Projects

Educational efforts at the J.L. Scott Marine Education Center, the Dauphin Island Sea Lab, and the Environmental Studies Center

End Date: 02/01/11

Abstract

The expanded overarching goal of this proposed effort is to enhance the awareness and understanding of students, teachers, and the general public in both Mississippi and Alabama concerning the importance of the oceans, coastlines, and watersheds to their everyday lives. To achieve this goal will require various implementation strategies to “bridge the gap” between scientists’ research results and the interpretation of those data. The three outreach facilities which will be used for these interpretive efforts are: The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) - Gulf Coast Research Laboratory’s (GCRL) - J.L. Scott Marine Education Center (MEC); the Dauphin Island Sea Lab (DISL) - Estuarium; and the Mobile County Public School System’s (MCPSS) – Environmental Studies Center (ESC).

A combination of these informal lectures and the re-enforcement of these lectures through informal field activities – should empower these audiences to better understand research data, measurements, analyses, prediction, and the interpretation of data. Formative and summative evaluations implemented by an external evaluator, i.e. cognitive achievement pre- and posttests and attitudinal achievement through Likert-scale surveys will be administered by all three facilities for professional development program participants. Precollege students in select programs will be given pre- and posttests. For informal education field trips, Likert-scale evaluations will be completed only by the participating teachers relative to their perceptions and grade-level content appropriateness concerning to programmatic value. Further, impacts, activities, and anticipated outcomes and impacts will be determined using a Logic Model.

The rationale being proposed for this unique, bi-state collaborative will enhance the awareness and understanding of coastal ecosystems by precollege teachers and students, as well as the general public through inquiry-based programs that encourage and promote hands-on experimentation, observation, discovery, prediction, problem solving, and appreciation of the natural world... to “bridge the gap” between research data and the interpretation of those data concerning the relevance of the oceans, coasts, and watersheds to our everyday lives.

Objectives

  1. To implement “face to face” and online Professional Development Programs for pre-college teachers, to include grant-writing.
  2. To implement informal educational programs for precollege teachers, precollege students, and the general public with additional personnel, i.e. a 0.33 FTE Educator provided by the MASGC and/or inkind-match.
  3. To develop and maintain instructional resources for implementation of study activities and interactive learning experiences for targeted audiences.
  4. To provide a more focused and coordinated mission between these three facilities, (to include 2.4 man-month FTE involvement by the MS Co-PI to coordinate the MASGC educational programs and work with other Sea Grant Network educators).

Methodology

Implementation will encompass formal and informal education programs which include:

  1. professional development efforts for precollege teachers, precollege students, and the general public;
  2. exciting and engaging lectures to increase content knowledge for teachers and students; 
  3. augmented teaching strategies for use by participating teachers in their own classrooms; and 
  4. hands-on activities involving: collecting and sampling, through seining, sieving, making plankton tows; testing water quality; sampling the soil; and/or collecting plants.

A combination of these informal lectures and the re-enforcement of these lectures through informal field activities – should empower these audiences to better understand research data, measurements, analyses, prediction, and the interpretation of data.

Formative and summative evaluations, i.e. cognitive achievement pre- and posttests and attitudinal achievement through Likert-scale surveys will be administered by all three facilities for professional development program participants. Select precollege students will be given pre- and posttests. Teachers will be mailed pretests to “bring with them” for their scheduled precollege student field trips. Posttests will be given to these same teachers to administer to the same select students within two to three days after returning to their respective schools. Franked envelopes will be given to these participating teachers for the return of these posttests to the MEC, the DHP, and the ESC for data analyses and comparisons to the correctly “matched” pretests. For informal education field trips, Likert-scale evaluations will be completed only by the participating teachers relative to their perceptions and grade-level content appropriateness concerning to programmatic value.

In addition, long term affect will be assessed by selecting a representative group of participants and conducting interviews and follow-up surveys. The surveys will use a five-point, Likert-scale and will question participants about perceived value and satisfaction with the activities. The surveys will be posted on-line so that participants will have the option of completing the survey on-line or to print it out and complete a hard copy. The site directors will assist in the selection of participants that will be
interviewed by the evaluator. The interviews will provide attitudinal and/or affective information.

Participants will be asked about perceived value of the activities and whether participation in the program had any long-range impact. The data will be reported in table format as well as in a graphical format. The interview data will be transcribed and coded using comparative analyses. The results of the analyses will be reported out in different ways.

Rationale

The rationale being proposed for this unique, bi-state collaborative will enhance the awareness and understanding of coastal ecosystems by precollege teachers and students, as well as the general public through inquiry-based programs that encourage and promote hands-on experimentation, observation, discovery, prediction, problem solving, and appreciation of the natural world... to “bridge the gap” between research data and the interpretation of those data concerning the relevance of the oceans, coasts, and watersheds to our everyday lives.

For More Information Contact: the MASGC Research Coordinator, Loretta Leist (Loretta.leist@usm.edu).
Please reference the project number E/D-12.