Middle school students, teachers and graduate fellows are beginning to reap dividends from a partnership between UNM, Belen and Socorro Consolidated School Districts, Sevilleta Long-Term Ecological Research Program and Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge, funded for three years with a $1.6 million grant from the National Science Foundation.
Photo: UNM graduate student Anthony Salem explores materials behavior with liquid nitrogen alongside students at Belen Middle School as part of the National Science Foundation’s GK-12 Program called Ecohydrogeology in the Middle Rio Grande Environment or E-MRGE.
The program, titled E-MRGE or Ecohydrogeology in the Middle Rio Grande Environment, rotates graduate fellows between school systems and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife outreach program. The E-MRGE fellows work with middle school teachers to demonstrate and promote the teaching and learning of science.
Led by principal investigator and Biology Professor Scott Collins and co-investigator Laura Crossey, professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences, program goals include demonstrating key scientific concepts, connecting middle school learning to the habits and skills required for future study in science disciplines, providing science professional role models, enhancing teachers’ content knowledge and understanding of principles of science, and assisting in science instruction.
The active learning projects are also designed to help teachers meet New Mexico science standards. Teachers receive support and university credit through summer courses offered by UNM’s Albuquerque Teachers Institute.
“We are learning about global climate change and human impacts on ecosystems,” said Juliana Medeiros, a Ph.D. candidate in Biology. “I was really shocked when one student told me that he couldn’t sleep the night I showed them the movie ‘An Inconvenient Truth.’ The important part, I feel, is that we are also working on solutions to these issues.
“Many of my students have told me that I am their favorite teacher and that they really enjoy the lessons. I think that most of them have never been asked to develop their own scientific questions and experiments, they have never been given the opportunity to explore their own creative and imaginative ideas about the world around them.”
Anthony Salem, a graduate fellow from earth and planetary sciences, feels the mid-school students are benefiting from the experience.
“I think, for the most part, the students enjoy having us come in,” Salem said. “We represent the outside world to them, and it’s a break from their daily routine. I feel we’re also making an impact. We’ve had students ask us about college and careers, and we’ve had students ask us great questions about various areas of science.
“As for the students, I think what we’ve had to show them has made them question some of their preconceptions and has also broadened some of their horizons.”
Media Contact: Steve Carr, (505) 277-1821; e-mail: scarr@unm.edu