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  1. Laura Cisneros
  2. http://www.lauramariecisneros.com/
  3. Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
  4. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  5. University of Connecticut
  1. Chester Arnold
  2. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  3. University of Connecticut
  1. Todd Campbell
  2. http://education.uconn.edu/todd-campbell/
  3. Professor
  4. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  5. University of Connecticut
  1. Cary Chadwick
  2. Geospatial Educator
  3. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  4. University of Connecticut
  1. David Dickson
  2. Extension Educator
  3. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  4. University of Connecticut
  1. David M. Moss
  2. Associate Professor
  3. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  4. University of Connecticut
  1. Laura Rodriguez
  2. Graduate Research Assistant
  3. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  4. Neag School of Education UConn, University of Connecticut
  1. John Volin
  2. Professor, Natural Resources and Vice Provost for Academic Affairs
  3. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  4. University of Connecticut

Promoting Lifelong STEM Learning Through a Focus on Conservation, Geospatial ...

NSF Awards: 1612650

2018 (see original presentation & discussion)

Grades 9-12, Adult learners, Informal / multi-age

When energized, tech-savvy teens team up with dedicated, knowledgeable local conservation leaders, good things can happen. With the goal to bringing together teens and adults to jump-start local conservation projects across the state, an interdisciplinary team at the University of Connecticut from the Department of Natural Resources and the Environment, the Center for Land Use Education and Research, and the Neag School of Education have collaboratively developed the Conservation Training Partnership program. Conservation efforts by these intergenerational teams are a “win” for all stakeholders – for the students, for the local conservation advocates, for the community, and for the environment.

The Conservation Training Partnership program brings together teens and adult volunteers, supporting their conservation efforts by providing training during a 2-day field experience workshop along with guidance as they conduct a local conservation project of their choice. During the workshop, using conservation science as a framework, each team learns how they can apply innovative, user-friendly mapping and web technology to address conservation issues through hands-on fieldwork. Following the workshop, the team carries out a conservation project that addresses a local environmental issue in their hometown leveraging their new knowledge and technological toolkit. Teams showcase their work at a regional conference in spring of the following year.

The learning and identity authoring that occurs in these intergenerational partnerships is studied at the workshop and throughout the implementation of the conservation projects to better understand the importance and outcomes of intergenerational learning in informal STEM settings.

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Discussion from the 2018 STEM for All Video Showcase (27 posts)
  • Icon for: Miyoko Chu

    Miyoko Chu

    Senior Director of Communications
    May 13, 2018 | 09:39 p.m.

    What a great, hands-on opportunity involving technology, mentorship, science, and conservation! What have you found to be the biggest challenge so far? What successes have you been most excited about?

     
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    Marilu Lopez Fretts
    Sarah Hampton
    Laura Cisneros
  • Icon for: Todd Campbell

    Todd Campbell

    Co-Presenter
    Professor
    May 14, 2018 | 07:35 a.m.

    Hi Miyoku...thanks for your interest!

    What successes have you been most excited about? Seeing teens and adults recognized as capable and knowledgeable participants in conservation work both by each other and by a larger community (e.g., local land use board, peers at schools). 

    Biggest challenges to date: Framing the work of intergenerational teams so that teens and adults work as partners. While we have norms we emphasize to support all taking on roles as learners and leaders, historical and cultural norms of how adults and teens interact sometimes leads to the adult positioning the teen as the learner and the adult as the knowledgeable other. In some of these cases, the project seems to be something the adult partner is doing for the teen's benefit, instead of a valued community pursuit that will meet the needs of a local community and positions the adult to learn through participation. Would love to hear how others address these more deeply rooted traditions/norms.

     
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    Marilu Lopez Fretts
    Sarah Hampton
    John Volin
  • Icon for: Laura Cisneros

    Laura Cisneros

    Lead Presenter
    Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
    May 14, 2018 | 07:37 a.m.

    Hi Miyoko, Thank you for your comment and questions! We just completed our first programming year and 14 of our 16 intergenerational teams completed on-the-ground conservation projects using mapping technology that benefited their communities. One of our challenges this year was making sure the teen/adult teams worked together as a team (both as learners and contributors) as opposed to as student/mentor. Both sets of intergenerational learners bring unique knowledge and skill sets, and both are learning new skills/information through their projects, but for some of our teams we found that the adult thought of the project as the “teen’s project” and that they were mentoring the teen. We are now making changes to an activity we have the teams do during the 2-day workshop on “working together”, to help them both see the unique attributes they both bring to their project and what they both can learn from the project.

