NSF Grant to Place Duke Teaching Fellows In Coastal N.C. Schools

Monday, August 5, 2002

Beginning this fall, kindergarten through 12 grade students in four eastern North Carolina schools will have a direct window to ongoing research about life in variable and polluted marine coastal environments through a new teaching fellows program being established at the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort.

A $1,006,850 grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) will place 14 Duke students -- three doctoral students, five Master of Environmental Management students and six undergraduates -- into Carteret County schools for the next three years, where they can share their research and add hands-on learning activities to the classroom experience.

The teaching fellows will devote 15 hours a week to the project. The format encourages learning, and promotes the goal of the NSF to enrich science and mathematics education in the nation's schools.

"The Duke Marine Lab has responded to concerns of local residents for coastal pollution by partnering with K-12 schools to raise environmental awareness," said Celia Bonaventura, primary investigator for the project and professor of cell biology. "The addition of this program contributes to this partnership by benefiting the teaching fellows educationally and by allowing them to bring their special knowledge into the classroom to reconnect children to nature."

Bonaventura is based at the Duke Marine Lab in Beaufort, which is part of the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences. Michael K. Orbach, director of the Duke Marine Lab, is co-principal investigator.

Carteret County schools participating include Smyrna Elementary School, Newport Middle School, East Carteret High School in Beaufort and West Carteret High School in Morehead City. As part of the program, some 27 computer-assisted microscopes will be installed in the schools and used in studies of marine and freshwater environments.

David Lenker, Carteret County School superintendent, said, "It is the school system's belief that relevant, hands-on activities help motivate students to become lifelong learners. As many families in Carteret County depend upon the water for their livelihoods, it is only natural that schools support the use of the local environment as a living laboratory."

Duke is one of 22 institutions nationwide to receive three-year grants from NSF's Graduate Teaching Fellows in K-12 Education (GK-12) program. The program is intended to encourage graduate students to increase their communication skills by sharing science and mathematics expertise. Assisted by faculty mentors, the teaching fellows will bring inquiry-based projects into the classrooms. The projects will draw on marine resources and illustrate the importance of science, mathematics, engineering and technology.

Under the GK-12 program, graduate students in the program receive annual stipends of $21,500, plus a cost-of-education allowance. Undergraduates will receive as much as $5,000 per academic year, plus up to an additional $5,000 for service during the summer.

Fellows, assisted by faculty and staff at the Duke Marine Lab, can pursue a wide range of research interests from ecology to biochemistry that will complement their K-12 teaching activities. They can focus on such topics as the foraging ecology of bottlenose dolphins; the social and economic impacts of fisheries regulation; the ecology of marine fish and turtles; and the effectiveness of agricultural practices in improving estuarine water quality.

Steve Desper, coordinator of the program for the Duke Marine Lab, said the fellows will begin meeting with their faculty mentors in August, and will be in the schools by late September.

The Duke Marine Lab is located on Pivers Island across the channel from the historical center of Beaufort. The region's system of barrier islands, sounds, estuaries and coastal ocean offer both pristine and heavily polluted areas that are available for study by the teaching fellows.