Clayton, N.C. (K-8 Science Infrastructure Project)
In October 2000, Bayer and the Johnston County Schools (JCS) announced a partnership that would bring science education reform to Clayton students, and make JCS one of 20 forward-thinking school districts in the state to join the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction’s “K-8 Science Infrastructure Project.”
Since then, Bayer has awarded five consecutive annual grants totaling $165,000 to JCS. Each grant has served to further support the district in its efforts to implement the reform program in all of its K-5 classrooms, providing ongoing professional development for teachers and high-quality, National Science Education Standards-based curriculum materials.
To date, this support has helped JCS implement the program in 14 of its 19 elementary schools by purchasing 148 curriculum kits that represent 23 different science topic areas, and by providing training in both teaching methodology and science content to 170 of the 900 K-5 teachers in the district.
For the 14 schools currently in the program, JCS will use the latest grant to purchase 34 new curriculum kits and refurbishment materials for the 2004-2005 school year and train the remaining 730 teachers. JCS strategy calls for the 170 teachers now proficient in inquiry science instruction to train the others. In addition, JCS will use part of the grant to purchase an extra 50 curriculum kits for the 2005 – 2006 school year. This will give JCS a major jump start for next year when full implementation of the program is expected to be achieved in all 19 elementary schools and the two middle schools that house fifth grades.
In the five years since the Bayer-JCS reform partnership was announced, North Carolina has undergone some changes with its statewide science education efforts – changes that have catapulted the Bayer-JCS program to a leadership position within the state. First, it developed and then adopted new state science education standards as part of its overall education standards, called the “North Carolina Standard Course of Study.”
Second, the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction transformed its “K-8 Science Infrastructure Project” into the North Carolina-Infrastructure for Science Education of “NC-ISE,” designed to help other school districts meet the new state science standards.
In addition to Bayer’s financial support, the company has provided human resources. In 2000, at the time the JCS partnership was announced, Bayer also launched a “Science Volunteers in the Schools” program in Johnston, Wake, Durham and Orange counties with 75 employee-volunteers. Today, that number has more than doubled, with more than 150 Bayer employee volunteers committed to working with students and teachers on hands-on science learning at local elementary and middle schools. Many of those employees have provided much-needed help to the JCS teachers who are tasked with implementing reform in their classrooms.
Finally, recent JCS assessments illustrate that the reform initiative is making real progress. The assessment asked both Johnston County teachers and principals to rate their schools on a number of reform activities.
Across the board, both groups assigned higher ratings after the project implementation than before:
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Implementation of curriculum reform
- Teacher ratings increased from 1.5 to 2.1
- Principal ratings increased from 1.7 to 2.5
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Availability of professional development activities
- Teacher ratings increased from 1.5 to 1.9
- Principal ratings increased from 1.5 to 2.5
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Development of a centralized materials support system
- Teacher ratings increased from 1.4 to 2.1
- Principal ratings increased from 1.7 to 2.8
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Development of new student assessments
- Teacher ratings rose from 1.6 to 3.8
- Principal ratings increased from 1.4 to 2.3
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Level of partnership activities
- Teacher ratings increased from 0.9 to 1.1
- Principals rose from 1.5 to 2.0
Last updated: March 2011
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