Design-Based Science for STEM Student Recruitment and Teacher Professional Development
Allison Felix, Joel Z. Bandstra, William H.J. Strosnider
Abstract
We have developed a design-based project for outreach efforts to recruit students to STEM fields as well as science teacher professional development. The project challenged high school students in a one-week high school summer outreach academy and middle and high-school teachers in a two-week summer science institute to design and construct a system to remediate water impacted by acid mine drainage, a ubiquitous and locally-relevant issue, and involved them in field experiences with real remediation systems. The design and construction of the remediation systems also involved learning and application of science concepts from chemistry to environmental science, the engineering design process, mathematical problem solving, and the use of technology for data acquisition and analysis. In addition, the project involved students and teachers in 21 century thinking skills and the characteristics of scientific and technological literacy as they collected data, designed systems and subsystems, utilized data-driven decision making, solved problems, and communicated their results to their peers.