USING COMMUNITY ASSETS TO PROVIDE MEANINGFUL CONTEXT IN SECONDARY EARTH AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE CLASSES

BELS in NH or Building Equity Leaders for STEM in NH is a five-year Master Teacher fellowship program to develop teacher leaders in equity and STEM instruction. BELS comprises three strands: teacher leadership, equity, and enriched STEM content and pedagogies. These strands are woven together to create a coordinated, comprehensive professional development program for middle and high school teachers to positively impact STEM instruction at the Fellows’ school and across the state. This model has been collaboratively designed by UNH faculty, 3 school district partners, and NHSTA and NHTM representatives. Throughout all the PD activities STEM content is adapted to the needs and subject areas of the Fellows. This year the program has focused on incorporating community assets into instruction to situate learning in a relevant and meaningful context and actively engage students in STEM learning. In this presentation we will share several examples of earth and environmental topics that Fellows’ designed as community responsive lessons for their middle and high school students. BELS in NH (NSF #1950183) is funded by the National Science Foundation’s Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program (https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2021/nsf21578/nsf21578.htm). The NSF Noyce program provides funding to institutions of higher education to increase the number of K-12 teachers with strong STEM content knowledge who teach in high-need school districts.