Student Opportunities
The annual North Carolina AQ-IQ Contest for Seventh Grade
It’s that time of year again! It’s time to start talking about the AQ-IQ contest with your 7th grade students.
Who:
The NC Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Air Quality invites ALL NC 7TH GRADE STUDENTS to participate in the 2022-2023 AQ-IQ Contest!
What is the AQ-IQ Contest:
The annual North Carolina AQ-IQ Contest for seventh grade combines S.T.E.M. education and project-based learning with student creativity to teach air pollution science to students across the state. The contest gives these students an opportunity to learn about air quality and think about solutions to air pollution. It puts students in charge of creating a project to educate others about an air quality problem. In the past, projects have been posters, videos, Minecraft creations, games, and artistic projects off all sorts.
Each year the AQ-IQ contest gives out special awards for projects that meet one of the following categories:
- Air Pollution Monitoring and Control Technology
- Cleaner Cars, Cleaner Commutes, and Cleaner Air
- Pollution Free Electricity Technology
- The Science and Technology of Reversing Climate Change
Note: Depending on the number of statewide entries, a larger statewide AQ-IQ award ceremony may be held in June or July. Location and specific date to be announced. In general, entries will compete against other entries from their regions. However, the best regional projects may then be evaluated in the statewide AQ-IQ Contest for a statewide award.
Examples of past project winners can be found on the NC Air Awareness YouTube page:
https://www.youtube.com/user/NCAirAwareness/videos
When:
Now until midnight on March 11, 2023 students can create and submit their projects through this form .
Why:
The AQ-IQ contest allows students to explore their interests and strengths while engaging with the material and learning about air quality. Students are asked to think creatively while designing their projects. Watch our video to hear from teachers about why the AQ-IQ contest works in their classrooms: https://youtu.be/ArtLhL1z1hY
How:
Students need to follow the step-by-step Student Worksheet guide to develop an AQ-IQ project. Once completed, students submit their projects using the online form linked above. We ask students to include both their teacher’s and parent’s emails, as well as their project’s bibliography, when submitting.
For more information on the AQ-IQ contest, you can also visit the NC Environmental Education webpage.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Keith Bamberger at keith.bamberger@ncdenr.gov or 828-296-4500, or through our NC Air Awareness email (air.awareness@ncdern.gov).
We are excited to share this opportunity with 7th grade students again this year and we look forward to seeing what they create!
The Nano Innovation Challenge for Middle and High Schools
THE NANO INNOVATION STUDENT CHALLENGE: USING TINY SCIENCE TO SOLVE WICKED PROBLEMS
Middle and High School Teachers- Sign up your students for this exciting competition. Registration is open until February 20th, 2023.
WHAT DO STUDENTS DO?
Learn about nanoscale science and apply that knowledge to help address one of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, then create a 3-minute video featuring your ideas.
Submissions Due: April 1, 2023
Teachers must register their school by February 20, 2023. After registering your class, you will receive additional information. Registration is limited to 25 North Carolina Schools.
PRIZES: Teams will win prizes that include Amazon gift cards: 1st place $100; 2nd place $50; 3rd place $25. The 1st place winners also will have an hour of scanning electron microscope time to conduct a class investigation. Teachers of winning state-level teams will receive a $50 gift card.
ABOUT THE COMPETITION
Who Can Participate? Middle and High School student teams of up to 5 students
Grab your lab coat and goggles and help scientists address the UN Sustainable Development Goals using nanotechnology. Your idea might be the next excellent solution to providing people across the globe with clean water, better medicines, or making solar energy more economical.
The Task: Create a 3-minute multimedia presentation in the format of a video to pitch your idea for using nanotechnology to address one of the Sustainable Development Goals. Presentations will be judged on these criteria: 1) Application of scientific content, 2) Creativity/Innovation, and 3) Presentation quality.
Judging: There are two levels of judging: 1) Each school will judge the projects and select one winning team to go forth to the state level. 2) At the state level competition, scientists and science educators from the Research Triangle Nanotechnology Network will judge the Nano Innovation presentations and will select the winning teams. Note: The state competition is limited to the first 25 schools to register.
Sponsored by The Research Triangle Nanotechnology Network, the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation, and the College of Education at NCSU.
See Attached Flyer for More Information
Professional Development Opportunities
Nature Workshop...Free for Select Districts!
Do you need FREE ideas to get your students journaling or using Science notebooks outdoors? We have an upcoming FREE Nature Journaling workshop just for you (And if you travel more than 40 miles one way to the workshop we can reimburse you for gas)! Please encourage your teachers to Register now!
Examine ways to share the natural world with your students through nature journaling. Special guest and local artist Bess Taylor will join us for the day to share her enthusiasm and inspiration for art in the outdoors. We’ll practice various journaling techniques as we explore plants and animals that can be found in most backyards, schoolyards, or local parks. Discover cross-curricular connections through activities that can be used in virtual and in-person classrooms. Participants will receive a variety of nature journaling supplies.
Eligibility: Thanks to a generous donation from the Anonymous Trust, this workshop is offered free of charge to teachers, guidance counselors, media coordinators or assistant principals in public schools from one of the following counties:
Beaufort, Bertie, Bladen, Chowan, Columbus, Cumberland, Duplin, Edgecombe, Gates, Greene, Halifax, Hertford, Hoke, Hyde, Jones, Lenoir, Martin, Nash, Northhampton, Pasquotank, Perquimans, Robeson, Sampson, Scotland, Tyrrell, Warren, Washington, Wayne, Wilson, and Vance.
If you are interested in attending and do not meet the previously mentioned criteria, we have good news: the waiting list is open to all educators. If we have spaces available, we will start pulling people off the waiting list beginning February 25, 2023. Participants that do not meet the Anonymous Trust criteria will have a workshop cost of $60.00 and will not be eligible for fuel cost reimbursement.
Credit: 8 contact hours toward CEUs or Criteria II/III for North Carolina’s Environmental Education Certification Program
Register online
We have a new online registration system! With the new system, the full workshop fee is due when you register and payment is via credit card. Registration for most Educator Treks is on a first-come, first-served basis. Treks fill quickly, so register early!
Please note that in-person programs are subject to change or cancellation depending on COVID-19 restrictions. A full refund would be provided in event of a cancellation.
DETAILS
- Nature Journaling in Your Nature Neighborhood, Saturday, Mar. 25, 2023 (9:00am-5:00pm)
- Fee: $25 deposit (but this will be refunded upon completion of the workshop). If you are traveling more than 40 miles (one way) to attend the workshop, you are also eligible to be reimbursed for fuel costs.
- Requirements: For teachers, guidance counselors, media coordinators or assistant principals in public schools in one of the following counties: Beaufort, Bertie, Bladen, Chowan, Columbus, Cumberland, Duplin, Edgecombe, Gates, Greene, Halifax, Hertford, Hoke, Hyde, Jones, Lenoir, Martin, Nash, Northhampton, Pasquotank, Perquimans, Robeson, Sampson, Scotland, Tyrrell, Warren, Washington, Wayne, Wilson, Vance.
- If you are interested in attending and do not meet the previously mentioned criteria, we have good news: the waiting list is open to all educators. If we have spaces available, we will start pulling people off the waiting list beginning February 25, 2023. Participants that do not meet the Anonymous Trust criteria will have a workshop cost of $60.00 and will not be eligible for fuel cost reimbursement.
- Program Instructor: Megan Davis and local artist, Bess Taylor (Chadbourn, NC)
VENUE
Helms Nature Preserve in Whiteville, NC
Teacher Learning for Effective School-Based Citizen Science
Are you a 5th grade teacher in North Carolina? Would you like your students to do real science? Do you wish you had resources for teaching science on your school grounds?