    One of our successes for our project was that 14 of our 16 teams completed their conservation project and presented it at one of two regional conferences that we made open to them (Connecticut Conference on Natural Resources & Connecticut Land Conservation Conference). Conference attendees were excited about the projects and our participants left energized, enthusiastic and proud of their accomplishments! 

     

     
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    Sarah Hampton
    John Volin
  • Icon for: Miyoko Chu

    Miyoko Chu

    Senior Director of Communications
    May 14, 2018 | 08:36 p.m.

    Thanks for these insights, Todd and Laura. The intergenerational dynamic sounds really interesting. It seems similar to a challenge that I anticipate our project may encounter, not in terms of generations, but perceived expertise--lay audiences and expert scientists interacting and working together. We're hoping for collaboration with everyone in the roles of both learners and contributors.

  • Icon for: Laura Cisneros

    Laura Cisneros

    Lead Presenter
    Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
    May 14, 2018 | 07:05 a.m.

    Welcome Informal Educators, K-12 Teachers, Researchers and All! Our project is going into its second programming year, and we just finished working with our first cohort of participants (teens and adult learners), which consisted of guiding them through on-the-ground conservation projects using geospatial technology and studying their identity authoring. We would love to hear your questions/comments on:

    1. Bringing together teens and adults to work as a team to solve evironmental problems in their community;
    2. Using mapping technology to carry out conservation efforts and engage in informal STEM ed; and
    3. Intergenerational learning and identity authoring that occurs as these teams carry out their conservation projects.

    Thank you for join us!

     
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    Marilu Lopez Fretts
    Sarah Hampton
  • Icon for: George Hein

    George Hein

    Facilitator
    Professor Emeritus
    May 14, 2018 | 08:35 a.m.

     Thanks for posting your program.  It was useful to go to your web site to get additional information.  Do you do any debriefing of the teams after they have finished their field work.  What do they find most challenging?

     
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    Todd Campbell
  • Icon for: Laura Rodriguez

    Laura Rodriguez

    Co-Presenter
    Graduate Research Assistant
    May 14, 2018 | 08:50 a.m.

    As part of the Educational research piece, we conducted separate focus groups with the teens and adults during the conference in March when they showcased their work. Both teens and adults emphasized that scheduling time to work together and finding time to work on the project in general were challenges. The workshops took place in July, but many of the teams did not really get started until the fall. The adults noted that the teens were very involved in after school activities such as sports, band, and drama which made it difficult to find time aside from weekends to work. Starting in the fall was also problematic for some projects (e.g. identifying and mapping plants for pollinators) because the bulk of their time together ended up in the winter. All were positive about working in intergenerational partnerships. Some teens would have liked to have another teen with them also.

     
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    Sarah Hampton
    John Volin
    Todd Campbell
  • Icon for: George Hein

    George Hein

    Facilitator
    Professor Emeritus
    May 14, 2018 | 09:21 a.m.

    Did you match most of the teens and adults, or did they usually sign up together as teams? If the former, what guidelines did you have for making matches?

  • Icon for: Laura Cisneros

    Laura Cisneros

    Lead Presenter
    Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
    May 14, 2018 | 10:21 a.m.

    Teams are formed in both ways: (1) some teams may apply together, and (2) some teams we match up before the program. Most often we match up our teams rather than the former. To match a teen with an adult, we ask a series of questions on our online application. Below is a description taken from our application:

    Before attending the CTP workshop, we will pair you with a teammate. Teams will consist of one teen and one adult. The goal is for each team to carry out a service-learning conservation project together after the CTP workshop. We will take into account the following to help determine teams: (1) where you live, (2) your interests and (3) your time availability. To help us match participants, please respond to the following questions:

  • Icon for: Brian Drayton

    Brian Drayton

    Researcher
    May 14, 2018 | 09:38 a.m.

    Hi, Laura, 

       What mapping system are you using?

