Chemical Education Today
Association Reports: ACS An Overview of the Education Division by Sylvia A. Ware The ACS Education Division is responsible for the majority of the ACS education services administered by the professional staff in Washington. The Education Division is not to be confused with the member Division of Chemical Education Inc. (CHED), which operates its own comprehensive set of programs and activities, nor the Society Committee on Education (SOCED), which is the cognizant governance committee responsible for ACS education policies and directions. Education Division programs support the needs of many instructional levels—from pre-school through the continuing education of the mid-career chemist. There are services for elementary, middle school, and high school educators and students, as well as for undergraduates in twoand four-year programs, and technicians in the chemical process industries. Broadly speaking, there are three main categories of programs: materials development, professional development, and programs for students. This particular article focuses on materials development only, with our other programs to be discussed subsequently. The Education Division’s involvement in materials development began in the early 1980’s with the initiation of the NSF-funded, Chemistry in the Community (ChemCom) project. ChemCom was initially designed as a one-year course for those high school students who do not anticipate majoring in chemistry at university. It is now considered by many as an introductory course in chemistry for citizenship—a course appropriate for all students. In ChemCom, chemistry is introduced within the context of societal issues involving chemistry on a “need-to-know” basis, allowing students to develop the science knowledge they need to become informed citizens, participating in societal decision-making involving chemistry. The third edition of ChemCom will be published by the Kendall/Hunt in early 1997. The success of ChemCom, which was initially published in 1988, led to the development of a one-semester chemistry course for non-science majors, Chemistry in Context (CiC). CiC is also organized around societal issues involving chemistry, with the intent of helping students become better decision-makers on issues in the personal and political arena. The depth of exploration of both the chemistry and the societal context framing the course is more sophisticated in CiC than ChemCom. However, both have the same intent, to provide students with the background they need to use chemistry as citizens. The second edition of CiC will be published by the end of 1996. The ACS Education Division has also developed a three-year integrated science and technology program for 6th-, 7th-, and 8th-grade students entitled FACETS (Foundations And Challenges to Encourage Technologybased Science). Again the organization of content is thematic, although here the themes are topics of more personal interest to middle-school students—their bodies, their schools, their recreational activities. Rather than science for citizenship with its political connotations, this is science for consumers. Like ChemCom, the NSFfunded, FACETS is published by Kendall/Hunt. At present, ACS is working on a two-year high school program for students who are not university-bound, but are going directly into the technical workforce. SciTeKS (Science and Technology Knowledge and Skills) also
A238
teaches science and technology on a “need-to-know” basis, but here the “need-to-know” is driven by the “needto-perform” in the workplace. The organizing themes come from problems addressed in various industries, in soda-bottling, sewage treatment, plant propagation, petroleum exploration, polymers, etc. SciTeK will introduce students to a virtual workplace using multi-media simulations as well as written text. In each of these courses, the content selected, as well as the ways in which the content is organized, depend on the nature and interests of the students taking the course rather than on the “traditional” organization of science concepts. The organizing principle is always the end use of the knowledge by the students. In addition to these curriculum projects, the Education Division publishes three magazines: WonderScience for middle school students; ChemMatters for high school students; and in Chemistry for undergraduates. WonderScience is published eight times a year, jointly with the American Institute of Physics. While the focus in the past has been on hands-on, physical science activities only, we are planning to add more life and earth science topics, as well as more mathematics. A complete set of WonderScience will be published by the Delmar Publishing Company at the beginning of 1997. This set is correlated, activity by activity, with the National Science Education Content Standards. ChemMatters is published four times a year, and is edited by a high school teacher who is still in the classroom. The complete collection of ChemMatters issues is available on a CD-ROM, permitting full-text searching for topics covered. The emphasis in the magazine is on the myriad applications of chemistry. In Chemistry is the official magazine of the ACS Student Affiliates program for undergraduates majoring in the chemical sciences. It is, however, available by subscription to other students and faculty. Finally, for the beginning reader, in 1995 we developed Apples, Bubbles, and Crystals, a science ABC book full of poems and activities (available from McGraw Hill). The ABC book has been so successful that a second beginning reader is now under development. The illustrations are wonderful, the science is great fun and age-appropriate—we are still working hard on our verse writing! The view of chemistry promoted through all of these materials is broad. Chemistry is viewed not only as a physical science but also as a life science, an earth science, an environmental science, a materials science, a useful science and, of course, the central science. The materials are also congruent with the National Science Education Content Standards as they relate to chemistry, and with the AAAS Benchmarks. The Education Division is the smallest of the ACS staff divisions, with a staff of only 37 full-time employees. Therefore, much of our work is accomplished through the participation of the ACS membership, either as volunteers or on subcontract. We are particularly indebted to many of the members of DivCHED, who have been responsible for the excellent quality of many of our programs, including those described above. While this is the “other” Education Division, the relationship between the two divisions is always supportive, and frequently synergistic, as we work toward common goals. Sylvia A. Ware is Director of the Education Division, ACS, 1155 Sixteenth Street, NW, Washington, DC 20036;
[email protected].
Journal of Chemical Education • Vol. 73 No. 10 October 1996
