentors for afterschool youth
• Obtaining curriculum and activities from museums, or bringing museum scientist-educators into your program to facilitate activities

For the last presentation, I spoke about the many different resources available through the Coalition for Science After School. In particular, I highlighted our members and the National After School Science Directory as being great places to find local partnerships or connect with programs outside of your immediate area. I also highlighted our Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter pages as being great places to connect with resources, funding streams, events, professional development opportunities, research, and more. These tools are free and easily customizable to your needs.

For the final half hour of the workshop, we engaged in networking and a white-board brainstorming session to identify what individual programs actually need to facilitate STEM partnerships. We ended with a productive conversation on goals and next steps for the workshop participants.

For more information about the workshop--as well a starter kit for getting STEM in your afterschool program--visit Gabrielle Lyon's post on the Project Exploration blog.

Many thanks again to our wonderful speakers and engaged participants, and a special thank you to the California AfterSchool Network and Time Warner Cable for helping to make this workshop a reality.

Building Effective Community Partnerships for Science After School Part I: Including Science Volunteers in Afterschool Programs

This is Kalie, Manager at the Coalition for Science After School. Yesterday, I flew from our offices in Berkeley, CA down to San Diego to participate in a pre-conference session at the Step Up Your Game conference hosted by the California AfterSchool Network. The session was facilitated by Gabrielle Lyon, who serves on the Steering Committee of the Coalition, and sponsored by our friends at Time Warner Cable. 

We assembled a two panels of speakers to talk about how to build successful partnerships to promote science after school, who spoke about 1) how to recruit and integrate volunteers from the science and business worlds into afterschool STEM programs, and 2) community resources that programs can leverage to include STEM. This blog post summarizes the first part of that conversation.

Many thanks to the California AfterSchool Network and Time Warner Cable for helping us to make this event happen!

First, Dr. Lyon asked the participants about their programs. About half of the participants were already doing some level of STEM in their programs. We also established that "science" and "STEM" were interchangeable in our conversation. We then had a few moments for a free write, prompted by the question "What is worth it for young people in your programs to know and experience when it comes to science?" Some responses of the free write included:

• Exposure to skill for college and careers (for example, in computer programming)
• Wanting students to know that STEM is fun
• Relevance to 21st century career pathways, especially in a rural area
• Real-life connections to everyday life

Dr. Lyon pointed out that kids are only in school for about 20% of the day, which leaves lots of opportunities for alternate or extended learning of STEM skills. She also asked us to frame the rest of the conversation as how our vision can support the goals outlined during the free write.

After a brief presentation on Project Exploration (including on some of the results of the 10-year retrospective study of their STEM programming), we moved on to the first panel of presenters, who talked to us about including volunteers in their afterschool programs.

First, we heard from Linda Kekelis, Executive Director of Techbridge. Techbridge is an afterschool program for girls that focuses on STEM activities with a strong connection to careers. Linda said that early feedback in the program indicated that the girls saw the activities as fun hobbies, but not necessarily things that could help them in the future. The program's leaders saw the need to invite role models--women with real careers in the STEM fields--to work with the girls. After bringing in role models, program leaders found that even a one-time meeting with a role model can make a huge impact. Not all of the role models intuitively knew how to successfully interact with the girls, and Linda offered these tips for guiding interactions between the girls and the role models:

• Make the interactions easy for the role models by providing training
• Start by asking for a one-time commitment to build interest
• Start by simply asking the role models to talk about what they do--making that personal connection to each girl participant is important

Other insights included to cultivate relationships by sending regular email updates about the program, communicating the value of training, and always expressing thanks.

Next, we heard from Liz Ferguson of BioWaves, one of the organizers of the Expanding Your Horizons (EYH) conference. This large conference brings together hundreds of girls for a day of workshops hosted by real female scientists, most of them affiliated with local universities in the San Diego area. Liz emphasized that it is important to make the conference an authentic science experience to spark interest among the participants. She said they largely recruit their scientist mentors by finding clubs on the different university campuses in San Diego.

