QuarkNet
A Program for High School Science Teachers
QuarkNet is an educational program funded by the National Science Foundation and centered at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Chicago, Illinois. The aim of this program is to help support science education in high schools by establishing a nation-wide science teacher network. It provides opportunities for science teachers to learn first hand about frontline physics research in universities, and establish mentor relationships between science teachers and physics professors at universities.
QuarkNet has established 24 centers and will expand by adding 12 more centers each year over the next three years in universities and laboratories participating in hadron collider experiments at CERN in Switzerland and Fermilab in the US.
The High Energy Experimental Physics faculty at University of Florida,
were chosen to be part of this program starting in the year 2000.
We are members of two large international collaborations of physicists that operate
(or plan to operate) huge, complicated detectors whose purpose is to help
elucidate the structure and behavior of matter at the smallest scale.
Two
high school science teachers from Alachua County
worked with us in the summer of 2000:
Vincent Lane of Bucholtz High School in Gainesville
and
Gary Blaskowski of Eastside High School in Gainesville.
They worked with our group during the summer of 2000, and now, during the school
year, they are using their experience in the classroom.
They will also work with the UF physics faculty to design a
research program for up to ten other area teachers who will join the center in
the second year, and they will also help recruit those other science teachers.
These teachers will hold summer research
appointments under the mentorship of the local center physicists. During these
summer appointments, the teachers will participate in the research work of
their mentors. This will allow them to work with aspects of particle physics
devices and applications, become familiar with modern methods of scientific
inquiry, learn about how experiments in particle physics are conceived and
implemented, how physicists go about acquiring and analyzing their data.
By this participation in the research work, the science teacher will establish a working relationship with the scientists from an institution near their high school. After the end of the summer, the teachers will go back to their high school, but the mentor relationship between teacher and physicists will continue during the academic year, when the teachers will extend their research work to the classroom. Eventually this will lead to the formation of a network of science teachers, with periodic meetings during the academic year to discuss pedagogical and scientific issues.
We will be looking for up to ten more teachers from North Florida to join us in
this endeavor for next year (2001).
During the three week visit there is a stipend of $300 per week. For those who
are beyond daily travelling distance, there are funds available for short term
housing.
If you are interested in participating in this program, please send us
e-mail or an informal "snailmail"
note containing the following information:
Deadlines and facts: