NSF Award
1923552
The International Technology and Engineering Educators Association (ITEEA) proposes a project--Exploring Computation Integrated into Technology and Engineering (ExCITE)--to prepare high school technology and engineering (T&E) teachers to teach computer science (CS) and computational thinking (CT) in their classrooms. The project will leverage the NSF-funded Beauty and Joy of Computing (BJC), an Advanced Placement CS Principles course, enhancing it with real-world, hands-on problem-solving challenges to increase student engagement and better suit the design-based pedagogy employed by T&E and many Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) teachers. It will design and implement a professional development (PD) program that prepares and supports T&E teachers in teaching this enhanced course. The course, BJC-T&E, will be offered as part of the ITEEA's flagship Engineering by Design (EbD) national curriculum, which will significantly broaden participation in CS and CT for a large cohort of students (and their teachers) and expand access to BJC-T&E to diverse populations nationwide.<br/><br/>ExCITE will employ a Research Practitioner Partnership (RPP) that includes CS faculty from North Carolina State University and Boston College, researchers and T&E curriculum experts from Hofstra University's Center for STEM Research, and state education departments and local school districts in Maryland and Virginia. The RPP framework ensures that all stakeholders have been fully engaged in the development and implementation of the PD and research and evaluation program. Through a full spectrum of PD workshops with follow-on support, ExCITE will prepare 190 T&E educators from geographically, socioeconomically, racially, and ethnically diverse regions to effectively integrate CS and CT into high school T&E curricula. ExCITE's RPP will use a Design-Based Implementation Research model, initially investigating two research questions: (RQ1) How can a PD program be designed and optimized to support high school T&E teachers in learning and effectively teaching BJC-T&E? and (RQ2) To what extent and under what conditions does the integration of CS skills into T&E using design-based real-world problems broaden participation of districts, teachers, and students, particularly those who do not normally adopt, teach or enroll in CS courses? The project will also include an evaluation that will document and assess the organization and functioning of the RPP, the PD implementation, revisions to the PD model, classroom testing, and dissemination of outcomes and research results.<br/><br/>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.