We learned more about EYH from Cassondra Williams, who spoke next about recruiting in the science community. Cassondra spoke about both EYH--a large, one-time event--and BeWISE (Better Education for Women In Science and Engineering), a long-term mentoring program for girls. Cassondra identified four places for finding STEM professional volunteers:

• Universities: the National Science Foundation (NSF) now requires many scientists who receive NSF funding to include public outreach in their research plans; this means that many professors and graduate students in the scientists may be looking for opportunities. 
• Corporations: research individual companies in your local area; they may have an employee volunteer program and/or an outreach coordinator
•  Research Institutions: this could include zoos and aquariums, as well as medical centers
• Government: branches of the military and federal agencies may have volunteering programs; state and county branches may be a resource as well

Cassondra emphasized that programs should have resources available to support volunteers, such as ways to communicate their complicated research. She recommended personal networking (such as getting on listservs), researching specific scientists/STEM professionals to reach out to, and contacting organizations' outreach coordinators as effective ways to find scientists volunteers.

Finally, we heard from Milinda Martin of Time Warner Cable. Milinda is the Vice President, Communications for the Southern California/Mountain West region. Milinda talked about Time Warner Cable's philanthropic initiative Connect a Million Minds, including the Connectory. We also watched a great video of Time Warner Cable employees talking about their volunteer experiences working with kids to promote STEM education. 

Milinda talked about some of the challenges for their volunteers, which could help afterschool programs identify ways to better incorporate and connect with corporate volunteers. First, many employees may not identify as STEM workers--for example, they work in marketing or administration--and might not feel prepared to do science with kids. Second, most employees work during the time that afterschool programs typically operate. Third, afterschool programs may struggle to find the right person at the corporation to contact--look for a volunteer or outreach coordinator. She also emphasized that many employees like to hear feedback from the organizations and programs for which they volunteer.

After the panelists wrapped up their presentations, they participated in a moderated discussion with the audience. Questions ranged from sources of funding to evaluation--some highlights from the conversation included:

• Building a relationship with volunteers and their home organizations is a key to success on both ends; this requires a good deal of dedication, investment, and time
• Nonprofit organizations should collect data on their impact with students--for example, giving students pre- and post-participation surveys to identify changing attitudes
• Students need and want a wide variety of exposures to STEM, and volunteering can help

Thank you again to our speakers, and we hope that this was useful for conference attendees. We'll post Part II of the session--on community resources for STEM--later this week!

Take Advantage of a Great Pre-Conference Opportunity this Monday in Sunny San Diego, CA!

We are traveling to sunny San Diego, CA this October 31st for the Step Up Your Game conference focusing on engaging older youth in afterschool. We will be hosting a pre-conference panel from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on building successful partnerships for science afterschool. We are happy to be able to offer FREE attendance to the pre-conference session for members of the Coalition for Science After School. Seating is limited!

This panel will be co-sponsored with Time Warner Cable. Our panel participants will include:

Linda Kekelis, Executive Director, Techbridge
Cassondra Williams, UCSD Scripps Institution of Oceanography
Gabrielle Lyon, Founder and Senior Explorer, Project Exploration
Liz Ferguson, Director of Education, Bio-Waves
Milinda Martin, Vice President in Communications, West Region, Time Warner Cable
Leslie Lowes, Informal Education Specialist, NASA
Katie Levedahl, Assistant Director of Out-of-School Time Programs, California Academy of Sciences
Kalie Sacco, Manager, Coalition for Science After School

Again, space is limited. If you are a member of the Coalition who will be able to attend the pre-conference, email Kalie Sacco at kaliesacco {@} berkeley {dot} edu with your name, title, and organization affiliation.

For those who will be unable to attend, check back on this blog next week for a summary of the panels. 

We hope to see you in San Diego!

What I Learned at the Association of Science-Technology Centers Conference

This is Kalie, Manager at the Coalition for Science After School, just back from four great days in Baltimore at the Association of Science-Technology Centers (ASTC) conference. I spent the first two days of the conference in the exhibit hall, where I was seated next to representatives from the Afterschool Alliance. The exhibit hall gave me a chance to meet representatives from many of our science center members, as well as introduce new people to the Coalition and the National After School Science Directory.

