Washington State University Vancouver, Tri-Cities, Pullman

Washington State University will be one of the nation's leading land-grant universities, preeminent in research and discovery, teaching, and engagement. Our mission: To advance knowledge through creative research, innovation, and creativity across a wide range of academic disciplines; To extend knowledge through innovative educational programs in which students and emerging scholars are mentored to realize their highest potential and assume roles of leadership, responsibility, and service to society; To apply knowledge through local and global engagement that will improve quality of life and enhance the economy of the state, nation, and world.

The NextGen STEM implementation team at WSU works most closely with the following Working Groups: Education for Sustainability (promote the integration of sustainability principles across the coursework taken by preservice teachers); Math in STEM (how to integrate the Math content and experience with other disciplines); Clinical Practice (improving placement, improving communication with mentor teachers); Engineering (how to integrate engineering into pre-service teachers' experiences outside of engineering classes); and, Computer Science (how to integrate computer science into pre-service teachers' experiences); Diversity (recruiting and supporting diverse pre-service teachers, fostering an asset-based approach to students, supporting students' multiple understandings and connections to content); PCK (creating an exemplar curriculum for pre-service teachers).

Metrics of successful implementation of NextGen STEM Teacher Preparation include:

By 2020

  • Survey current Ed students to hear about the obstacles they encountered, how they overcame them (if they did), and what institutional barriers we could remove or reduce to help them
  • Have targeted conversations about placements, identify potential mentor teachers and share: placement coordinators will use this list to request placements -- consider the Science and Math Fellows through OSPI -- develop a "marketing" plan for the WSU teacher prep program to "sell" our preservice teachers for placement in local districts
  • Meet with CWU and EWU to discuss their sustainability pathways to get ideas of what we can do on WSU campuses -- maybe engage CSEJ on Vancouver campus
  • Document what's working and what's not in our various WSU programs on each campus
  • What do core practices from MIT program look like in a math methods class? Help supervisors and mentor teachers to understand what math ed looks like now (not necessarily "I do, we do, you do")
  • Explore an integrated science, math, language arts and social studies methods course, by taking a little time from all four existing methods courses to create the 4th integrated one for the same total credits
  • Create a timeline and plan workshops for WSU faculty, staff, with input from pre-service teachers, focused around disseminating best ideas and practices gleaned from NextGen Working Groups' expertise including workshops in
    • Math
    • Computer Science/computational thinking
    • Education for Sustainability
    • Clinical Practice

By 2025:

  • Continue core practices work and extend among all WSU campuses and programs
  • Use the EfS framework to help faculty incorporate sustainability into their courses, across WSU campuses, colleges and programs