P-12 Partners

The College of Education is engaged in work with several P-12 school partners.

Our students are placed in partner schools to complete in-classroom clinical experiences like student-teaching. Faculty members engage in research projects with K-12 educators, and externally funded programs in the college provide direct supports, resources, and opportunities for students and teachers across Indiana.

This page highlights some of this important work that is at the heart of the mission of the college.

designSTEM

designSTEM is a three year project funded by Indiana Department of Education that uses an engineering, design-based approach to teacher professional development. Through the project, twenty middle and high school STEM teachers per year are implementing lessons for science topic areas related to the Indiana Science Education Standards. The project includes summer professional development and Professional Learning Communities (PLC) during the school year. CATALYST faculty members design and lead the summer professional development workshops and PLC meetings.

Creating Algebra Teaching Communities in Indiana

Jill Newton, associate professor of mathematics education and two math education doctoral students, Andrew Hoffman and Brooke Max, just completed two weeks of professional development experience with 15 teachers from Frankfort Community Schools, including middle school and high school mathematics and special education teachers.

This is the second year of this Frankfort-Purdue collaboration. It continued work toward creating algebra teaching communities across Indiana. Several groups of teachers will be presenting sessions at the upcoming 2016 Indiana Council of Teachers of Mathematics conference, and all teachers will be implementing action research projects in their classrooms this year. This Math-Science Partnership is in collaboration with three other university-school partnerships in Indiana.

STEM Transformation Schools

The College of Education has partnered with 25 K-12 schools across the state of Indiana to engage in strategic planning and implementation of STEM program approaches. Some of this work has been enabled by external funding from the Indiana Department of Education’s Math and Science Partnership program, such as the PSTEM and Boiler STEM projects with Maple Crest Middle School, Maconaquah Middle School, Avon Intermediate East and Avon Intermediate West.

Project RESET: Refugee Youth Engaging in Critical STEM Literacy and Learning

Faculty member Minjung Ryu runs an after-school project that engages resettled Burmese refugee youth in STEM learning activities. The after school program is to advance the youth’s knowledge about weather and climate change, English competence, and critical STEM literacy. The youth participants in the program learn, talk, and present about weather and climate change and make digital stories about climate change to communicate with broader audiences. Through the project, Dr. Ryu and her team strive to build on the youth’s strengths and empower them as agents who know about science and make changes to the world around them.

Becoming a Spacewalker

Learn more about Becoming a Spacewalker, a book written by retired College of Education faculty member Susan Gunderson with astronaut Jerry Ross. The College of Education distributed thousands of copies of the book to fourth grade teachers across the state of Indiana. Learn more.

Trish Morita-Mullaney’s work with English Language Learners

Assistant professor Trish Morita-Mullaney researches English language learners and assists school corporations in meeting the needs of this growing population of students. Read more about her work with the Community Schools of Frankfort.