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Newsletter Volume 3 |
Spring 1999 |
Don Evans, Director of the Southwest Center for Educational Research and Development for Science, Math, Engineering, and Technology, ASU
It is more than just fortuity that there are many large and small grant programs within Arizona State University addressing the challenges of the national agenda to improve science, mathematics, engineering, and technology education. It is a sign of the interest within the faculty and the administration in helping to meet these challenges. But, in spite of large programs such as the Arizona Collaborative for Excellence in the Preparation of Teachers (ACEPT) grant, the Foundation Coalition grant, and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute grant as well as a host of smaller projects, the University has had no formal ways of bringing people together to unify these programs, i.e., to provide a University focus. But that is about to change.
The only current ASU center whose mission it is to address education in part of the targeted disciplines, the Center for Innovation in Engineering Education (CIEE), will be expanded in its mission to cover science, mathematics, and technology. As a part of this expansion the existing CIEE would be renamed and restructured to more accurately reflect this expanded mission. At this point the name The Southwest Center for Educational Research and Development in Science, Math, Engineering and Technology has been proposed. Don Evans, the director of CIEE, would continue as the director of the renamed and expanded center. This concept has been endorsed by the deans of the three colleges that will be involved: the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences (CEAS), the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS), and the College of Education (CoE).
Compared to the many similar centers at other institutions, the one being built here is somewhat unique in the inclusiveness of its scope. Essentially all other existing centers focus on just science and/or mathematics education, and most of these focus on only the K-12 education system in these fields. The ASU center will address both a much larger set of disciplines important to the technological advancement of the U.S. and an expanded educational system focus that includes not just K-12 education, but post-secondary and graduate education as well. In view of existing research on the advantages of integrating the subject disciplines and, as highlighted in the NSF "Shaping the Future" report, the national need to expand reform to post-secondary and graduate education, the center should be able to effectively work at the heart of the problems.
In a meeting of interested faculty held early last fall, a committee of faculty was charged to define the mission and vision of the converted Center and to determine its structure. The committee consisted of Steve Reynolds (Geology), Marilyn Carlson (Mathematics), Anton Lawson (Biology), Don Evans (Engineering), Dale Baker (Education), Sue Wyckoff (Physics), and Steve Rissing (Biology). Under the structure proposed by this committee, the Center director will report to an Administrative Board that will deal with procedural issues involving resources and policies. This Administrative Board will be made up of appointees of the deans from each of the three colleges involved currently three associate deans, one from each of the involved colleges, are functioning as the Administrative Board. In addition, an External Advisory Board consisting of appropriate people from outside the University, will be used to help direct the focus of the Center. To provide more of the day-to-day guidance than either the Administrative Board or the External Advisory Board can provide, a Faculty Advisory Board will be created by appointments made by the members of the Administrative Board. This Faculty Advisory Board will consist of faculty-level members appointed in the following way: two members from CoE; two members each from the natural sciences and mathematics, both in CLAS; two members from CEAS; one member representing technology; one member representing the community colleges; one member representing the K-12 educational system; and two at-large members. Members of the Faculty Advisory Board would serve 2-year terms,with staggered replacement by discipline.
The physical location of the newly converted center has not been defined as yet. In the interim, the Center will work from its already crowded location in ECG 205.
The committee charged with defining the Center has created a vision of the Center being a national leader in:
The mission of the Center is to bring together individuals, programs and organizations interested in improving K-20 science, mathematics, engineering, and technology education through research, development, and assessment of new educational theories, curricula, courses, delivery systems, technologies, infrastructures, and administrative polices. The center will encourage and support wide-scale sharing and implementation of effective approaches to producing a more scientifically and technologically literate populace and more capable science, mathematics, engineering, and technology majors.
It is hoped that this newly expanded center can get off to a quick and effective start early in the spring semester. Another committee, charged at the general meeting and chaired by Jim Middleton (CoE), has already lined up visits to the ASU main campus by several leaders of similar Centers at other Universities for the purposes of exploring how their centers operate. We invite your participation in these exchanges and hope that you will help us define what a center could do for you.
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