DE PERE — In a press release, St. Norbert College announced The National Science Foundation has awarded the college a one-year $118,000 capacity-building grant for a project entitled, “Creating a Minor in Education as a Pathway for Science, Math or Computer Science Majors to Obtain Teaching Licensure.”
St. Norbert, in partnership with Northeast Wisconsin Technical College (NWTC) and the Green Bay Area Public School District, will collaborate to increase the number of highly qualified, diverse STEM-committed students choosing and completing STEM education programs at St. Norbert.
“This is an extremely timely and important collaboration between the STEM disciplines and teacher education at St. Norbert, and between SNC and NWTC,” said David Bailey, divisional dean of natural sciences and professor of biology at St. Norbert.
The goal of the project is to develop a strong external partnership with NWTC that leads to transfer students choosing STEM education at St. Norbert as well as strengthening existing urban community partnerships with K-12 schools and developing additional rural and suburban K-12 school partnerships.
St. Norbert will create a STEM teaching minor for students who decide to pursue teaching later in their college careers, including students who are recruited into STEM teaching from a STEM major, and students who transfer from NWTC's Laboratory Science Technology program while still graduating in four years. The minor will begin with a foundational course that will focus on community-engaged teaching, including field experience in a Green Bay area public school.
The grant is part of the National Science Foundation Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program, which seeks to encourage talented science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) majors and professionals to become K-12 mathematics and science (including engineering and computer science) teachers.