There is no doubt that science center leaders are interested in connecting with afterschool programs, or looking to include afterschool content in their educational programming. If you’re from a science center looking to partner with or include more afterschool programming, join the Coalition to receive our newsletter and engage with this dynamic community of out-of-school time STEM stakeholders.

Outside of the exhibit hall’s open hours, I was able to attend some interesting sessions focusing on education in science centers. I took some notes to share with our members. Descriptions of each session are below; some of them run a bit long, so skip ahead to the session titles that interest you the most:

1)   Integrating Scientists Into Educational Programming

2)   How to Demonstrate the Value of Science Centers

3)   The Center for the Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE): Year 4 Initiatives and the Future

4)   Innovative and Collaborative Sharing of Educational Resources Online

5)   Activating Young Science Learners

Thank you to the team at ASTC for putting on a great conference! I learned a lot and plan on attending again next year when the conference moves to Ohio. See you in Columbus!

Integrating Scientists Into Educational Programming

This session focused on showcasing the ways in which museums work with scientists to enhance their education programs and events. We heard from two representatives from the American Museum of Natural History, who offers a Science Café night for adults and a two-year mentoring program for high-school youth that matches them with a scientists mentor. We also heard from Elizabeth Babcock of the California Academy of Sciences, who talked about the museum’s Careers in Science program and efforts to make their scientist researchers accessible to museum visitors by opening up their glass-fronted research lab. Monique Scott of the Anchorage Museum talked about an exhibit on mammoths and mastodons and their programming that brought research scientists and community members together on the museum floor. Steve Tritz of the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) told us about a great summer camp program that takes place all across the Pacific Northwest, in which students travel with scientists researchers and help them with their fieldwork.

Student connection to professional scientists is an important motivator for showing students that they can become scientists too. For example, Mr. Tritz of OMSI talked about how his program works with tribal scientists to connect American Indian students to the research that they do. Challenges in integrating scientists into education programs include finding scientists who are natural communicators to the public, as well as reaching out to scientists outside of personal networks. Several presenters mentioned that working with post-docs or graduate students has been a good strategy, as those students and recent PhDs often have an interest in outreach and a natural connection with students. For afterschool programs looking to partner with scientists, reaching out to a local college’s STEM departments could be a great way to find scientists interested in outreach.

For more information about this topic, stay tuned on our blog for a summary of the workshop we’ll be facilitating at the Up Your Game conference on October 31^st in San Diego, where we will be focusing on connecting scientist volunteers and afterschool programs.

How to Demonstrate the Value of Science Centers

In this session, we heard from representatives from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) on their research and evaluation efforts to demonstrate how valuable museums and libraries—including those that focus on science content—are to their communities. IMLS recently put out a study on 21^st century skills, which is available for download at their website and may be a useful tool for afterschool groups seeking to integrate skill-building STEM activities into their programs.

We also saw a video produced by the California Science Center highlighting some of their great exhibits, programs, and community recognition over the years. William Harris, Senior Vice President of Development and Marketing at the California Science Center Foundation, said that they have saved everything positive said about them over the years—ranging from local news coverage to a donation letter sent by a six-year-old visitor. These testaments to their educational impact, combined with videos of some of their most exciting exhibits and programs, was informative while also creating a deep emotional impact. He also said that they made their first video of this nature using a flip-phone camera—something relatively cheap that many people already have. Producing a video of this nature would be a great asset for an afterschool program to show potential funders and policymakers.

The Center for the Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE): Year 4 Initiatives and the Future

The Center for the Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE) is a partnership between several projects, initiatives, and institutions that seeks to bring together and advance the field of informal science educators. Funded by the National Science Foundation, CAISE is continuously growing and expanding to bring together more partners and stakeholders across multiple STEM fields. Check out their website for more information about their projects, partnerships, and constituents.

Innovative Collaborative Development and Sharing of Educational Resources Online

This session introduced participants to a variety of educational resources and tools—all collaborative in nature and available online. Many of the resources found on these sites may be useful for afterschool programs looking to increase their STEM content—or for STEM providers seeking new venues for distributing their work.

