CWRU's Center for Science and Mathematics Education will share responsibility with other local universities to retool sixth through 12th-grade teachers from the Cleveland Municipal School District with new math and science strategies for the classroom.

photo by Susan Griffith Jim Bader, director of the University's Center for Science and Mathematics Education, developed CWRU's role in the partnership to help improve math and science education in Cleveland schools.

The National Science Foundation has awarded the Cleveland Mathematics and Science Partnership-comprised of CMSD, CWRU, John Carroll University, Cleveland State University and the Education Development Center-a five-year, $7.5 million grant to plan and teach the middle and high school teachers some of the newest, cutting-edge science and how to incorporate it into the classroom.

Jim Bader, director of the University's Center for Science and Mathematics Education, developed CWRU's role in the partnership with Mano Singham, Harsh Mathur and Gary Chottiner from physics; Clemens Burda from chemistry; David Singer from mathematics; Kathy Kwiatkowski from the CSME; and Phil Safford from teacher licensure.

Under Bader's direction, CWRU will form teams of CWRU faculty and Cleveland science teachers from 10 comprehensive high schools and nine high school programs. Each team from math, biology, chemistry and physics will evaluate the curriculums and develop a series of core lab exercises and activities. Then CWRU will train the educators in how to teach their students the labs and how to implement them into the curriculum.

Over the next three years, Bader plans to have each CMSD teacher spend two weeks on campus in an intensive summer workshop learning the labs.

Follow-up support from CWRU will come as chairs of the department have agreed to cooperate in the training and release faculty members whenever teaching loads permit to serve as Faculty-in-Residence two days a week to work alongside the classroom teachers as they implement the new labs at the school.

In the third phase of the program at CWRU, the high school teachers will have the opportunity to take courses on campus in their respective disciplines.

Bader also envisions in the fourth and fifth years to seek additional funding to support research activities for the teachers, similar to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute-supported Summer Program in Undergraduate Research (SPUR).

Grant support came from the NSF's Math and Science Partnership, a program that has evolved from President George W. Bush's "Leave No Child Behind" initiative.

"This grant is a phenomenal opportunity to improve math and science instruction in our sixth through eighth grades, as well as in our high schools," said Cleveland Municipal School District CEO Barbara Bryd-Bennett.

"I'm excited that the College of Arts and Sciences and its faculty will be working with the Cleveland schools on important issues of science and math teaching. I am particularly pleased that the project will engage our students and faculty in ways that embrace the educational experiences of our own students," said Samuel Savin, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and professor.