EDUCATION
NSF Funds Major Precollege Science Education Reform Program New program gets $8.6 million to support a variety of projects that seek to bring dramatic changes to science curricula, education Ward Worthy, C&EN Chicago
It is the largest single financial effort in precollege science education reform since the post-Sputnik era of the late 1950s. That's how Luther S. Williams, the N a t i o n a l Science Foundation's assistant director for education and human resources, describes $8.6 million in NSF grants to fund a new program that may drastically change the way science is taught. The U.S. Department of Education already has furnished $1.5 million in grants to pilot the program at state and local levels. Curricula for more than a million science students in five states will be affected by the "scope, sequence, and coordination" (SSC) program. If the pilot projects are successful, they could "transform middle level and high school classes nationwide," NSF says. "Students may have completely new science class schedules, with time spent in science courses increased as much as 50%." Six NSF grants, all three-year awards ranging from $1.3 million and $1.5 million, will go to the National Science Teachers Association; the California Department of Education; Baylor College of Medicine, Waco, Tex.; the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras; the University of Iowa, Iowa City; and the University of North Carolina at Wilmington/ East Carolina University, Greenville. Department of Education grants, all two-year awards in the $500,000 to $600,000 range, will go to NSTA, the
state of California, and Baylor College of Medicine. Williams explains that the model developed for the program replaces the traditional method of teaching science—one subject per year—with a method in which each science is taught each year throughout the middle and high school years, from grades seven through 12. In the middle school years, the approach will be "descriptive and concrete." High school course work will stress basic measurements and a semiempirical approach in grades nine and 10, then progress to more quantitative, abstract, and theoretical studies in grades 11 and 12. Furthermore, science would be obligatory, not elective, for all six years. The SSC program grew out of "Essential Changes in the Scope, Sequence, and Coordination of Secondary School Science," a 1989 article by Bill G. Aldridge, executive director of the National Science Teachers Association (C&EN, Sept. 11, 1989, page 7). NSTA will play a major role as coordinator and, through a subcontractor, provide for independent evaluation and documentation of the parts of the program. "In the U.S., we have something called the 'layer-cake' curriculum," Aldridge says. That is, students typically take biology in the 10th grade, chemistry in the 11th, and physics in the 12th. Thus, a student who wants to study physics has no opportunity to do so until the senior year. In fact, although some 80% of high school students take biology in the 10th grade, only about 21% of the students persist through chemistry and physics—so many have no exposure to those subjects at all. There's fairly solid evidence that one can't correctly identify all the capable young people at an early age, Aldridge says. The effect of the cur-
Williams: largest reform since 1950s rent system, he adds, is to move children at an early age into "tracks" that give opportunity to some but prevent it for others. "What has happened is that [the current approach] has systematically excluded a number of important groups in our society from both science literacy and the ability to pursue careers in science and technology and engineering." The U.S. is the only industrialized nation using the "layer-cake" approach, Aldridge says, noting that the essentials of the curriculum haven't been revised since 1893. In contrast, he adds, in every other industrialized nation, almost all children study each major field of science for several years, not just one. In the SSC approach, earth/space science, biology, chemistry, and physics would all be taught every year in middle and high school. Course content would be closely coordinated from one subject to another, with the aim of providing "a more integrated high school science education," NSF says. For example, October 15, 1990 C&EN
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Education concepts of chemistry and biology might be integrated into a more general multidisciplinary module on aquatic ecosystems. As a consequence of the new system, science textbooks would need to be completely revamped and science teachers retrained. Says Thomas Sachse, California Department of Education's manager of science, mathematics, and environmental education, "We're also working with publishers in a very direct way on developing new types of instruction materials." The California effort is a major one, with the state Department of Education coordinating science education reform in 214 middle and high schools. Sachse notes that the state program includes both preservice and in-service professional development opportunities for teachers, allowing them to get some early experience with the reorganization pattern. The program is also promoting the formation of partnerships between secondary schools and universities. "Large numbers of university faculty are willing to work with us," Sachse says. "People from academic faculties in chemistry, physics, earth science, and biology are coming forward and saying, 'We'd like to see our students have this kind of program and we're willing to contribute our expertise to help students and teachers through the difficult transition process.' " Sachse points out that implementation of the new program will require policy changes at the state level—changing university entrance requirements, for example. His office is also "working with the teacher credentialing group to allow for more integrated and coordinated types of teacher credentials" as well as with science supervisors and district administrators. "There's a fertile ground for this sort of reform to occur," he observes. The Baylor College of Medicine project, which will include resources from Rice University and the University of Houston, will provide support for schools in Houston and nearby Conroe, Tex. That center will concentrate on program development, field testing, and demonstration of various grade-level models, NSF notes. In fact, the program is 28
October 15, 1990 C&EN
Aldridge (left), Crow, and Sachse will direct various aspects of program already under way in the seventh grade in four Houston-area schools, according to Baylor SSC project director Linda W. Crow. And, she says, "It works. I get to go out to schools every week and really see it happening. I see students doing a lot of science and interested in a lot of science. I see a whole range of different types of students." (The Houston project includes two "triethnic" schools and a majority Hispanic school.) Teachers are also "happy about what they're doing," Crow adds. One feature of the seventh-grade program is that it is seven hours per week rather than five—sort of. "We have increased the number of hours in science by coordinating with the reading time, adding some time for science without taking from other subject areas," Crow explains. The University of Puerto Rico will concentrate on integrating mathematics with sciences in grades seven to nine. Materials developed at other centers will be translated into Spanish for use in schools on the island and also on the mainland. The University of Iowa, working with four school districts in that state, will pursue a different approach, developing instructional materials that put greater emphasis on the relationship of science to problems of technology and society. UNC Wilmington and East Caroli-
na University will work with six centers of the North Carolina Mathematics and Science Education Network to provide teachers with resources and materials to teach all four science disciplines, beginning with the seventh grade. Large though the SSC program may be, it's only one of several major science education reform programs under way. NSF's Williams notes, for example, that there will be a deliberate attempt to link it with another large effort, the American Association for the Advancement of Science's "Project 2061" (C&EN, March 13, 1989, page 22). That program has substantial private as well as NSF support. Also, the American Chemical Society has received an NSF grant to develop a new middle school chemistry curriculum. According to Ann Benbow, ACS's pre-high school science coordinator, the project is named FACETS (for "Foundations and Challenges to Encourage Technology-based Science"). It will be "an integrated science-technology sort of thing," Benbow says, intended as a precursor to ACS's ChemCom, a 10th-grade chemistry curriculum that also emphasizes the impact of chemistry on society. "We will look at what NSTA has to say," she adds, "but that doesn't mean we'll take the NSTA guidelines as gospel." D
