For the past two months, I have been working very hard to put together a meeting here in Arlington, VA. At the National Science Foundation, I work with Harriet Taylor, program director in the Computer and Information Science Engineering Directorate. We work on a program called CPATH, (Pathways to Revitalize Undergraduate Computer Education). Connected to that is a program called Research Experience for Teachers (RET). I was given the task of planning, organizing, and leading a meeting of CPATH RET teachers.
Last week it all culminated in a meeting that brought 35 K-12 teachers together in Arlington, VA for two and a half days. They traveled from 15 different states and grades taught ranged from grade school through high school. As a part of the RET experience, they had all spent a summer working with a professor and a team of graduate students at a university or college working on some sort of research in computer science. They then brought what they had learned back to their classrooms and tried to infuse computational thinking into their curriculum. Our meeting brought them altogether where they could share what they had done.
One of the big jobs I had was to create a booklet that highlighted each of their projects. I also created a poster of each project for the poster session at NSF where they could share their experiences with members of the NSF directorates.
All in all, everything went very well. The food was good, keynote speaker were great, break out sessions appeared informative. Feed back from the teachers was very complimentary. I made many new contacts and some new friends. I learned a great deal from the experience of organizing the meeting and creating the booklet and posters. My confidence in my ability to carryout such a big endeavor is now strong. Everyday that I am here, I am doing something new and stretching outside of my comfort zone. I am over the halfway point of my Fellowship. I cannot explain what a wonderful opportunity it has been for me. I hope you are enjoying reading about some of my adventures.
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| 2011 CPATH RET teachers |
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| Poster Session at NSF |
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| Talking to participants about the day's activities. |
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| Can you see how captivated my audience is? :-) |
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| I am doing a card trick that demonstrates computational thinking. |
1 comment:
We are enjoying reading about your adventures. And we're proud of you and your example of always stretching yourself.
I'm sure Sam would love your card trick. :0)
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