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| Network Topics |
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ITEST/COSEE Webinar On Wednesday, February 23, ITEST (Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers) Learning Resource Center and COSEE showcased curriculum materials on topics ranging from computer game development to engineering design to ecology to ocean sciences. These curricula - designed for middle/high school teachers and students and available online at no charge - encourage and support innovative STEM learning and teaching and have been adapted through collaboration with partners, educators and students across the ITEST and COSEE education programs. The webinar was recorded and will be archived and posted to the ITEST and COSEE websites soon.
Opportunities for Undergraduates, Graduate Students and Post-Docs This collection of resources available throughout the COSEE Network is now available on COSEE.net here. |
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| COSEE National Office Updates |
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Network Meeting The 2011 COSEE Network Meeting will be held in Newport, Rhode Island, May 2-4 at the Hyatt Regency Newport. The deadline to register for the meeting is Monday April 4. For details, contact either Andrea Gingras or Romy Pizziconi.
Outreach in Mexico COSEE Executive Director Gail Scowcroft conducted an education program "Climate Change, the Role of the Ocean, and Impacts on Ocean Life" in Punta de Mita, Mexico on February 21. The workshop was held as a fundraiser for the local organization PEACE that works to promote environmental awareness and stewardship of the Bahia Banderas region. PEACE conducts programs for school groups and adults. |
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| Working Group Updates |
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Scientist Engagement Working Group Take a moment to visit the COSEE Engaging Scientists page. The three case studies already posted (Drs. Rick Keil, Carrie Thomas and Bob Chen) will soon be joined by two more. The SEW-G is very close to beginning the approval process for Dr. Michael Kemp (University of Maryland, COSEE Coastal Trends) and Dr. Scott Glenn (Rutgers University, COSEE NOW). The production team continues to make excellent progress. Dr. Brian McCann has scheduled a visit with Dr. Isaac Ginis, (University of Rhode Island, COSEE National Office) during the May Network Meeting, and is finalizing dates for summer visits to Dr. Joel Hoffman (Environmental Protection Agency, COSEE Great Lakes) and Dr. Jude Apple (Western Washington University, COSEE Pacific Partnerships). In the meantime, Catherine Cramer is logging interviews and writing text for Dr. Crystal Johnson (Louisiana State University, COSEE Central Gulf of Mexico), while Lisa Taylor completes the case study website pages and posts additional content. Jessie Kastler is working with evaluators and building a webquest that will facilitate use of this webpage by K-12 teachers seeking ocean career discovery resources. The interview process will soon be started with the two remaining featured scientists, as this project moves steadily toward completion. Please contact SEW-G Chair Jessie Kastler with questions, suggestions and comments (228-872--4269).
Evaluation Working Group Second Scientist Engagement Survey: A Success! We have completed data collection for the second annual cross-COSEE Scientist Engagement Survey, led by the Evaluation Working Group (EWG). Fourteen centers participated in this effort. Invitations were sent out to 872 scientists and the Network received approximately 500 responses from scientists and others for a 56% response rate. Chris Parsons (last year’s EWG Chair) is working closely with Inverness Research to sift through the data provided by the Centers, confirm the accuracy of the data submitted and collate the data. In March, the data will be analyzed and final results will be released in early April. Results from this survey will enable the EWG to add to COSEE’s NSF Decadal Review by reporting the number of scientists working with COSEE in 2010, types of interactions, and benefits that scientists gain from working with COSEE. The EWG wishes to thank everyone in the COSEE Network for your efforts in making this a successful scientist survey and a true COSEE-wide effort. For more information about the survey, contact Chris Parsons of COSEE NOW.
Our other EWG news is that starting in April, Shawn Rowe (COSEE Pacific Partnerships) will be taking over for Rosanne Fortner (past EWG chair) as the EWG liaison to the COSEE Council. The EWG wishes to thank Rosanne for her stellar support of the EWG and invite everyone to support Shawn in his new role as EWG liaison. Chris Parsons has just stepped down as EWG Chair in February but continues to be an invaluable resource for the EWG. So we would also like to thank Chris for her hard work and dedication in guiding the EWG during the past year and a half. I cannot thank all of the EWG members enough for working on this year’s scientist survey. The EWG has been an excellent working group that has been able to accomplish a great deal in the past two years. We look forward to continuing our work toward COSEE’s NSF Decadal Review and creating a vision for evaluation for COSEE’s future. For more information about the EWG, contact Patricia Kwon of COSEE West.
Web Working Group This month the WWG ramped up work on implementing RSS feeds for COSEE.net and the Center websites. Also ongoing: content migration for COSEE SouthEast's move to the CMS, population of COSEE OCEAN's new website (also on the CMS), securement of a domain and host account for COSEE TEK, and updates regarding the posting of subpages on parent pages that are hidden. For more information, contact Annette deCharon, WWG Chair.
ENTS Sub-Group The Excellence in Networking Tools Sub-Group (ENTs) received excellent results from a survey sent to the Network recently, which asked about topics for future webinars. Based on the data, ENTs is in the process of planning the next webinar, tentatively scheduled for April. Details coming soon. For more information, contact one of the ENTs co-chairs Catherine Cramer and Carla Companion. |
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| COSEE at Conferences |
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 | Student poster at ASLO |
ASLO Aquatic Sciences Meeting COSEE offered several workshops and sessions at the February ASLO meeting in Puerto Rico. Details here.
COSEE at NSTA 2011 The COSEE Network will again have a presence during the 2011 NSTA Conference, San Francisco, CA , March 10-13. COSEE will have a booth in the Exhibit Hall, Catherine Halversen will offer a short course, COSEE will host a full day of concurrent sessions, a COSEE luncheon featuring Dr. David Hollander of the University of South Florida, and COSEE will participate in the NMEA and NESTA Share-a-thons. Details here. NSTA has highlighted the COSEE Program on their conference website.
COSEE at NSTA 2012 Session proposals for the NSTA National Conference are due on Friday, April 15, 2011. Details here. |
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| Center News |
COSEE California COSEE California, COSEE West and COSEE Pacific Partnerships collaborated on a 3-day workshop on Communicating Ocean Sciences (COS) specifically for Knauss Fellows, held February 14-16 at NOAA headquarters in Silver Springs, Maryland. For details contact Craig Strang at COSEE California.
COSEE Coastal Trends will be accepting applications for Teacher Research Fellowships through the end of March. The fellowship is 6 weeks long. Teacher Fellows will participate in a marine science research project and lead curriculum development based on the research. Fellows will be based either at Assateague Island on the Atlantic coast of Maryland or at the Horn Point Laboratory on the Chesapeake Bay. For details and to apply, click here.
COSEE Florida Dr. Rick Tankersley, senior scientist at Florida Institute of Technology, led COSEE Florida's first Presentation Boot Camp on February 11 -12. Details here.
COSEE Great Lakes Steve Stewart, COSEE GL leader for Michigan, has received a "Recognition for Excellence" award, the highest accolade Michigan State University Extension can give to an employee. In addition to his work with COSEE GL, Steve has been instrumental in establishing the Great lakes Education Program and Summer Discovery Cruises, and has led development of curriculum using the Great Lakes Observing System [GLOS]. In the February 2011 issue of Upwellings. Steve links education with the regional economy through a focus on GL Literacy Principle #8: The Great Lakes are socially, economically and environmentally significant to the region, the nation and the planet.
COSEE NOW presents Reflecting on Practice Workshop for Informal Science Educators (2011) to be held in April. Over the past month, scientists aboard the Nathaniel B. Palmer have been investigating the waters of the Ross Sea. Visit the Ross Sea blog.
COSEE OCEAN is collaborating with COSEE California to present a Special Interest Session on Ocean Science Education as part of the GK-12 Learning Network Conference, Sunday, March 13. Details here. COSEE OCEAN presented an all-day workshop at the February ASLO meeting, Using Network Science for Collaboration. Visit the new COSEE OCEAN website.
COSEE Ocean Learning Communities For the second year COSEE OLC, in collaboration with the UW Ocean and Coastal Interdisciplinary Sciences GK-12 program (OACIS GK-12), SoundCitizen and the UW Institute of Science and Mathematics Education offered the high school level curricular materials, My Place in Puget Sound. The curriculum is a place-based inquiry science unit that addresses environmental issues with real and current data, is community relevant, and empowers students to act around environmental issues. The culminating event was a public poster session held on February 4 at the UW campus. 160+ high school students shared their projects with fellow students, scientists, graduate students, citizens and the university community. This project leveraged strengths of all four contributing projects to create something that none of them could create alone.
 | Poster designed by high school students and presented at UW in February |
On February 26, COSEE OLC collaborated with WA Sea Grant at the high school Ocean Science Orca Bowl Competition held on the UW campus. The day concluded with an awards banquet held at the Seattle Aquarium. It was an exciting day of competition involving 16 teams.
COSEE Ocean Systems On March 24th, COSEE-OS partner the Seacoast Science Center (Rye, NH) will host a day-long workshop to attempt to investigate benefits and best practices for scientists engaging in broader impacts activities. The workshop will engage both educators and scientists in a thoughtful dialogue about broader impacts and aims to create recommendations for interested scientists and informal educators.
