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Experience to Impact: A Comparison of Models of University-Based Summer Internships for High School Teachers Donna Barrett and Marion Usselman Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics and Computing (CEISMC) Georgia Institute of Technology

Introduction The Georgia Intern Fellowships for Teachers (GIFT) program, initiated in 1991, is a collaborative effort of corporations, universities and school systems designed to enhance the mathematics and science experiences of Georgia teachers and their students by providing teachers with summer internships in science and mathematics-rich work environments. Over the past fourteen years the Georgia Institute of Technology, through its Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics and Computing (CEISMC), has provided summer research experiences for over 900 teachers in both university and industrial settings, with more than 200 teachers working in university laboratories at Georgia Tech and Emory University in the last five years alone. By offering business, industry, public science institute and academic research fellowships to teachers, GIFT allows educators to observe first-hand the skills and knowledge necessary for the preparation of our future workforce: the students currently in Georgia’s classrooms.

By participating in GIFT, an average of 75 teachers per summer have had the opportunity to experience the applications of science, mathematics, and computing as they apply to "real world" inquiry, problem solving and reasoning. Each teacher is assigned a science or engineering mentor who is responsible for orienting the teacher to the work environment and guiding the teacher through the summer experience. The teacher also collaborates with the mentor to develop an Action Plan for integrating new perspectives, knowledge, and insights gained from the fellowship experience into the classroom to stimulate student interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). These Action Plans can also include partnership activities such as mentor visits to the teacher’s classroom, field trips to the research lab, and high school student research internships in university laboratories.

GIFT placements vary greatly in length, intended scope and type of research experience, and can be grouped into the following six general categories: 1. Fellowships in technical data analysis divisions of corporations; 2. 8-week experiences in which teachers conduct science, engineering, or social science research in academic laboratories; 3. International experiences in which teachers travel with university lab members to conduct research or compare cross-cultural models of academic instruction; 4. Student mentoring experiences where teachers supervise high school student research projects conducted in the university laboratory, 5. Fellowships created to assist teachers in refreshing their knowledge of specific academic content, and 6. Fellowships created to help develop K-12 or informal education curriculum units based on academic research.

Proceedings of the 2005 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2005, American Society for Engineering Education

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Barrett, D., & Usselman, M. (2005, June), Experience To Impact: A Comparison Of Models Of University Based Summer Internships For High School Teachers Paper presented at 2005 Annual Conference, Portland, Oregon. 10.18260/1-2--15472