EMPOWERING STEM GRADUATE STUDENTS AS EDUCATORS: ENHANCING EARTH SCIENCE EDUCATION THROUGH UNCONVENTIONAL LEARNING EXPERIENCES IN 6-12 CLASSROOMS

The Williamson Fellowship at the University of Utah provides a year-long stipend to graduate students to assist with science education in local grade 6-12 classrooms. Williamson Fellows spend a full school day once a week at a local Title 1 school and support the Earth Science teacher with lesson development and implementation, hands-on experiments, and leading field trips. Graduate students are encouraged to use their academic connections to create unique, one-of-a-kind field trips and provide a deep understanding of the presented material and concepts. The Williamson Fellowship helps address the STEM teacher shortage and fosters a culture of lifelong learning, mentors, and role models for the 6-12 students. Graduate students develop essential communication and leadership skills, boosting their STEM literacy and communication skills and workforce readiness. Furthermore, this collaboration between public schools strengthens university-community partnerships.

Here, we highlight the positive experiences of both the participating fellows as well as the students and teachers. We discuss the creation and implementation of the local Salt Lake City field trips as well as the conception and formation of interactive lessons and lectures. We will focus on the geology units for the respective classes, although we will also examine how our expertise in general earth science assisted the cooperating teachers. We will summarize these outcomes by describing our final deliverable for the fellowship: a portable Science Escape Room that adapts to different lesson plans.