SDSA Directory Connects Classrooms and Resources
Where Education and Adventure Meet Head On...Inside the Computer
Special thanks to SDSA Friends. . .
Partner of the Year Awards. . .
San Diego Engineering Society Supports the San Diego Science Alliance
Science Alliance Members and TOPS Staffing Services Team Up
K-12 Science Calendar 1995-1996 School YEAR
by Walter Desmond, SDSA Steering Committee
Hundreds of science, mathematics, and technology education resources in San Diego; thousands of willing professionals. . . But how do teachers find out about them? Compare them? Schedule them? It's often a case of "so many resources--so little time."
The San Diego Science Alliance (SDSA) is helping to solve this problem by linking education programs with educators through our Resource Catalog. This is a directory of hundreds of science programs and resources offered by more than 150 local organizations, all catalogued by subject in an easy-to-use table. Member companies, institutions and education offices cooperated in producing the catalog and distributing it to all schools in the county, as well as to hundreds of individual educators.
The Resource Catalog is also available through our World Wide Web home page [http://www.cerf.net/sd_science/]. The home page contains a San Diego Science Calendar, the SDSA newsletter, access to information and home pages of member organizations, and pointers to some of the most fascinating and exotic technology sites around the world.
Our resource database is expanding daily. Participants and users can contribute to this growth by sending us new listings, updating existing ones, and giving us other suggestions for improvements and additional features. We also welcome help in editing, updating and further designing of the electronic home page, and in editing and producing the next edition of the printed catalog. Readers interested in joining these editorial efforts should contact Patricia Winter (455-3335, winters@vaxd.gat.com) or Walt Desmond (625-3450, desmondw@cerf.net).
All these activities are moving us continually toward our goal: a single, comprehensive resource facilitating communication between the science and education communities in San Diego.
Dear Ms. Winter:
I wanted to thank you for your outstanding efforts toward improving the quality of science education particularly with respect to your formation of Science Alliance and the resource catalog. Your catalog has been invaluable for me. For example, I have recently made contact with the Nature School and hope to begin an Aquaria Rearing Project in the class, I have had a guest speaker from Association for Women in Science, won a $1,000.00 grant through Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association and have set up numerous field trips by utilizing the catalog.
The catalog has made finding contacts, phone numbers, special programs, and grant opportunities easy and convenient. Without this catalog and all of your efforts I would not have access to all this information to improve my teaching and our site's science program. Thank you very much and I look forward to your updated version.
Sincerely,
Rosanna Lupien
Gompers Secondary
On June 7, Walt Desmond received the Community Service Award from the San Diego Science Educators Association for "outstanding contributions to science education." This award was well deserved for all he has done, much of it through the Science Alliance.
. . . On June 1st, Lynne Gordon presented her 3rd Annual Science Symposium at San Diego High School. In the program she gave "Special thanks to the San Diego Science Alliance. All speakers at the Symposium represent organizations belonging to the Alliance."
. . . Virginia Madigan picked up copies of the Resource Catalog for the 60 teachers in the summer California Science Project.
. . . Of interest to teachers: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory at Cal Tech has established an extensive educational outreach program around its "Pluto Express" Project--including lesson plans, photos, video, etc. For info: (818) 354-6916 or pluto.education@jpl.nasa.gov.
. . . Alliance Pharmaceutical Corp. has partnered with Morse High School to present a model for duplicating a biomedical corporation, with the school curriculum incorporating product design, development, efficacy trials, quality control, patent research, packaging and marketing.
. . . Michael Sixtus and Andres Parra, Mar Vista High School, have received a $12,000 GTE Gift Grant. The Grant includes $7000 for the academic project--measuring energy flow through aquatic ecosystems--and $500 for professional growth activities. The award also includes a trip to Boston and Washington, D.C. to visit GTE facilities and governmental representatives.
"Science in San Diego", the first course developed and organized by the San Diego Science Alliance, was well received by the teachers. In fact we had numerous requests to repeat it both with different sites for the same teachers and the original sites for a new group of teachers.
Science Alliance is pleased to announce that "Science in San Diego I" will begin on Tuesday, October 19 and run for 10 weeks. The spaces in this course will first be offered to the 50 teachers who were in our February course. So far, on board for this series are: Nokia Mobile Phones, BioSym, Kelco, a division of Monsanto, and San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant (this will be a 4-hour Saturday session on November 18). There will likely be some spaces available for teachers not in the first course. "Science in San Diego II", for a new group of 50 teachers, will begin on Thursday, October 5 for 8 weeks. To date, we have commitments from Alliance Pharmaceutical Corp., SAIC, Salk Institute for Biological Studies, GDE Systems, Inc., UCSD, and General Atomics.
Each session takes place at a different host site. The visits include a discussion about the organization being visited and the type of work done there, as well as an introduction to some of the scientific efforts underway at the institution. When possible, a tour or lab visit is included. Refreshments and hand-outs are furnished by the host. Teachers who wish inservice credit for the course can make arrangements with the teacher liaison for each course (Bart Hays and Joe Baron).
These courses are open to science teachers from all schools. The registration letters will be sent in late August, and distributed by Janet Trentacosta and Marilyn Stevens. Teachers may register now by sending their name, home address and phone, and school name to Patricia Winter by FAX ONLY (455-3379) or e-mail: winters@vaxd.gat.com. No phone reservations will be accepted.
