CSUN is one of seven minority serving universities (MSI) that is collaborating with the NASA-funded Texas State University Project to promote:

1. More diverse students’ access to rigorous STEM-achievement resources; and

2. An exchange of knowledge and experience that advances STEM- integrated curricula to assure their students' scientific literacy achievement within culturally responsive learning settings.

The MSI partners work to connect the local NASA CENTER [Jet Propulsion Lab and Armstrong Space Center] with their institution’s faculty from the many STEM disciplines that intersect with the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)--while including faculty from global studies, arts and humanities.

How will the NGSS affect the learning outcomes of K-12 students and produce post-secondary students who exhibit more knowledge and excitement about the ways in which they can become the next generation of “audacious scientists and engineers?” /

CSUN’s Michael D. Eisner College of Education Professors Susan Belgrad and Norm Herr lead university faculty to leverage the five-year NASA grant to offer K-12 educators experiences that have created a new awareness and dialogue on the anticipated impact of the NGSS for underrepresented minority (URM) students. Through the NASA EPDC Project they have introduced faculty and K-12 teachers to a wide variety of NGSS-aligned STEM experiences that bring the new standards alive. Included in these activities have been the workshops on EV3 Mindstorm Robotics, Stomp Bottle Rocket workshops and the second and third annual Rally in the Valley supported by a variety of organizations including the Discovery Cube Los Angeles and NASA JPL.


Key to the success of the CSUN work has been the partnership with the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) whose education staff have offered NASA TXST PRESENTATION\California-State-University-Northridge-e1435783979370.pngthree summer institutes that focused on the way in which NASA’s scientific missions integrate the STEM disciplines.

K-12 educators from URM schools and CSUN faculty have been engaged with JPL scientists and mission specialists and experienced the “Life Cycle of NASA Missions,” in which they have acquired new appreciation and understanding of geo-physical and space science that when transferred to their classrooms, may lead to greater student understanding of the importance of climate science as a continuing multiple-discipline scientific pursuit. /

The NASA STEM Educator Professional Development Collaborative is a project led in collaboration with Texas State University. We aim to maintain and build upon the best of the existing NASA professional development offerings and to work closely with NASA to pilot and subsequently implement other innovative, high-impact approaches to new audiences of formal and informal educators. Selected samples of NASA Project Lessons that have been reviewed and aligned to the NGSS with a culturally responsive lens, will be showcased in this presentation. The audience will be invited to discuss why institutions of higher learning and teacher preparation faculty must lead the way in assuring that K-16 STEM education is both accessible and responsive to the diverse perspectives and “funds of knowledge” of URM students.

Let’s Visit the Website First:

https://www.txstate-epdc.net/k-12-educator/

Educators in Grades 4-8 Earth Right Now Teacher and Student Digital Badges: NASA Langley 100th Celebration Tuesday 10/04/2016 1:00 pm PT FREE 1-hour Webinar

NASA's Digital Learning Network Event -- NASA STARS en Español
Audience: All Educators and Students
Event Date: Oct. 13, 2016, 1-1:45 p.m. EDT
Category: Education Webcasts
Do you want to be one of NASA’s STARS? In this series of live Spanish video chats, "Students Talk about Real STEM" with NASA professionals who work in these areas. Join NASA’s Digital Learning Network and Educator Professional Development Collaborative for an inside look at NASA missions, research and careers. Submit questions via Twitter using #NASASTARS or via email to . Or sign up at https://www.txstate-epdc.net/nasa-stars/ for your class to connect directly.

Celebrate National Hispanic Heritage Month with NASA: Earth, Aerodynamics and Mars!

https://www.txstate-epdc.net/celebrate-national-hispanic-heritage-month-with-nasa-earth-aerodynamics-and-mars/

It’s National Hispanic Heritage Month, a great time to celebrate culture and emphasize to students that NASA is for them! NASA has some amazing astronauts, engineers, scientists and technicians that serve as inspiration to all. Just a fewexamples includeNASA’s first Hispanic Astronaut, Dr. Franklin Chang Díaz, former NASA astronaut José Hernández, son of a migrant farm worker who knew he could fly in space,andDr. Ellen Ochoa, the first and only Hispanic woman to travel to space, who is now director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

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How we are adapting NASA Lessons to be presented in culturally responsive curricular formats.

Farming on Mars Space Biology

This is structured as a teacher PD where teachers themselves become researchers and work to create developmentally, culturally relevant curriculum and instruction for their students. They will learn how to lead student investigations that help them understand how NASA’s farming in space-quest is both drawing from and changing the agriculture world and other aspects of everyday life due to new innovative technologies.

Task: You are a team of diverse male and female engineers and scientists who want to be on one of the early missions to settle Mars as an Earth Colony. You know that farming your own food will be as important as identifying the sources of water and minerals needed to produce food. In the first two parts of this challenge you and your team will gather research on the knowledge, resources and materials you will need if you are to submit a winning proposal to NASA so your team will go to Mars. You may even want to study how various indigenous or primitive cultures including those existing today have developed farming strategies in the harshest of environments.

Part II – DESIGN CHALLENGE Each group begins by making predictionsrelated to the topics researched in Part I. (Human nutritional needs; what plants that grow on Earth are most suitable to be grown on the planet Mars given the composition of Mars' soil, lack of water, etc.); what is the history of agriculture on Planet Earth? What can we learn from indigenous farmers from different cultures? [Groups are given reading materials and website links to access scientifically accurate knowledge].

And Finally,

Did you know that the Rosetta Mission just ended? Do you know how??

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/jpl/home/index.html