MAINE: EPSCoR Track-2 Project creates Community Collective
INSPIRES, an NSF EPSCoR RII Track-2 grant that focuses on gathering, analyzing, and utilizing data collected from across the Northern Forest Region, has partnered with the Maine Center for Research in STEM Education (RiSE Center), an interdisciplinary research center at the University of Maine. The RiSE Center provides support for twenty-two faculty members conducting educational research within their different STEM disciplines (e.g., chemistry, physics, mathematics, engineering) through various programs and projects. INSPIRES and RiSE have provided a rare opportunity — especially in a science-based research project—for middle and high school teachers from across Maine and Vermont to act as researchers.
“I cannot stress how much of an impact that had on the teachers. Because they got to do it and when the sensor comes online—they helped to set that up—their students can potentially use the data collected from the sensor. The teachers got to see the fieldwork and the high-tech coolness all at once,” Sara Lindsay (Assistant Director of the RiSE Center and UMaine Associate Professor of Marine Science) stated.
INSPIRES and RiSE also incorporate a theoretical framework called Quantitative Reasoning in Context (QRC) to talk about data, which include things that are fundamental to the research process (e.g., data literacy skills, ability to graph data and interpret graphs of data, thinking about research questions and the ability to respond to research questions using claims supported with data).