SECONDARY SCHOOL FIELD RESEARCH PROGRAM: A MODEL FOR RAISING STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT

A central goal of science education is to engage students in active learning so that they can experience first hand the challenges and rewards of carrying out basic and applied research. Experiential learning can be difficult to implement at the high school level because of limited resources and limited research training of educators. In 2006 we launched the Secondary School Field Research Program (SSFRP), which provides field research experience for inner city high school students and their teachers. The schools involved serve urban minority at-risk youth. The SSFRP is a model of how limitations of urban science education can be overcome through collaboration between research scientists at a major university and public high school teachers. The program is designed to raise student academic achievement, build self-confidence, empower students to envision possibilities for their future and prepare students to succeed in college. Using Piermont Marsh, one of 4 reference marshes in the Hudson River National Estuarine Resource Reserve System, as our outdoor laboratory, we investigate the factors that bear upon our central research question: Is it possible to have a sustained, biologically healthy estuarine system in the midst of a highly populated industrial area? We have sought to address this question in a scientifically rigorous way by engaging students and their teachers, while maximizing funds through efficient, well-planned protocols. Science teachers and their students have collected physical and hydrographic data, monitored succession plots, analyzed samples for nutrients, and performed a 5-year baseline census of nekton and invertebrates. All sample collections and data analysis are performed by teachers and students working under the supervision of scientists from Columbia and Loyola Universities. Our student participants so far have been more than 65% female, 90% African- or Latin-American, and approximately 90% from low income families. To date, 100% of our graduates have gone on to college. Approximately half are majoring in science or engineering, and approximately half of those are oriented toward careers in environmental or marine science.