  • Icon for: Laura Cisneros

    Laura Cisneros

    Lead Presenter
    Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
    May 14, 2018 | 02:16 p.m.

    Hi Brian,

    Just to make sure you saw, my colleague, Cary, responded below about the mapping programs we use. Thanks for your question!

  • Icon for: Cary Chadwick

    Cary Chadwick

    Co-Presenter
    Geospatial Educator
    May 14, 2018 | 10:46 a.m.

    Hi Brian,

    We use free or very low cost ($3) apps and web mapping technology in the two day workshop. For GPS field mapping (trails, boundaries, points of interest), we use an app called Track Kit. https://track-kit.net/ The app is very simple to use, allows for rich data collection (photographs, audio, detailed notes), and provides free cloud storage for data files and photos. For field surveys we use a free app called Epicollect5. https://five.epicollect.net/ This is a survey based app that allows a user to build a customize data entry form (survey) and geolocate the responses as they are collected in the field (the device uses its GPS to tag each response with a latitude/longitude value). Survey forms are built on the Epicollect5 website and then downloaded to devices, which allows for offline field data collection. Epicollect5 surveys are built using intelligent design so they are very flexible and can be used to author a robust survey. It's also a great tool for citizen science as surveys are easy to share and do not require a log-in to fill out. Once participants learn how to use these mobile apps to collect field data, they are taught to create custom, interactive web maps using Google Maps (My Maps). They learn how to customize the data and best practices for collaborating on projects and sharing content with the public. You can learn more about the apps and check out additional resources on the CTP website here: http://nrca.uconn.edu/students-adults/materials... Hope this is helpful. Let me know if you have additional questions!

     
    3
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    Sarah Hampton
    John Volin
    Todd Campbell
  • Icon for: Rachel Shefner

    Rachel Shefner

    Facilitator
    Associate Director
    May 14, 2018 | 04:36 p.m.

    Nice video! I think that Laura's comment that some teens would like to see another teen on the team is interesting. It makes me wonder about the outcomes you expect to see from this project. Are you following any of the teens back into their school environment? Does participation in the project have any in-school impacts?  I am thinking they might be able to be better able to work in (or even lead) teams of their peers a a result of this work. For the teens that will be graduating during the project will you be tracking their selection of a major, or other post-high school work? Does program participation lead to any internships? What are some expected outcomes from this project?

     
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    Todd Campbell
  • Icon for: George Hein

    George Hein

    Facilitator
    Professor Emeritus
    May 14, 2018 | 05:58 p.m.

    I think Rachel's question is worth keeping in mind.  Your project is only loosely connected to school work or formal education activities, so it would be hard to evaluate long-term impact for students in the most common ways.  But you might get interesting results if you figured out a way to get funding to interview the participating teens a couple of years after their experience in the program.We have too few longitudinal studies of long term impact.

     
    2
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    Sarah Hampton
    Todd Campbell
  • Icon for: Todd Campbell

    Todd Campbell

    Co-Presenter
    Professor
    May 14, 2018 | 06:28 p.m.

     

    Hi Rachel and George, 
    Thanks for your comments/questions. We agree that these questions are worthy of pursuing, even though they weren't part of our original proposal and our current work. Heidi Carlone, researcher from UNC-Greensboro and an NSF PI on a similar project, is on our advisory board and has made similar suggestions based on supplemental funding she was awarded for a similar project so that she could pursue more longitudinal questions like these. We plan to draw on her expertise and findings connected to her project along with questions like Rachel has articulated to propose supplemental funding to stay connected to and learn from our participants. In some ways, we already see some of the benefits as past teen alum from Natural Resource Conservation Academy (the program that is being scaled in our project) have gone on to study at UConn and have stayed connected to the NRCA leaders.

     

    Here is a piece about Heidi Carlone's Herpetology project that was published in NSTA's Connected Learning:

    http://csl.nsta.org/author/heidicarlone/

     

    I don't think it reports anything from the longitudinal work they are completing, but does reveal some of their interesting findings that we see as connected to the kind of work we are doing. We have drawn on her project’s work to develop surveys to help us think about how identity constructs might change over time and hope to publish soon about these surveys and what we are already learning very soon. 

  • Icon for: Betsy Stefany

    Betsy Stefany

    Researcher
    May 14, 2018 | 07:29 p.m.