•     NSDL SMILE pathway: This great collection of informal math and science activities from science centers all across the country can be found at www.howtosmile.org. Users can search for activities by content, age, cost, and many other parameters. They can also submit reviews, ratings, and suggestions for modifications for each activity. We often recommend the SMILE pathway to afterschool programs looking for short science activities that use inexpensive materials and explain their science content in an easy-to-understand way.
• NISE Network: The NISE Network is a collaborative partnership of science institutions offering resources for understanding and explaining nanotechnology in informal education environments. The presenter, Catherine McCarthy of the Science Museum of St. Paul, also gave an enlightening talk about copyright and the potential issues of sharing digital resources. The NISE Network uses a Creative Commons license, and encourages sharing with attribution. 
• Open Exhibits: This community-based initiative provides free software that uses multi-touch and other human-computer interaction (HCI) technology to museums and other educational organizations. They also use a Creative Commons license. This new project capitalizes on the collaborative nature of science centers and the ease of open-source software development and sharing. Many of the exhibits that have been developed through Open Exhibits use cheap technology that visitors may be familiar with, like Microsoft Kinect and Google Maps. Check out their community site to see some of the projects that have been developed.

Activating Young Science Learners

The Science Learning Activation Lab research project based in the San Francisco Bay Area seeks to identify and explain the factors that “activate” science learning in children before they reach middle school. Their working definition of activation is a dynamic state composed of dispositions, skills, and knowledge that enable success in proximal learning experiences. It is definable, malleable, and predictive of future learning choice. Identifying factors of activation has the potential to present tangible evidence to policymakers and funding organizations that learning outcomes other than test scores can effectively measure science learning and increasing the number of students who go through the STEM pipeline (that is, students who go on to choose STEM majors and careers).

The research team, which includes the Lawrence Hall of Science and the University of Pittsburgh, is funded by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, which has long supported Bay Area science research. The researchers are still formulating their tools for identifying and measuring activation. They hope to answer the question of how we, as informal science educators, can activate children’s interest and curious minds in ways that ignite persistent engagement in science learning and inquiry. Although this work is focused in the Bay Area, the research findings and any resulting models or tools for measurement can certainly be used by organizations in other areas.

At the session, we heard from leaders at major Bay Area informal science learning institutions (the Lawrence Hall of Science, the Children’s Discovery Museum, the California Academy of Sciences, and the Exploratorium) about what they hope the research can accomplish as it moves forward. The hope is that by working together, the institutions can dramatically increase the amount of science being offered to Bay Area children.

The research being pursued in this project is highly relevant for afterschool providers who are seeking to offer science content in their programs. The researchers agree that any kind of learning experience has potential for activation, and afterschool learning is certainly a part of children’s learning experiences. Keep an eye on their website for preliminary results, and we certainly hope that they will present the next stage of their findings at next year’s ASTC conference in Columbus, Ohio.

Join Us at These Upcoming Conferences & Events This Fall

One of our top priorities in the coming year is to attend conferences and events around the country to meet afterschool leaders and learn more about the latest developments in the field. Here is where we’ll be in the next month—let us know if you will be at any of these meetings and events, or suggest somewhere for us to go next!

• Association of Science & Technology Centers (ASTC) Annual Conference: We are kicking off our conference season this weekend at the ASTC conference in Baltimore, MD. Kalie will be there with the Afterschool Alliance to talk to science centers about how out-of-school time programs are an important part about science center offerings. 
• Up Your Game Pre-Conference Workshop: Later this month, we’ll be travelling to sunny San Diego, CA to host a pre-conference workshop at the Up Your Game conference. This conference focuses on older youth in afterschool, with sessions oriented towards middle school earlier in the week and high school later in the week. Our pre-conference workshop on the 31st will focus on building partnerships for afterschool STEM, with two panels on engaging volunteers and finding community resources. We will have speakers representing high-quality afterschool programs and resources, and the workshop will be a great way to share practices and learn how to integrate community partnerships to promote STEM in your afterschool program. There is still time to register for this conference, so we hope to see you there!
• National Summer Learning Conference: It may be fall, but it's still a great time to talk about summer learning! We'll be exhibiting at the National Summer Learning conference in San Francisco, CA from November 15th-16th. Summer learning is an important part of providing out-of-school time education opportunities for youth, and we look forward to connecting with many great summer programs at this event.

