The intent of the PISCES family science learning programs is to build sustainable interest and community commitment in high quality science programs at a diverse cross section of schools in San Diego County that typically lack access to engaging science programs. It is anticipated that more than 60 Family Science learning experiences, serving approximately 6,000 students and families, will occur in the 2003–04 school year with the support of the Boston Scientific Foundation. Informing and involving the school community, which includes parents and community members, in the importance of science learning for all students can build a sustainable future for science as a priority in the school curriculum.

PISCES kicked off the Family Science initiative with a well-attended teacher professional development program on October 16 at the San Diego County Office of Education. Teachers from 28 PISCES Project schools attended the workshop led by the Foundation for Family Science. Incentives are provided for teacher leadership and implementation of Family Science at PISCES school sites, thanks to the grant funding from Boston Scientific.

Family Science programs give teachers, students, and parents an opportunity to share science learning experiences informally. Students feel a sense of pride at being able to show their parents, in nonthreatening venues, that they are knowledgeable about science terms and procedures. When they are immersed in family-learning oriented programs and observe other parents similarly engaged, parents build confidence and gain insights in asking questions and exploring science concepts with children.

Members of the San Diego Science Alliance have experienced the rewards of partnering teachers, families, and scientists in community settings and are now excited to see more opportunities available through the PISCES Family Science programs. SDSA members from industry and research can participate in PISCES Family Science by providing an informal demonstration of the science used in developing products or research applications at a Family Science event.

Intended outcomes of Family Science learning experiences include a visibility of science curriculum connected to San Diego area industry and field learning experiences in K–6 school communities. San Diego Science Alliance members interested in participating in school site Family Science events should contact PISCES Project Family Science coordinator, Adrienne Marriott (adrienne_marriott@hotmail.com) or PISCES Project Co-Director, Nancy Taylor (ntaylor@sdcoe.net).

As we approach the close of the year it is time to look back and reflect upon our accomplishments and the many positive changes that the San Diego Science Alliance has experienced over the course of the year.

• This year we were very pleased to welcome new board members from such renowned San Diego companies such as BioMedica, Inc; Air Products and Chemicals, Inc.; Hewlett Packard; Pfizer; and the UCSD Supercomputer Center. It is the continued support of our old corporate friends and these new partnerships with San Diego companies that make the San Diego Science Alliance a success for our community, our teachers and our students.
• The Resource Catalog continues to develop and grow and is now utilized by more and more science teachers than ever before. Our new redesigned web page will be launched on October 22. The excitement continues, thanks to all who are involved and care to make a difference.
• We continue to grow and develop on all fronts. No longer content to be the “best kept secret” in San Diego, we strive to reach more individuals in the business and academic community through our outreach efforts and new events. This year we had a North County event at ViaSat in July and, due to its success, plan another on November 18 in North County Inland at BAE Systems and cohosted by Hewlett Packard.

• Our High Tech Fair continues to grow and gather new exhibitors every year. Once again this year, students from all San Diego County schools were the beneficiaries of our business partners’ zealous pursuit of engaging students in science and proudly sharing their own technological accomplishments.

This past year that I served as president of the Board of Directors of SDSA has been extremely rewarding. It is amazing to be part of such a dynamic and passionate group of people. We look forward to many new innovative and exciting experiences in the coming year.

But we cannot do it alone. We need your support and expertise. Experience the joy and excitement that our students feel when a new world opens up before them. Be a part of something truly wonderful; get involved with the San Diego Science Alliance and see what you can do to make a difference. Thanks for your support!

The BE WiSE Program (Better Education for Women in Science and Engineering) has exciting plans for the school year, for both new 7th and 8th grade girls who will enter the program as well as the active group of Alumnae. And our first set of BE WiSE Alumnae graduated from high school in June. One alumnae started at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis where she spent seven weeks as a plebe before officially starting in the fall. Girls also are at Humboldt State, Cal State San Marcos, State University in Morrow, Georgia, and Grossmont Community College, to name a few.

In July a small group of 10th and 11th grade alumnae met at the Zoo for a most interesting evening with two CRES researchers and a Zoo veterinarian. The program was arranged by Wendy Slijk, a long time BE WiSE Steering Committee person. Wendy arranged the program with Meg Sutherland-Smith, a Zoo veterinarian, who took the girls to the hospital and showed them the various tools needed for surgery and other procedures for large and small animals. Dr. Barbara Durrant from CRES explained to the girls about the artificial insemination program for the pandas, and

Lauren Howard, a resident veterinarian in the Zoo hospital, talked about the condor program. Indeed, this was a special opportunity for all involved. The theme for the overnights in April and May for the new group of 7th and 8th grade girls will be marine biology. Joy Wolf at SeaWorld has generously made it possible for one of the overnights to again be at SeaWorld; the other one will be at the Birch Aquarium. The committee is making plans now for these two spring overnights, and information will be posted on the web site (www.sdsa.org/bewise) as it becomes available.

Several programs are planned for the BE WiSE alumnae this year too. In January, the 9th and 10th grade alumnae will spend a Saturday at the General Atomics Fusion Facility. Their parents will be invited to arrive one hour before the program ends so they can have a tour of the tokamak. In March the 8th grade alumnae will go to Legoland and participate in a robotics program. On Saturday, October 11, 55 BE WiSE alumnae in 8th, 9th, and 10th grade attended the Expanding Your Horizons Program at UCSD (see article in this newsletter about that day). Several of the current 12th grade alumnae have indicated they would like to help at the spring overnights at SeaWorld and Birch Aquarium. This is a busy start for the BE WiSE Program and more will be added.

Students going to summer camp don’t usually make the headlines, but, for four San Diego students, attending two weeks of Space Camp in Huntsville, Alabama, made big headlines in their lives. Thanks to the generosity of law firm Fish and Richardson P.C., fifth grade students Suzanna Osuna (Rolando Park, San Diego Unified SD), Zacharay Ennenga (Parkview, Chula Vista Elementary SD), Micah Shaw (San Altos, Lemon Grove SD) and Anthony Millican (Emory, South Bay Union SD) were able to have this wonderful experience.

As part of the San Diego collaborative INScience’s 2002–2003: Year of Space in San Diego, the students entered an essay contest, answering several questions such as “If you could fly on the next Space Shuttle Mission, or on a mission to Mars, why would you want to go? “ and “Do you think there is life in outer space?” Teachers from each district submitted entries to INScience corporate partners Fish and Richardson P.C., and representatives of the San Diego office of the firm selected a winner from each of the four districts.

Fish and Richardson were extremely generous in their outfitting of the students for their adventure: travel, Space

Camp tuition, room and board, $200 spending money, and a space suit.

How did Space Camp affect the students? Suzanna’s father, Paul Osuna, writes: “She hasn’t stopped talking about it. Her confidence and attitude towards math were positive before she went, but now she’s confident that she will master whatever comes her way. She’s really excited about continuing to study math and science for a career in a space-aerospace field. Suzanna is staying in touch with her new friends around the country and decided on her own to start saving up money to go back to Huntsville for a follow up.

All INScience collaborative partners—the San Diego County Office of Education, San Diego Science Alliance, University of San Diego, Reuben H. Fleet Science Center, San Diego City Schools, Lemon Grove School District, and Chula Vista Unified School District —are deeply grateful to Fish and Richardson P.C., with special thanks to Kelly Largey and Amy Park.

Last May the board of trustees in San Diego City Schools adopted a new reform, inquiry-based curriculum for high school chemistry. The program, Living By Chemistry (LBC), was developed at the University of California Berkeley and the Lawrence Hall of Science. The latest adoption is part of the district’s reform efforts begun in 1999. Superintendent Alan Bersin and the district’s high school leadership team are working to ensure that students who graduate from San Diego City Schools will have taken the coursework that will enable them to enroll in the state’s university system. The district added another year of science to the graduation requirement and all students take physics, chemistry, and biology.

Providing curriculum that increases student conceptual understanding and leads students to further work in science has been the goal of the district. Entering freshmen begin their secondary science experience with Physics 1, 2 a course in conceptual physics using the NSF supported curriculum, Active Physics. The physics course is then followed by Chemistry 1–2, using another NSF supported curriculum, Living By Chemistry. Both of these programs are based on the idea that students need many hands-on experiences to truly understand the concepts and principles of a science discipline.

The process that led to the adoption of Living By Chemistry took a year to complete. The science department solicited interested chemistry teachers to fieldreview the curriculum. Eighteen teachers taught one module of the curriculum in the second semester of last year. The teachers found the program both accessible for students and rigorous in chemistry content. Teachers felt that the curriculum showed students the relationship of a chemistry topic to their lives, thus engaging the students in their own learning. They also

felt that students more actively participated in class.The chemistry adoption committee recommended the curriculum to the board of trustees for adoption, and, in a rare 5-0 vote, the board approved the materials for adoption in preparation for implementation in the fall of 2003.

Professional development, a hallmark of the district’s effort to improve student achievement, began in the summer of 2003. For chemistry that included a two-week summer institute for teachers. The focus of the summer institute was on familiarizing the teachers with the new curriculum and introducing them to the learning design of the materials. The format of the curriculum requires more student participation and less teacher direction (such as lecturing.) Monthly professional development days will be held throughout the year to support the needs of teachers and students. Teachers without a credential in chemistry are enrolled in the San Diego State Chemistry 496 course which will increase chemistry content knowledge and prepare participants for the credentialing exam, the CSET.

The emphasis in the classroom is on learning chemistry at the level required to succeed on the California Science Standards Test in Chemistry. The structure of the new materials will support all students to that end. Emphasis on group work and communicating both orally and in writing are strengths of the curriculum design.

Autumn Chapman, a district high school science resource teacher, leads the work of guiding the implementation. She is assisted by Dr. Rebecca Kruse who works both for the school district and San Diego State University. Providing research support, implementation guidance, and leadership are Dr. Gillian Roerig of SDSU, Dr. Angelica Stacy of the University of California Berkeley, and the SCI Center at BSCS in Colorado.

The Science Alliance’s 7th Annual San Diego County Educational Technology Fair is scheduled for Wednesday, February 18, 2004 from 9 a.m.–2 p.m. at the Del Mar Fairgrounds. We expect at least 50 exhibitors and 2500 students to attend, plus several legislators and the media. Our cosponsors of this event are the San Diego Congressional Delegation, the San Diego County Office of Education, and San Diego City Schools.

It is definitely a team effort! Participating schools will receive an educational kit for their teachers to enhance the students’ experience at the Fair, as well as possible reimbursement for their bus expense. There will also be a teacher orientation and dinner on January 24, 2004 at the San Diego County Office of Education.

The Tech Fair is unique in that its charter is to enlighten 7th–12th grade students to the world of science and the possibilities of a scientific career. Local participating companies, who provide the interactive experiences for the students, find the experience fun and rewarding. The students enjoy seeing “real life” application of what they may be learning in the classroom. This is a wonderful venue for a cooperative effort between business and education.

Communication of the event and registration is being handled electronically this year. The link to the registration web site is sdsa.org/hightech/exhibitor_ registration.html.

For questions or more information, contact Co- Chairs Cathy Akin (cathy.akin@viasat.com) and Patricia Winter (pat.winter@gat.com).

Thanks to generous contributions from Washington Mutual Foundation (WAMU), Xerox Corporation and WestEd, the 2003–2004 Resource Catalog will be better than ever. WAMU granted $10,000 to the Science Alliance to improve the online database of resources for teachers, Xerox prints the catalog each year, and WestEd hosts our web site.

During the summer, we engaged two local teachers, Nina Drammissi and Gretchen Taylor, who contacted each and every organization in the catalog to help update their program resources. Several new organizations were recruited and lots of information was brought up-to-date. The entire database will be printed by Xerox in time for our fall community event on October 22.

Another summer activity led by Nina Drammissi and Rick Beach included hosting three focus groups of science teachers who generated many, many suggestions to

improve the search tools for finding programs in the online Resource Catalog. Nineteen teachers from nine school districts at all grade levels participated along with SDSA board members Chris Smith, Arlene De Strulle, Rick Beach, and Patricia Winter.

Changes to the SDSA web site, www.sdsa.org, are nearing completion for a planned launch at the fall community event on October 22. Karl Wang, our new webmaster who works at the San Diego Supercomputer Center, has redesigned the layout and appearance of the web site and updated the online Resource Catalog. New board member Chris Smith, SDSC, has led the initiative to expand our web services and we will be funding one of his web programmers, Tracy Zhao, to learn more about and exploit the capabilities provided by our server host agency, WestEd.

Thanks to all of these generous contributors, the programs of the San Diego Science Alliance continue to expand and improve.

On Saturday, October 11, more than 550 young women and 150 parents joined industry professionals at San Diego’s second Expanding Your Horizons (EYH) Conference at UCSD. The goal of the EYH Conference is to enhance girls’ exposure to mathematics, science, and technology. Dr. Padma Nanduri of Associated Eye Surgeons Medical Group at UCSD, and medical expert for Channel 7/39, was the event’s Keynote Speaker. Students attended three of over 60 different interactive workshops led by industry professionals. In addition, there was a special workshop track for parents to provide tools and techniques to support their daughters’ interests and future aspirations. The program concluded with a special activity designed to involve, excite, and encourage the girls’ interest in science, mathematics, and technology. “Girls in grades 6–10 from the greater San Diego region were invited to join scientists and engineers from the region who inspired and supported their interest in science and technology. It is truly a unique opportunity for industry to interact directly with their future workforce,” said Kathy Kailikole, EYH Conference Chair.

The EYH Conference Steering Committee was comprised of dedicated volunteers who are committed to giving girls the finest of opportunities for developing their capabilities and

understanding their right to prepare for an equal place in the world of science, mathematics, and technology. Steering Committee members include: Kathy Kailikole, UCSD; Becky Stawiski, San Diego Futures Foundation; Kelly Jenkins-Pultz, U.S. Department of Labor, Women’s Bureau; Danine Ezell, San Diego City Schools; Sara Steinhoffer, UCSD; Susan Kelly, UCSD Jacobs School of Engineering; Elizabeth Basinet, Barrett Resource Group; Patricia Winter, San Diego Science Alliance; Jo Moss, American Association of University Women; Cheryl Brown, Coalesce Consultant.

The EYH Conference was made possible through generous donations by Conference Sponsors. University of California, San Diego (UCSD) donated the facilities for the conference and staff to support the event, including Conference Chair, Kathy Kailikole. The San Diego Foundation, at the request of an anonymous donor, provided generous funding to support the event as a Platinum Sponsor. Silver-level Sponsors include General Atomics and San Diego Gas and Electric, a Sempra Energy Company, both providing generous financial donations for conference development. Cubic Corporation, Dow Chemical Company, Lockheed Martin, Merck, Nokia, Pfizer, the San Diego Foundation’s Ronald and Joan Moss Fund, San Diego Workforce Partnership, Sony, and U.S. Department of Labor Women’s Bureau contributed as Bronze-level Sponsors.

Are you a scientist or engineer who would like to use your skills to help inspire future scientists and engineers? INScience* will connect San Diego area engineers and scientists with 4th and 5th grade students and teachers to discover the excitement of engineering, design, and scientific inquiry. Utilizing a curriculum—A World in Motion—provided by the Society of Automotive Engineers, volunteer engineers and scientists will have opportunities to learn about the curriculum and participate in classroom activities.

Volunteer engineers and scientists who have participated in the INScience introductory workshops to become familiar with the design and engineering project of the World in Motion curriculum may be scheduled to visit classrooms. They may share relevant engineering and research experiences and/or provide technical assistance during the design phase of the curriculum. During the week of February 23, 2004, INScience volunteers will visit 4th and 5th grade classrooms as part of a culmination activity for the World in Motion engineering projects.

Engineers and scientists interested in volunteering in the INScience program during the 2003-2004 school year may prepare by participating in an introductory workshop that will provide an overview of the program and curriculum, submit a letter of intent to participate, and attend the INScience Engineers and Scientist briefing prior to classroom visits. Volunteer time commitment may range from 3–15 hours and/or up to two school days (9 a.m.–2 p.m.) during National Engineering Week, February 23–27, 2004.

For additional information log on to the INScence web site at www.sdsa.org/INSscience.

*INScience is a countywide collaboration between San Diego County Office of Education, San Diego Science Alliance, University of San Diego, Reuben H. Fleet Space Center, Chula Vista Elementary School District, Lemon Grove School District, and San Diego City Schools.

INScience delivers nationally recognized science programs to San Diego City Schools, Lemon Grove, and Chula Vista school districts. Four vital educational entities—San Diego County Office of Education, San Diego Science Alliance, University of San Diego, and Reuben H. Fleet Science Center—partner with these school districts. Their INScience collaborative engages teachers, students, families, community partners, and visiting researchers to focus on education through the lenses of science, engineering, mathematics, and technology. The participating school districts will help set the pace for expanding this program to additional school districts in years to come.

In this year’s highlighted partnership with the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) and its World in Motion program, INScience will leverage resources to provide:

• professional development for curriculum specialists and 200 5th grade teachers;
• a JetToy design competition for 5500 5th graders in teams of three;
• 100 classroom visits and school assemblies;
• a community science event with visiting science researchers for 10,000 K–12 students and families in community venues; and
• a specifically enhanced curriculum consonant with national and California standards.

In 2002–03, with Honorary Chair Captain Wally Schirra, the INScience collaborative was a national Journey through the Universe site. It provided professional development to more than 200 teachers, hosted three community science nights for more than 500 participants, and completed classroom visits and school assembles to more than 12,100 students with seven visiting space scientist researchers in its four participating districts: Lemon Grove, South Bay Union, Chula Vista, and San Diego City Schools.

Science is key to San Diego. INScience coordinates the efforts of diverse local and regional elements involved in science throughout the San Diego area. Special efforts will engage first generation and low income students and their families.

INScience information, events and updates are online at www.sdsa.org/INScience/. Stay tuned and try to catch our JetToy with your cursor!

I recently attended a workshop on Involving Scientists and Mathematicians in Our Work at the Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS). The LHS, located at the top of a hill above the University of California, Berkeley, is a world class institution that develops science curriculum materials and museum displays. Some of their more well known efforts include GEMS (Great Explorations in Math and Science) and FOSS (Full Option Science Systems), programs that are used in many San Diego area schools.

What was the point of the workshop? In the past, curriculum developers, especially for grades K–8, developed their materials essentially on their own. They may have used a scientist as a consultant to write a small section or to review an aspect of the material at the conclusion of their development effort. But they now realize that they need scientists at the beginning of their development effort, in the midst of their efforts, as well as to review the final product; in other words, they need scientists to be active members of their development teams. The point of the workshop was to determine mechanisms for involving scientists and to discuss models that have been shown to work

Curriculum developers face several difficulties. Primarily, they find it difficult to recruit scientists to become members of their teams. And, in general, they view members of their local university, UC Berkeley in the case of LHS, as the most likely and easily accessible pool of candidates. Two other participants in this workshop included the chairmen of the physics and mathematics departments at UC Berkeley. Both pointed out that young, pre-tenure faculty members have no incentive to spend any of their precious time helping to develop K–12 curricula, since that work would not improve their likelihood for tenure. Even tenured members have little

or no incentive, since such activities are unlikely to improve their status in their community or increase their chances for salary increases or promotion. Industrial scientists probably have even less incentive to become involved in such efforts, since these efforts do not contribute to their company’s profit.

Yet there are models that work. Collaborations with NASA scientists are quite painless since a portion of NASA contracts must include an educational outreach component. Therefore, there is an available pool of NASA scientists willing and wanting to collaborate in the development of educational materials. But this requirement is not currently part of the grants of other government agencies, limiting the incentives for these other scientists to participate.

I was the lone representative from industry at this workshop as well as the only non-Berkeley scientist. It is rare that scientists become involved with professional curriculum developers, such as those at LHS, in particular if they are not located nearby and especially if they are from industry. While most scientists work in industry, industrial scientists have not yet brought their experiences and expertise into K–12 science curricula. The chance for personal interactions and word-of-mouth introductions is just too low for most scientists who would like to impact curricula to do so. There needs to be a more structured mechanism for involving scientists, particularly industrial scientists, with curriculum developers. A database of willing partners is sorely needed.

This is where the San Diego Science Alliance can play a connecting role. If you would be interested in working in some capacity with K–12 curriculum developers, please contact Patricia Winter at pat.winter@gat.com. If you have questions or comments about my roles in K–12 science education, feel free to contact me at Larry.Woolf@gat.com.

The Dow Chemical Company Biotechnology group has held several educational outreach events in the past year. We have held two Saturday morning hands-on workshops for the BeWISE alumnae. Through these workshops, the girls learned about various tools used in biotech companies such as bioinformatics, DNA preparation and manipulation, protein analysis, and basic microbiology. A group of scientist volunteers at Dow also held a similar workshop for middle school science teachers in San Diego City Schools. Both were well received, and we hope to hold more events such as these in the future.

Hello, my name is Debra Brice and I am an 8th grade Science teacher at San Marcos Middle School. I have been selected as a NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) Teacher at Sea (TAS), along with another teacher from Chile. As far as I am aware, this is the first time that the NOAA Teacher at Sea program has supported teachers on a UNOLS (University-National Oceanographic Laboratory) ship, but not the last. For those of you who do not know, the NOAA Teacher at Sea Program has had more than 400 teachers participate in the last 13 years. This year is a turning point for the program: establishing new partnerships, raising its visibility, providing sponsorship opportunities, and reaching more students and teachers.

The ship we will travel on is a Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIA) ship—R/V Roger Revelle— and the chief scientist, Dr. Robert Weller, is from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. The Chilean teacher and I will be flying to Equador at the beginning of November to meet the ship and will leave Manta, Equador on November 9. We will be at sea for about three weeks and will return to Arica, Chile to fly home. During our trip we will be deploying a tsunami buoy for NOAA and doing some other physical oceanographic research related to the deployment of a weather buoy for Woods Hole. The Chilean teacher and I will be e-mailing students as well as doing webcasts that can be viewed by our own students and many others on the NOAA TAS web site. We will be working with classrooms in Australia, Spain, Canada, and Equador, as well as the U.S. and Chile, and will be working with geography classes as well as science classes. For more information and education resources on tsunamis, go to www.pmel.noaa.gov.

My students toured the Roger Revelle with Dr. Robert Knox, the Assistant Director of Scripps, on September 23, 2003,

and were accompanied by Captain Althouse. My students met the scientists I will be traveling with as they were loading and preparing the ship during that week. Since that week was Scripps Centennial Celebration, it was very appropriate that we were inspiring young oceanographers during this special time. My students will be able to follow me on the web during my whole trip, and they will be able to ask questions and participate in experiments using near real time data. This is truly a “classroom without walls.” The newest text book on the first day in a classroom is already five years old as far as the data it contains. Students need to learn to use real data and remote sensing as part of their everyday science experiences. These students, by accessing the TAS and SIO web sites, can participate with real scientists in the field doing real science as it happens. NOAA has been sending teachers and, through them, their students to sea for 13 years. This is where science education is going—partnerships with scientists and research institutes that bring real science into the classroom.

Here are the plans for my trip. I leave November 4 for Manta, spend four days in Manta, and then we depart on November 9. We go 800 miles southwest off the coast of Chile to deploy a Weather and Acoustical Buoy for Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, then we go in towards the coast to deploy a Tsunami detection Buoy for NOAA. I will be interviewing scientists and crew members in live webcasts as well as participating in the science that is going on. I will be e-mailing and answering student questions daily as well as developing lesson plans. My e-mail on the ship will be Debra.Brice@noaa.gov. The web site you can see me on is www.tas.noaa.gov/.

I hope you and your students can join me on the web.

SDSA Newsletter Volunteers

Newsletter Editor:
Janet Trentacosta

SDSA Executive Director:
Patricia Winter, General Atomics Sciences Education Foundation

Contributors:
Barbara Abelin, Cubic Corporation
Cathy Akin, ViaSat Inc.
Liz Basinet, Barrett Resources
Rick Beach, Ph.D., Classroom of the Future Foundation
Kim Bess, San Diego City Schools
Debra Brice, San Marcos Middle School
Diane Retallack, The Dow Chemical Company
Nancy Taylor, San Diego County Office of Education
Cynthia Villis, Ph.D., University of San Diego
Patricia Winter, General Atomics
Larry Woolf, Ph.D., General Atomics

San Diego Science Alliance,
a non-profit organization
6449 Caminito Sinnecock
San Diego, CA 92037
(858) 454-7622
Fax: (858) 454-4548
e-mail: pat.winter@gat.com

SDSA web site: www.sdsa.org