HR: 1340h
AN: ED23B-1278    [Abstracts]
TI: High school students as science researchers: Opportunities and challenges
AU: * Smith, W R
EM: willsmith2@aol.com
AF: Bristol High School, 1801 Wilson Ave., Bristol, PA 19007, United States
AU: Grannas, A M
EM: amanda.grannas@villanova.edu
AF: Villanova University, Department of Chemistry 800 Lancaster Ave., Villanova, PA 19085, United States
AB: Today's K-12 students will be the scientists and engineers who bring currently emerging technologies to fruition. Existing research endeavors will be continued and expanded upon in the future only if these students are adequately prepared. High school-university collaborations provide an effective means of recruiting and training the next generation of scientists and engineers. Here, we describe our successful high school-university collaboration in the context of other models. We have developed an authentic inquiry-oriented environmental chemistry research program involving high school students as researchers. The impetus behind the development of this project was twofold. First, participation in authentic research may give some of our students the experience and drive to enter technical studies after high school. One specific goal was to develop a program to recruit underrepresented minorities into university STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) programs. Second, inquiry-oriented lessons have been shown to be highly effective in developing scientific literacy among the general population of students. This collaboration involves the use of local resources and equipment available to most high schools and could serve as a model for developing high school- university partnerships.
DE: 0400 BIOGEOSCIENCES
DE: 0458 Limnology (1845, 4239, 4942)
DE: 0800 EDUCATION
DE: 0805 Elementary and secondary education
DE: 1000 GEOCHEMISTRY
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting