RPCS Stem Institute

T H E S T EM I N S T I T U T E AT R O L A N D PA R K C O U N T R Y S C H O O L

A N E D U C AT I O N A B OV E I N S C I E N C E , T E C H N O LO GY, ENGINEERING, A N D M AT H E M AT I C S .

A MESSAGE FROM THE STEM INSTITUTE DIRECTOR At RPCS, we are committed to preparing our girls and young women for the future they will live in, not the present they inhabit now. The U.S. Department of Labor estimates that in the coming century, 80 percent of all non-service industry jobs will require some degree of formal training in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

Through STEM-dedicated educational opportunities (as well as our regular curricular sequence), RPCS builds on the innate curiosity of all of our students and their desire for challenge to become leaders in tomorrow’s workforce.

The program is focused on developing in our students a core set of “common habits of mind” (see sidebar next page) that will make each of them effective problem solvers—the foundation of every STEM field. Employing an interdisciplinary approach in all of our STEM opportunities, we provide the girls and young women at RPCS with the cross-disciplinary skills they will need to pursue whatever future they desire, and in so doing, we seek deliberately to play our role in the larger mission of the school.

I hope you enjoy learning more about our STEM program.

David L. Brock Director, The STEM Institute at Roland Park Country School

It is our responsibility to ensure that our children are prepared to lead our country in the 21st Century and compete in the global marketplace. In order to do that, we need to provide our children with an education that includes a solid foundation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

–State Educational Technology Directors ’ Association

OVERVIEW The STEM Institute at Roland Park Country School strives to foster within girls the attitudes, cognitive skills, and academic foundations to investigate intellectually rigorous problems in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Our goal is to produce young women with the confidence, passion, persistence, and curiosity to explore the empirical world and to develop innovative habits of mind. Engaging in a problem-based curriculum, students of the Institute will learn to plan research projects, work with others, synthesize new knowledge, generate novel solutions, and communicate effectively about their results. Participants will develop the necessary ethical, analytical, and creative reasoning skills to pursue interests in and to prepare for careers in the STEM disciplines.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION The core of the Institute consists of a series of semesterlong research apprenticeships that may be taken in sequential order or as stand-alone courses and are intended for both the student with a committed interest in a possible STEM career and the student who is exploring STEM research for the first time. Each course in the 9th and 10th grades teaches a collection of unique skill sets within specific STEM fields that complement the regular scope and sequence of RPCS math, science, and technology programs, and all of the courses employ differentiated instruction to meet the academic needs of students with prior STEM experience as well as those of the novice researcher.

While graduates of the Institute will be expected to take all four semesters during 9th and 10th grades and develop a final portfolio of major work completed (see “STEM Portfolio Requirements”), the units and semesters remain autonomous, and any student may take any one (or more) of the semester courses on a Pass/Fail basis. In the 11th Grade Research Internship Program, each full–time student of the Institute will be expected to complete a research project of her own choosing, with a focus on a single STEM discipline and topic.

G R A D U AT I O N REQUIREMENTS In addition to and/or in conjunction with the 9th and 10th grade components of the program, graduates of the Institute must complete the following academic coursework as part of their general training in order to receive certification: • • • •

One course of statistics One course of introductory engineering One course of computer science Any two Advanced Placement STEM courses (e.g. , AP Calculus, AP Comp Science, AP Chemistry) • One summer internship (departmental approval required) • Four full years of science • Four full years of math

COMMON HABITS OF MIND • Persisting through failure • Maintaining a sustained effort • Supporting a conclusion • Recognizing the reasonableness of results • Systematic problem solving • Attacking problems from multiple angles • Learning from and building on existing work • Identifying the question • Capacity to model and recognize model’s limits • Audience appropriate communication • Capacity to receive and internalize constructive feedback • Tool evaluation • Data evaluation • Self-teaching • Implementing proposed solutions • Owning moral responsibility for ones’ work • Capacity to engage in constructive peer review • Developing team effectiveness

PORTFOLIO REQUIREMENTS

SCOPE & SEQUENCE OVERVIEW

Each graduate of the Institute must assemble a final portfolio of eight pieces from the list below with at least one coming from each of the four semesters. Possible choices for inclusion in this final portfolio are:

STEM Seminar IA Science

Foundational skills, including literature search for exploratory science

STEM Research Seminar IA

Te c h

Programming to create models

• Computer model to project magnet strength • Peer review formatted paper on short-term memory • Formal poster on seasonal change

STEM Research Seminar IB

• “Space” probe delivery mechanism • Presentation of robot solution

STEM Research Seminar IIA

• Computer program for illustrating Euclid’s postulates • Formal paper comparing and contrasting Euclidean, Spherical, and Hyperbolic geometries, including potential applications and connections to postulates of each system • Project applying topology or one of the 3D geometries to 2D space

STEM Research Seminar IIB

STEM Seminar IB Engineering

Ethical case studies; design process; budget; timelines

Math

Applied

STEM Seminar IIA Math

Formal

Te c h

Use and create 2D and 3D models

• Final presentation of sunscreen product and its container • Video of engineering product presentation • 11th grade internship proposal • Sustainability project prototype

STEM Seminar IIB

CORE COURSE DESCRIPTIONS

STEM Research Seminar IIA interweaves technology and pure mathematics as it investigates non-traditional geometries and topological topics. Students will study possible shapes of the universe and the techniques to project 3- and 4-dimensional objects on a 2-dimensional surface. They will explore Euclidean, Spherical, and Hyperbolic 2-Dimensional Geometries, Mobius Strips and Klein Bottles, as well as 3-Dimensional Projective Geometries, and they will learn how technology supports these mathematics by enabling students to visualize and investigate mathematical objects that cannot be built in our 3-dimensional world or drawn on a 2-dimensional plane. Students explore the complexity of such interactive programs and learn to write their own using Scratch and MatLab programming languages. The course culminates with a final project of the student’s choosing related to topics studied during the semester.