Keep an eye out for our Steering Committee members at other conferences and events around the country. You can also find out more about where we will be in our monthly newsletter.

Webinar: Learning Science Outside the Classroom

As part of their recent special report on informal science education, Education Week will be hosting a webinar tomorrow (4/19) on science learning outside of the classroom. The webinar will take place from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. EST and will feature John Falk, Professor of Free Choice learning at Oregon State University, and Dr. Alan Friedman, former Director and CEO of the New York Hall of Science and current member of the National Assessment Government Board. Both are highly regarded experts working at the cutting edge of informal science learning research, and they should have a lot to say about this ever-evolving field.

Dr. Friedman also gave a talk at the 2010 National Conference on Science & Technology in Out of School Time on the importance of program evaluation. Download a free podcast of his talk on the Coalition for Science After School iTunes U page.

Check out our updated iTunes U page!

iTunes U recently upgraded their interface, and the Coalition for Science After School page is cleaner and more easy-to-use than ever. Visit the page (link will open iTunes) to download recorded sessions from the 2010 National Conference on Science & Technology in Out-of-School Time! Learn about:

-Creating and sustaining community partnerships
-What funders are looking for from OST STEM programs
-Research trends and recent findings in the OST STEM field

-How technology is being used by OST programs

There's a lot to learn from these leaders and experts. What surprised you? What would you like to know more about? And please feel free to share these podcasts with your networks!

Evaluation and Afterschool

Evaluation and assessment are important components of ensuring your program's long-term success. As stated on the Coalition website:

"Program assessment and evaluation provide critical feedback for ensuring that a program is making the most of this opportunity. Additionally, these reviews can prove useful in securing funding."

Two Coalition members have recently completed major evaluation studies. Destination ImagiNation, a national non-profit afterschool program, underwent an evaluation by the University of Virginia. They found that Destination ImagiNation participants outperformed their non-participant peers on creative thinking, critical thinking, and problem-solving--all stated goals of the program.  

Project Exploration, located in Chicago, found that they have had a major impact in participants' decisions to stick with STEM education and career goals. The study was done by the Center for Research, Evaluation, and Assessment (REA) at the Lawrence Hall of Science, UC Berkeley and looked at ten years' of data collected by Project Exploration as well as surveys of more than 30% of Project Exploration participants. They also found that their youth-centered model was effective in encouraging positive youth development outcomes. You can read the full report, or listen to a podcast about the study at the National Conference on Science and Technology in Out-of-School Time presented by Project Exploration co-founder and director Gabrielle Lyon and REA Research Specialist Bernadette Chi. 

The Coalition website also has a list of tools available for program evaluation, as well as a list of independent evaluators from across the country. Looking for even more evidence of why evaluation is so important? Download this podcast from our conference in September, presented by Dr. Alan Friedman of The Museum Group. The podcast, called Three Reasons to be Eager to Do Evaluation: Your Funders, Your Organization and Your Students, presents compelling reasons why evaluation and assessment should be made a regular part of program design and implementation.

Podcasts from the National Conference on Science and Technology in Out of School Time Now Available!

Did you miss our conference in September? Were you unable to attend a particular session? Or do you want to share something you learned with your colleagues? Podcasts from many of the sessions, including the Keynote, plenary sessions, and breakout sessions are now available for FREE download on iTunes!

To access the podcasts, follow this link:  http://tiny.cc/a3zwr

The link will open iTunes. To download iTunes for free, go to http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/. 

Many thanks to our speakers, the staff of Swank AV at the Sheraton Universal Hotel, and the volunteers who assisted with recording!   

Conference Update: Keynote Presentation, Funding Plenary, and our Breakout Sessions!