Nearly nine months after the tragic Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the ecosystem continues to feel its effects. Dr. Karen Orcutt and Dr. Kjell Gundersen will present new data during COSEE Ocean System's second ROLE Model Webinar of the spring series showing how the oil has affected their study sites and what roles microbes have played in the spill's aftermath.
COSEE Pacific Partnerships Co-Director Shawn Rowe presented a session on Communicating Controversial Topics using Concept Mapping at the 2011 Oregon Academy of Science Meeting on February 26 in Portland, OR. Laury Perry, a 2010 COSEE PP PRIME Program community college student intern, gave a poster presentation on her summer research on the caloric content of prey species of juvenile Chinook salmon and the effects of a parasitic isopod on caloric content of the smooth bay shrimp. At the Pacific Estuarine Research Society Meeting in Astoria, OR, March 3-5, Shannon Point Marine Center Scientist Jude Apple gave a poster presentation on COSEE PP opportunities for ocean scientists to fulfill their broader impacts. Mark Burnap, another COSEE PP PRIME 2010 community college student intern, gave a poster presentation on his research project on methods for growing native Olympia oysters for restoration projects in the South Slough NERR in Coos Bay, OR. On March 12, Shawn Rowe will offer a workshop on Educating the Public About the Shore at the Sharing the Coast Conference, sponsored by CoastWatch and the Oregon Chapter of Northwest Aquatic and Marine Educators.
COSEE West presents Tiny But Toxic! Harmful Algal Blooms: Science, Technology and You!, March 21 – April 8, 2011, a free online workshop offered in collaboration with the College of Exploration. For information contact Pat Harcourt.
COSEE West-Colorado Collaborative presents a teacher professional development course, Spring and Summer, 2011: Exploring Connections Between the Global Oceans and the Inland Southwest. Details here or contact Lesley Smith. |
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| Announcements |
Engaging and Supporting Latinas in STEM Join this webcast, Thursday, April 7, 2011 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM Pacific Time as practitioners from informal and formal education discuss strategies and programming ideas for engaging and supporting Latinas in STEM. Register here.
Input Needed: On Next Generation of Science Education Standards The National Research Council (NRC), with a grant from the Carnegie Corporation, is developing a conceptual framework that will guide new K–12 science education standards. A draft framework was released for public input last summer and a final document is slated for release this spring. As we inch closer to new science standards, NSTA wants to know what you think. Take this quick poll.
Input Needed: On Ocean Priorities Action Plans As charged by President Obama’s Executive Order establishing a National Ocean Policy, the newly formed National Ocean Council is seeking input toward development on strategic action plans. There will be strategic action plans for each of the nine action areas, which have been made priority objectives by the Council. The comment period ends on April 29, 2011. Ocean Leadership’s policy team is currently working on submitting formal comments. If you would like to contribute to their efforts by assisting on one or more of Ocean Leadership’s action area working groups, please contact Staci Lewis. The NOC is set to release drafts of the strategic action plans in the summer of 2011. The draft plans will also be made available for public comment.
Ocean Film Festival March 9-13, 2011: The 8th Annual San Francisco Ocean Film Festival, the nation's premier cinemaquatic event, will feature more than 50 adrenaline-drenched and thought-provoking films exploring the beauty, mystery and excitement of the ocean. More details in this podcast. |
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Contribute to CNN! Send news and announcements of interest to the COSEE Network community to the editor, Catherine Cramer.
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| COSEE Centers and Council Representatives |
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| COSEE Alaska (Nora Deans, North Pacific Research Board) |
| COSEE California (Craig Strang, UC Berkeley) |
| COSEE Central Gulf of Mexico (Sharon Walker, Institute for Marine Mammal Studies) |
| COSEE Coastal Trends (Laura Murray, U of Maryland Center for Environmental Science) |
| COSEE Florida (Edwin Massey, Indian River State College) |
| COSEE Great Lakes (Rosanne Fortner, Ohio State University) |
| COSEE Networked Ocean World World (Janice McDonnell, Rutgers University) |
| COSEE OCEAN (Bob Chen, University of Massachusetts) |
| COSEE Ocean Learning Communities (Phil Bell, University of Washington) |
| COSEE Ocean Systems (Annette deCharon, Darling Marine Center, University of Maine) |
| COSEE Pacific Partnerships (Jan Hodder, Oregon Institute of Marine Biology) |
| COSEE SouthEast (Lundie Spence, South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium) |
| COSEE TEK (Ivar Babb, University of Connecticut) |
| COSEE West (Linda Duguay, University of Southern California) |
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