STEM Research Seminar IA introduces students to the applications of technology to the process of scientific investigation. Students will learn to write basic software programs to model different natural phenomena, and they will complete both a detailed investigation on seasonal change and a study on short-term memory to develop their ability to evaluate scientific literature and determine appropriate tool use. A poster presentation and learning to write a peer-reviewed paper are the culminating activities for this course.

STEM Research Seminar IB introduces students to the basic elements and demands of engineering and applied mathematics. Students will complete a semester-long design project that simulates the engineering and math needed to explore nearby planets. They will design the kind of equipment it takes to deliver space probes to another planet’s surface and learn the technology and constraints of controlling such a vehicle remotely. Students will finish the course by learning how to program sensor-rich robots, which they will use to complete missions on a large-scale model of the “Red Planet.”

Engineering

Prototype production; quality control

Science

Material and environmental science; Research proposal

STEM Research Seminar IIB introduces students to how the disciplines of science and engineering are integrated.

Students will explore materials science and environmental impact to develop a novel sunscreen formula and the package to contain it for retail purposes. Students will learn how to develop an engineering research proposal, and they will create a prototype product to test for quality control. All students will complete a culminating project examining sustainable design.

The STEM disciplines are important for all students. They teach logical thinking as well as practical skills. Yet, too often, girls buy into the societal pressure that these subjects are not for them.

–The National Coalition of Girls ’ Schools

OTHER STEM OPPORTUNITIES 8th Grade Accelerated STEM Program

This year-long course prepares girls with strong abilities in math and science to participate in the Upper School accelerated science sequence. As part of their preparation, students in the course will participate in national STEM competitions such as the Toshiba ExploraVision program and the Siemens We Can Change the World Contest.

An increased focus on STEM learning through unique opportunities makes the RPCS experience

An Education Above.

The Environmental Science Summer Research Experience for Young Women (E.S.S.R.E.)

Launched in 2001, E.S.S.R.E. is a three-week summer internship in environmental field studies for 9th and 10th grade girls from the greater Baltimore area. Participants explore the soil chemistry and biota of the Roland Park Country School campus, author and test lab activities for studying soil microenvironments, and adapt these labs for dissemination and use in a wide variety of educational situations and socio-economic conditions. The program’s primary objectives are to give this target audience the opportunity to engage in authentic, self-directed primary research into the ecological roles of soil microbes and, as a result, to nurture their interest in science in general as a possible career option.

THE STEM-PLUS PRESCHOOL – GRADE 8 TOOLKIT • Perseverance • Knowledge is interdisciplinary

E.S.S.R.E. has received national recognition for our efforts to promote the study of soil ecology (including the 2006 SeaWorld/ Busch Gardens/Fuji Film Environmental Excellence Award) and to promote young women’s interests in research (including the chapter “Securing a ‘Voice’” in the National Science Teachers Association monograph, Exemplary Science for Resolving Societal Challenges). Former interns have gone on to work at national research centers such as the University of Maryland’s Center of Marine Biotechnology, the Spinal Cord Injury Center at the Palo Alto VA Hospital, MITRE’s Nanosystems Group, and the Johns Hopkins Space Telescope Science Institute. Many graduates of the program have pursued careers in science, including the Ethyl and Albemarle Science Scholarship from the University of Richmond, the Meyerhoff Scholarship from the University of Maryland Baltimore County, and the National Science Foundation’s STEP program at Dickinson College. A lab manual based on the girls’ work was published in 2008.

• Independent thinkers/risk takers

STEM-Plus: Preschool - Grade 8

• Critical consumer of knowledge

At RPCS, we recognize that intellectual passions can arise at any stage in life. But it is the early years that the National Research Council has identified as especially critical to developing an interest in STEM, and for that reason, we have identified an intellectual toolkit (see sidebar) to provide our students with the skills to nurture this interest. Integrated into the full Preschool through 8th Grade curriculum, our students employ this toolkit regularly in problemsolving projects that can include: • Using sustainable practices to grow and harvest gardens on campus • Participating in a bridge-building design competition • Creating and analyzing fraction quilts • Digging for archaeological artifacts and deciphering the findings • Learning computer code to build unique designs with newly found skills • Understanding Ancient Rome by producing a web project • Designing a city park and presenting proposals to a panel of Baltimore City officials • Working in the Innovation Lab to further develop STEM based projects

• Collaboration • Curiosity • Knowledge evolves over time • Understanding has levels of complexity for the same idea • Can reflect on progress • Comfortable with making mistakes • Knowledge has consequences for the social and natural world • Effects have causes • Interconnectedness of all knowledge • Comfortable using technology • Measurement • Design • Graphing • Communication • Computational thinking • Identifying a problem • Creating a plan to solve a problem • Supporting a solution to a problem with evidence • Logical reasoning • Self-assessment of solutions • Observation • Pattern recognition

AUGUST 2016

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