For those of you not in LA with us, we just wrapped up our first full day of the 2010 National Conference on Science and Technology in Out of School Time! We started off the morning with an excellent Keynote Presentation from Dr. Pedro Noguera, who spoke eloquently and engagingly about the need for innovative education in STEM. After two rounds of breakout sessions and lunch, we heard from major funders of STEM programs, who spoke about what they look for in potential fundees and funding trends in the field. There are exciting collaborations and partnerships being made all around!

The folks at Project Exploration have been blogging all day over at http://www.projectexploration.org/blog/ and tweeting at #scienceafterschool. Lots of big updates over there, so take a look!

Not in LA? You can still follow the National Conference on Science and Technology in Out-of-School Time!

The 2010 National Conference on Science and Technology in Out of School Time starts today! We're kicking off the event with a pre-conference symposium focusing on Putting Youth at the Center of Pathways and Systems. Later tonight, an opening reception at the LA Zoo will feature Nick Dragotta of Howtoons, a comic series that incorporates STEM and inspires kids to build things. Most of our attendees will come to the conference tomorrow morning, when we'll hear from our Keynote Speaker Dr. Pedro Noguera.

If you're unable to make it to LA, we have a lot of ways for you to follow the conference from afar! On Twitter, you can follow the conference proceedings at the #scienceafterschool hashtag. Our co-host Project Exploration will be liveblogging many of the conference events and proceedings--check out their blog at http://www.projectexploration.org/blog/. We'll try and post here and on our Facebook page too!

Descriptions for conference sessions are now available!

We're getting really excited for the 2010 National Conference on Science and Technology in Out-of-School Time, coming up in just ten days! We're co-hosting the conference with Project Exploration and in partnership with Connect a Million Minds, and organizations from across the country will be coming to learn about and share their experiences in afterschool STEM education. Last week the session descriptions went LIVE on the conference website. We'll be having a total of 25 breakout sessions, plus two plenary sessions and a keynote address from Dr. Pedro Noguera, a leading urban sociologist interested in how social and economic conditions affect education.

We'll also have lots of opportunities for networking with funders, researchers, and providers, and a fun program showcase where you can learn more about programs from across the country. 

You can visit the official conference website here to learn more details about our speakers, presenters, and sessions. For now, I wanted to share a snapshot of the breakout sessions. Here are some of the titles and presenters:

How National Youth Organizations are Approaching STEM

Veronica Escobedo, Girls Inc.; Pam Garza, 4-H; Mary Grybeck, Boys and Girls Clubs of America; Sharon Junge, 4-H; Stephanie Lingwood, Girl Scouts of Western Washington; Kate Pickle, Girl Scouts of America

Pathways into Science – A Longitudinal Perspective

Robert Tai, University of Virginia

The Coalition for Science After School: Making High Quality Science as Integral to the
After School Experience as Snack and Basketball

Mike Radke, The Coalition for Science After School

Digital Youth Network: Using 21st Century Tools to Enhance Impact of Out-of-School Learning Experiences

Nichole Pinkard, DePaul University/Digital Youth Network

Supporting Exploration of Identity in Youth Programs

Diane Miller, St. Louis Science Center; Holly Hughes, Sam Noble Museum

Building Capacity for Science and Youth Development in OST: Findings from a Ten Year Alumni Study

Gabrielle Lyon, Project Exploration; Bernadette Chi, Lawrence Hall of Science

The Common Core Initiative and National Standards for STEM

Jason Zimba, Bennington College

What Research and Practice Say About the Impacts of Out of School Time STEM Experiences

Lynn Dierking, Oregon State University; Dale McCreedy, The Franklin Institute Science Museum

After School Staff Development – 4-H Tools of the Trade II…Inspiring Young Minds to be SET Ready for Life!

Sharon Junge and Sue Mangalallan, 4-H

Inquiry and Curriculum Through an Equity Lens

Maryann Stimmer, Educational Equity Center at AED; Heather Gibbons, St. Louis Science Center

There are still a few spots available if you would like to register online, or if you're in the LA area, you can register at the door. The conference will take place from September 23rd-24th, with a special pre-conference symposium on the 22nd, in Universal City (LA), CA. I'll see you there!