Meeting the Challenge: Support for Science Education, SDSA's third community-wide program was held on April 20. This event was hosted by Hubbs Sea World Research Institute and chaired by Linda Edeiken, Museum Educator and a member of our Steering Committee. Over 100 science-related people attended the event, which started with a tour of the Research Institute. Donald B. Kent, Senior Vice President and Director of Operations, warmly welcomed us and offered to host another future event. Gwen Rosenberg and Patricia Winter gave a Science Alliance activity report. Guest speakers were Tom Dillon, SAIC; Shawn Carlson, Society for Amateur Scientists; Christina Stamos-Pfeiffer, U.S. Geological Survey; Percy Myers, GDE Systems, Inc.; and Adela Garcia, IBM. At the last minute, Keith Brush from the Future Scientists and Engineers of America drove down from Anaheim to tell us about his program. Many of the guests brought materials for the Share Table, something we will continue at future programs.
SDSA's next event will be on Thursday, September 21 at the Mission Trails Nature Center, with Nokia Mobile Phones as the co-host and Denise Rekettye Pateros chairperson for the event. Denise is Associate Dean, Undergraduate Admissions, Director of Western Regional Recruitment for Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. Since she attended our April event and indicated she would like to become "involved", we wasted no time. We will have another interesting program and a special announcement. Watch your mail in early September for the invitation.
Intel Corporation has launched a national education program designed to increase technology literacy among students and inspire them to learn more about the science behind computer technology. "The Journey Inside" technology education program is aimed specifically at grades five through nine, when a student's interest in science, mathematics, and related studies can really take hold.
The free comprehensive classroom kit, The Journey Inside: The Computer, comes in a package that is a learning tool itself--the box serves as a model of a personal computer for students to open up and examine. The kit contains a teacher's guide, video, poster and hands-on chip kit.
The 300-page teacher's guide includes vocabulary, background reading, student handouts, overheads, resource listings and lesson plans for six units, which are divided into beginning, intermediate and advanced levels. The units cover the basic operations of computers and microprocessors, digital information, transistors, chip manufacturing and a review of critical inventions throughout history.
The six-module video introduces the concepts of each study unit with a typical twelve year-old on a quest to learn more about computers. The poster reinforces key concepts from the video.
To complete the experiments described in the teacher's guide, the chip kit includes an actual silicon wafer, a microprocessor, loose die, transistors, diodes, connecting wires and batteries for hands-on study.
The raw material for the program was developed by a collaborative of nine science teachers under the direction of Penny Moore, U.C. Berkeley, director of Prime Science and Science for Science Teachers. The materials have been refined for classroom use by the International Society for Technology in Education, which also conducts training classes for teachers in the effective use of the kit.
"The Journey Inside" kits are available free of charge to qualified teachers in the United States and Canada. Qualified teachers are those teaching science, mathematics, or computers in grades five through nine. For a descriptive brochure and order form, call 1-800-346-3029, ext. 143. Alternately: http://www.intel.com/about intel/journey inside.
The San Diego Science Alliance has made great strides in implementing some of our short-term goals because of the tremendous support we have received from the community. Special thanks to:
SDSA is establishing "Partner of the Year Awards" in four categories: teacher, administrator, volunteer and company. Up to two awards will be given in each category. For the companies, the award will consist of a plaque and a certificate. For individuals, the award will be a symbolic gift such as a night on the town along with a certificate.
Initially, the award criterion will be simple, for conspicuous and effective contribution to the partnership concept that underlies SDSA's mission to enrich science education for students. The first awards will be presented during a luncheon ceremony at the San Diego Science Educators Conference in March 1996. More about this will be announced at the SDSA community event on September 21.
by Phil Young, San Diego Engineering Society
Representative to the SDSA
The San Diego Engineering Society (SDES) is a local engineering organization with a depth of member engineers in a wide array of technologies. The SDES members bring engineering and science programs, resources, and engineers to the SDSA in support of
K-12 education.
SDES is an umbrella society for the 34 local engineering societies. These 34 societies have a membership of over 7,700 San Diego County engineers. Each society has been asked to list their K-12 programs and resources to be included in the Science Alliance Resource Catalog and Home Page.
Many of these societies have fully developed national programs and resources that just need to be requested. It will be exciting to get the local engineers and their respective society involved with the schools. Teachers are already requesting engineers to speak to their classes. Many engineering videos are in demand.
A list of the 34 member societies of the San Diego Engineering Society is presented below:
What do SAIC, Pacific Southwest Biological Service, Alliance Pharmaceutical Corp. and Salk Institute for Biological Studies have in common? As members of the San Diego Science Alliance, they are committed to furthering students' exposure to the sciences. They also are TOPS clients who have designated Science Alliance as their choice for receiving a donation through the TOPS "School Program."
TOPS Staffing Services Inc. is celebrating their 20th anniversary by donating a minimum of $20,000 to benefit the education of San Diego County students. A donation will be made on behalf of SAIC, Pacific Southwest Biological Service, Alliance Pharmaceutical Corp. and Salk Institute for Biological Studies at the end of 1995 in proportion to the amount of TOPS temporary services that they use throughout the year.
The TOPS program is available to existing clients and new clients. Companies that want to help further science education and help high schools prepare more skilled workers should call TOPS at 299-8770 and ask for Gaby Mergenthal, Regional Manager. Please identify yourself as a Science Alliance member.
The following are some events that are scheduled to take place during the 1994-95 school year. We encourage you to let us know about additional programs that should be included in this calendar.
This Newsletter is a quarterly publication of the San Diego Science Alliance.
THIRD ISSUE EDITOR
Janet Trentatosta
San Diego City Schools
We wish to express our thanks to General Atomics for printing the newsletter and to SAIC for the postage/mailing.
Copyright © 1996-1998, San Diego
Science Alliance , All Rights Reserved
12/14/98 ern