Northeast Noyce Professional Learning Network

The project aims to serve the national need of supporting the growth and development of highly effective K-12 STEM teachers in high-need school districts. Effective STEM teachers inspire and engage students, provide them with the skills and knowledge needed to participate in the STEM workforce, and ultimately help them achieve their full potential. It is particularly critical to build the capacity of STEM teachers to foster the frequently untapped talent of students in high-need schools, where many students from historically marginalized populations attend. To address this need, the project will establish a regional professional learning network in the Northeast United States. The network will increase opportunities for early career STEM teachers to connect and collaborate with STEM colleagues from across the region, including experienced master teachers. The network will complement STEM teacher development efforts at individual universities and school districts with professional learning activities to further promote the retention and success of early career STEM teachers in high-need districts. This project is a partnership between three institutions of higher education with previously successful Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship projects: the University of Rochester (NY), the University of Massachusetts at Boston (MA), and Saint Joseph’s University (PA). Project goals include: a) connecting, leveraging, and further developing the knowledge and expertise of master teachers to benefit early-career STEM teachers; b) providing high-quality professional learning experiences for over 600 prospective and practicing teachers that includes two regional STEM teaching conferences, 22 professional learning communities, 22 video clubs, 352 hours of coaching for early career STEM teachers, and nine local professional learning institutes; and c) connecting over 80 Northeast institutions of higher education offering STEM teaching programs to collectively create the Northeast Noyce Professional Learning Network. Among other things, this network will provide opportunities for STEM teacher education leaders to share knowledge and understandings that support continuous improvement of STEM teacher education programs. The project will advance understandings of how teachers access networks to collaborate, connect, and share through a robust program evaluation plan. The project benefits society by translating knowledge into solutions as teachers learn about and implement evidence-based practices in STEM education. This conference project is supported through the Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program (Noyce), which aims to support talented STEM undergraduate majors and professionals to become effective K-12 STEM teachers and experienced, exemplary K-12 teachers to become STEM master teachers in high-need school districts. It also supports research on the effectiveness and retention of K-12 STEM teachers in high-need school districts. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.