    This project is an interesting closer study to what we  use to expand as "just in time" teacher resources to extend class projects.  The map of their local school resources aligns with the same tools that they use in the classroom to give them the next potential for extension and also shows use in national applications like storms and last year's eclipse.  This also aids the teacher to consider resources and programs from  other local communities that will assist beyond his/her capacity and grade level focus.     We also have continually  developed a variety of high contrasting  locations to the shared experience in NH that you can see short  views  of  in our video at http://stemforall2018.videohall.com/p/1321 

    We use the app "Trip Journal" to access school resources and help the teacher to move from the classroom as a model and out to the field ...or at least build it into the class discussions after students vote on their site.  

     

  • Icon for: Laura Rodriguez

    Laura Rodriguez

    Co-Presenter
    Graduate Research Assistant
    May 15, 2018 | 07:44 a.m.

    Hi Betsy,

    Thanks for sharing! Your project sounds very much like a sister project that we are all working on at UConn called Teacher Professional Learning or TPL http://nrca.uconn.edu/teachers/index.htm. TPL is a 3-day workshop for high school science teachers to learn and integrate geospatial technologies in an NGSS-aligned environmental science unit. The difference from Conservation Training Partnerships (CTP) is that CTP is an informal science project that pairs high school students with adults in the community (not necessarily teachers) to work on authentic conservation projects. I'll take a look at the trip journal app. This is definitely something we might want to include in TPL.

     

  • Icon for: Betsy Stefany

    Betsy Stefany

    Researcher
    May 15, 2018 | 10:58 a.m.

    Thanks back to you for also sharing and thinking about the structure of engagement through digital tools.

    We also are engaging the interior environment in collaboration with USGreen Building Council and as development of a toolkit extension to the NASA/AREN project's patented flying platform.   These programs literally span across all options for phenomenon discussion and we will be writing more to explain that as someone has posed a question on evaluation.  What you see in the video is the first stages where the experience is equally accessed...the classroom.  USGBC has great new support activities and certification that teachers used to see their classroom as a STEM lab.   See http://stemforall2018.videohall.com/presentatio...

     
    1
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    Todd Campbell
  • Icon for: Sarah Hampton

    Sarah Hampton

    Facilitator
    MS Math and Science Teacher, Volunteer STEAM Coordinator
    May 15, 2018 | 07:03 a.m.

    I am excited about the opportunities software brings for authentic science engagement both in and out of the classroom. Finding time to vet and learn apps prevents me from incorportating more. I like how your project removes that barrier for your participants. Did participants volunteer for the program? How were they selected?

     

     

     

     

  • Icon for: Laura Cisneros

    Laura Cisneros

    Lead Presenter
    Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
    May 15, 2018 | 09:08 a.m.

    Hi Sarah, thank you for your comment. Yes, my collegaues, Cary Chadwick and Dave Dickson (our geospatial instructors), vetted 25+ apps before deciding on free/low cost and effective mapping apps to use for this program. The same with our teacher program that Laura R. mentioned above. For recruitment of participants, we have a network of 1000+ teachers  and youth program leaders we reach out to and work with throughout the state of Connecticut to share this program with their students. We also make in-school and organization presentations. For our adult participants, we work with CT Land Trusts, Wetland/Conservation Commissions, River Alliance, and many other community/conservation organizations. This year we are able to accommodate 100 participants (50 adults, 50 teens) at 4 workshops held throughout the state, allowing us to make this opportunity open to almost everyone that applies and expresses a geniune interest.

     
    2
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    Todd Campbell
    Sarah Hampton
  • Icon for: Sarah Hampton

    Sarah Hampton

    Facilitator
    MS Math and Science Teacher, Volunteer STEAM Coordinator
    May 15, 2018 | 11:41 a.m.

    Your intentional connection of two generations reminds me of a workshop I attended by Jessica Stollings. Her work might be interesting to you. https://re-generations.org/

     

  • Icon for: Todd Campbell

    Todd Campbell

    Co-Presenter
    Professor
    May 15, 2018 | 11:45 a.m.

    Hi Sarah, 
    Thanks for sharing this, since we haven't found that much research related to intergenerational learning, particularly in STEM education research. This is something that we believe makes this project so important (among other foci [e.g., supporting community land use decisions among municipalities).

     

     
    1
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    Sarah Hampton
  • Icon for: Angela Calabrese Barton

    Angela Calabrese Barton

    Researcher
    May 17, 2018 | 11:43 a.m.

    The importance of intergenerational partnerships has not gotten enough attention. Im excited to see how you think about the affordances of these partnerships, and also the ways in which the young people involves have opportunities to be positioned as experts. Thanks for the great project!

     
    2
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    Todd Campbell
    Sarah Hampton
  • Icon for: Todd Campbell

    Todd Campbell

    Co-Presenter
    Professor
    May 17, 2018 | 01:13 p.m.

    Thanks Angela!  Your work, especially at AERA co-presenting with young people, is a testament to possibilities associated with positioning young people as experts. We are digging into our data from Year 1 to explicitly think about the affordances and constraints inherent in intergenerational learning and ways in which we can productively press against cultural and historical norms related youth and adult interactions that are more horizontal in terms of positioning and learning. What are some ways you might have identified that support adults in considering positioning, both for themselves and for young learners they are participating with?

    We adopted/adapted the following norms/commitments from your group's work and shared with participants in Year 1, but we are realizing that just saying these things is not enough, so we are thinking of more ways we can position participants more horizontally in our work with adult and teen partners:

    Collaborative Team Partnerships Norms for Project Work. These norms are designed to ensure that both adult and teen project members are recognized as essential team members with unique existing resources (knowledge, ideas, and ways of solving problems) that are important for accomplishing project team pursuits.  If adopted, we believe these norms will support equitable learning experiences for all involved.

    1. Actively listen to and think about each team member’s ideas and different ways of making sense of the world that they have developed through their life experiences and interactions with others in their community. Make a concerted effort to hear and consider the voice of others.
    2. Actively support all team members in using their ideas, capabilities (e.g., technological), different ways of making sense of the world, and different experiences as resources resolving community-based concerns or problems. Commit to supporting others in using their resources in project work.
    3. Recognize that each team member’s ideas, capabilities, and problem solving strategies are always developing and need to be made public and collaboratively refined to support individual and group learning. Consider how the group’s project work can be enhanced overtime through the application and refinement of the group's diverse sets of ideas and sensemaking practices.
    4. Recognize how each team member’s community histories, values, and knowledge building practices have and continue to contribute to scientific understanding and problem solving. Recognize how unique backgrounds and perspectives can serve as sources of innovation and creativity in problem solving.

     

     

    *Modified from Bang, Brown, Calabrese Barton, Rosebery & Warren, (in press).

  • Icon for: Laura Cisneros

    Laura Cisneros

    Lead Presenter
    Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
    May 17, 2018 | 01:22 p.m.

    We hope everyone is enjoying this fantastic video showcase! If our video left you wanting to learn more about the types of conservation projects our intergenerational teams undertake, you can learn about their projects more here: http://nrca.uconn.edu/students-adults/projects.htm. The project titles are linked to conference posters that our 2017-18 participants presented at two regional conferences.

     
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    Todd Campbell
  • Icon for: Kevin Floyd

    Kevin Floyd

    Researcher
    May 18, 2018 | 08:22 p.m.

    Thanks for sharing this great project!  I can envision similar programs running all over the US, and am thinking about how this could work in El Paso. What kind of financial and/or logistical support is provided to the teams, outside of the initial workshop?  Is that something each team needs to solve, or is there some form of start up money?  

    Thanks,

    Kevin

  • Icon for: Laura Cisneros

    Laura Cisneros

    Lead Presenter
    Program Coordinator & Visiting Assistant Professor
    May 19, 2018 | 11:59 a.m.

    Hi Kevin,

    Thank you for your interest in our program! Each of our teams receive multiple forms of support as they carry out their projects, including bi-weekly email check ins from the program coordinator, In-person coordinator visits when needed, web resources and troubleshooting support on our Google Forum Page (https://plus.google.com/communities/10963986660...), and technology webinars. Currently we do not provide financial support for projects, but we do loan out equipment. We also help participants develop projects that are low to no-cost and work with local organizations for donations. In a few cases, we’ve worked with participants to apply for small grants

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