Partners In Time: Key Steps To Establishing An Effective Partnership Between The University And The K 12 Community

Today’s funding environment makes it imperative for institutions of higher education to actively solicit and maintain a positive ongoing relationship with the K12 community. Government and private dollars are often offered with the caveat that the universities engage local school districts in some part of the efforts. The K12 community, while under constant budget pressure itself, and therefore welcoming of additional resources, faces high stakes testing and accountability demands, teacher shortages and a myriad of other issues that might make starting, or maintaining, a relationship with the university less attractive. The key to establishing a symbiotic, long term relationship with interaction at all levels is forming programs that benefit both constituencies in a way that is not perceived to add to current workload. From the university’s standpoint, obtaining the funding to complete its primary task, usually research, is the key driver. In the K12 community, it is incorporating new programs and ideas in a manner sensitive to the district’s current climate and workload. The College of Engineering (COE) at North Carolina State University (NCSU) has, over the past five years, developed such a relationship with the local Wake County Public School System (WCPSS). WCPSS is the 25th largest school system in the country, with 127 schools and over 108,000 students. Engineering faculty and staff are actively involved in all grade levels and have developed a trusting, productive working relationship with WCPSS central office personnel. The result of this relationship is the university has a willing partner when seeking funding for research and growth opportunities, and the school system has a responsible collaborator on its initiatives. The end result is that this partnership is a winning proposition for the full K16 community. The Importance of the University-K12 Partnership The need to establish a symbiotic relationship between these two entities is apparent. In today’s economy, funding agencies are especially concerned with the ‘bang for the buck’ for their investment dollars. Increasing the spectrum of the population benefiting from this investment makes both economic and public relations sense. Science, technical and engineering pipelines at universities are under constant recruiting pressure, challenging enough for the general population but especially so for under-represented groups and women in these fields of study. In addition, universities have a vested interest in the rigor of the K12 curriculum so that incoming freshmen are well prepared for the demands of collegiate academics. P ge 981.1 Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright @ 2004, American Society for Engineering Education Universities and K12 institutions share the burden of adequate preparation for students who may choose technical careers. Indeed, universities “have a crucial role to play in the important strides being made to transform K12 science and math education.” 1 Weaknesses in the preparation of K12 students in science and mathematics are well recognized. The academic performance of U.S. students in mathematics and science slips from near the top of the list of 48 countries at the elementary level to near the bottom during the high school years (National Center for Education Statistics, 1999a) Since learning of science and mathematics tends to be hierarchical, the ability of students to take advanced programs in these subjects (as in AP or IB high school classes or a post-secondary engineering program) is highly dependent on the earlier years of schooling. 2 This results in constraint of the pool of qualified high school graduates who can successfully complete the rigorous course of study for a science or engineering profession. This academic underachievement will only improve with sustained and intensive effort—and standards and testing movements have put efforts to increase achievement in the spotlight. But testing alone will not achieve the goal. Technical professional organizations recommend “a reexamination and strengthening of the U.S. public education system through a focus on higher academic standards.” 3 Overall, it is fair to say that higher academic achievement for more students is critical to enlarging the pool from which universities can draw. 4 At the local level, the COE at North Carolina State University has the same concern. Recruitment and retention of a qualified, diverse student population are ongoing focus areas. For example, enrollment of women in State’s engineering program has dropped from a high of 23% in 1997 to a low of 16% in 2003. Minority representation is equally challenging. In the fall of 2003, African-American students comprised 7%, Hispanic students 2.5% and Native American students less than 1% of the total students enrolled in the COE (NCSU Institutional Planning and Analysis, 2004). And yet, NC State College of Engineering is among the top ten universities in enrollment of these underrepresented groups. From a preparation standpoint, students themselves (men and women) report having difficulty adjusting to the academic rigor of the coursework, citing particular struggles with the expectations for computer literacy and ability. 5 At the same time, the Wake County Public School System has taken unprecedented steps toward high achievement for all by setting an ambitious system wide goal of 95% of students in grades 3-12 performing at or above grade level in reading, math and science by the year 2008. An achievement gap between white students and African-American, Hispanic and low-income students persists. A state mandated testing and accountability program augments the demands of federal No Child Left Behind legislation. The culmination of these shared concerns is the need for a real, dynamic and symbiotic partnership in which resources are utilized and leveraged to the benefit of the entire K16 community. NCSU College of Engineering and Wake County Schools: A Partnership Grows The deep and mutually beneficial partnership now enjoyed by NCSU COE and WCPSS began very simply. Although the college had previously worked with individual schools on occasion, providing technical expertise or outreach services, the relationship was largely dependent on the individual faculty members involved. Then two coinciding events occurred that were the impetus for the current partnership. First, the COE created a position of Director of Outreach and Women in Engineering (WIE). Then, this director was named one of the principal investigators on a new kind of National Science Foundation grant, the GK12 (Graduate Fellows P ge 981.2 Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright @ 2004, American Society for Engineering Education in K12 Education). This program’s overall intent was to build on and strengthen the bond between universities and the K12 community. NCSU’s specific goals for its program were as follows: • To integrate science, technology and engineering topics with math, reading and writing in the K12 classroom • To encourage underrepresented groups in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) through role models and particular teaching techniques • To teach STEM content to diverse populations, including hearing-impaired students, students for whom English is a second language, students identified as being low income, and others • To adapt STEM content to appeal to different learning styles To facilitate the program’s implementation, the director hired a longtime collaborator, herself a mechanical engineer, as the program manager. Both women are parents of school-aged children, and were already well-established volunteers at their children’s respective schools. As engineers, their ease with math and science concepts and the integration of those two subjects into other core academic subjects was appreciated and well utilized by much of the school’s staff. In addition, both had taken on additional volunteer responsibilities working with school system central office personnel and the school board, participating in advisory councils, board committees and task forces. Therefore, when the NSF award was made, the relationships that had developed between the PI and program manager and school administrators, instructional resource teachers and classroom teachers was instrumental in the development and execution of the grant’s implementation plan. Mutual trust and understanding was a given, and their previous work helping teachers to implement the North Carolina Standard Course of Study (NCSCOS) in science and math helped greatly to facilitate effective use of both the university students’ and the classroom teachers’ time and expertise. The grant’s model is straightforward: graduate and undergraduate engineering students are paired with elementary or middle school classroom teachers to co-develop and deliver inquiry based lesson plans in science and math, or through integration of those subjects into a language arts or social studies unit. Fellows were expected to spend approximately 10 hours per week at the school, plus an additional five hours planning, attending meetings and documenting their work. Over the four years of the grant, 21 fellows worked in approximately 60 classrooms, impacting over 2000 children and over 75 teachers in grades K-8. From the beginning, the project directors were sensitive to the need to promote technical ability and enjoyment through the hiring of a diverse group of students. The breakdown of the fellows’ gender/ethnicity follows. White Female White Male Black Female Black Male Hispanic Female Hispanic Male