Piloting a New Curriculum: A View from the Trenches

Teachers who implement a new curriculum provide invaluable feedback to content development teams. Without this feedback, possible improvements to the material would not be known and consequently, not made. Teachers are in the trenches experiencing the various pains of implementing new educational programs. They see firsthand the impact on the students and, thus, recognize the positives, negatives, and potential improvements to the course design. This paper presents the experience of high school teachers implementing new curricula – one based on the science of cyberspace called Cyber Science, and the other is a redesign of physics. Both courses were developed by Louisiana Tech University in collaboration with the Cyber Innovation Center (CIC), a 501c3 not-for-profit corporation. Physics and Cyber Science were originally piloted regionally in 2010 and 2011, respectively, and then, expanded to a larger region including schools in the states Louisiana, Texas, and Arkansas in 2011 and 2012, respectively. Established through the CIC is the National Integrated Cyber Research Center (NICERC). NICERC’s Cyber Science and Physics courses utilize many technologies and projects to drive to the fundamental content. Cyber Science, specifically, integrates various disciplines (engineering, computer science, and liberal arts) to convey the ideas of cyber. NICERC’s Physics utilizes a microcontroller platform to convey physics concepts. With such unique curricula, teachers, undergo training through immersive, week-long professional development summer workshops to prepare for the upcoming year. This paper provides unique perspectives in implementing new curricula through the narrative of high school teachers. Descriptions of the teachers’ experiences include the professional development workshop, the implementation of the content, as well as student response to the material. Recording and reviewing such a view from the trenches is essential in future iterations of development and design for not only these courses but others as well.