If so, we have a great opportunity for you! Please complete this brief interest form for a research study that will happen across the state during the 2023-24 school year. Our project, Supporting Teacher Learning for Effective School-Based Citizen Science, or “TL4CS” for short, is funded by the National Science Foundation and will study what helps elementary teachers use citizen science to engage students with science content and practices. TL4CS will focus on two citizen science projects: Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, and Snow Network (CoCoRaHS) and The Lost Ladybug Project.
Participating teachers will:
- Implement CoCoRaHS and Lost Ladybug with their students using materials developed by our team
- Attend approximately 2 days of summer professional development (1 in-person and 1 virtual)
- Attend monthly virtual meetings (1 hour each) to receive additional support throughout the school year
- Complete a weekly brief (5-10 minute) instructional log about project implementation
- Complete an online survey at the beginning and end of the school year
- Administer student research instruments near the beginning and end of the school year
- Collect anonymous student work throughout the year (materials and postage will be provided)
All participants who complete the study will receive an honorarium up to $800 in installments over the year of involvement.
If you have questions, please reach out to our team at TL4CS@horizon-research.com.
What are teachers saying about using these citizen science projects with their students?
“I do feel like so lucky that I'm in this [project because] the CoCoRaHS part has just been amazing. And it did the thing that I've wanted to do every year as a teacher is, I've wanted to do weather because it's so hard, and I've never like found a way to make myself do it. And this has given me that opportunity.”
“[My students] had a couple posts in Google Classroom over the weekend. ‘I can't wait to see the rain gauge. I bet it's gonna be full.’ And then as soon as we got in, ‘Can we check the rain gauge? Can we check the rain gauge? We should have a lot of rain because it rained nonstop.’ It actually did stop, but you know, children are dramatic. So when we checked it, they were just like, ‘Oh my gosh.’”
“I have three students in my class this year who speak zero English. They’ve come a long way since the beginning of the year, but one thing that I really love about the ladybug searches is it's put everybody on an even playing field where everybody can search and be successful in the same way with very little need for interpretation. And so my three boys go out and enjoy looking for ladybugs just as much as the other kids. And they're able to feel successful when the classroom and all the academic vocabulary has been a bit of a struggle.”
“I'm currently working on the ecosystem unit, so I've been playing with ladybugs. We actually found our first ladybug on the playground, and I had a child over Thanksgiving find them at his grandparents' house, and the mother sent me like 12 pictures. I found some neat activities with food chains and food webs with ladybugs that went with our ecosystem unit perfectly.”
“I think it's pretty cool that it's not only my kids that are getting excited, their parents are into it. So families are thinking about it.”
Free ACT Workshop: Maximize ACT Assessments & Data For Student Success
This FREE workshop will describe…
- Why you really give The ACT® , PreACT®, and ACT® WorkKeys® Assessments
- How each assessment plays a valuable role in monitoring and measuring true college and career readiness
- Ways to engage students and recognize their achievement
- Where to find your ACT and PreACT data, how it connects, and what you should do with it
- Why college and career readiness begins in elementary school
Participants will leave the session with…
- A deeper understanding of the value of ACT assessments for all stakeholders from school to family to community
- Knowledge to effectively communicate this value to other educators and staff, students, and families
- Concrete ideas for helping motivate students
- Knowledge of how to use data from ACT assessments for multiple purposes including benchmarking in grades 8-12
This FREE, interactive workshop is ideal for district and school leaders, curriculum and instruction staff, and college and career readiness staff looking to deepen their understanding of state-mandated ACT assessments and data. This workshop is not geared toward school counselors or test coordinators. You will get great benefit from bringing a team to discuss applications for your district or school.
Light refreshments will be provided prior to the presentation.
Please bring a sack lunch – lunch is 30 minutes.
Registration Information Link
K-12 Science Standards Revision Updates
Completed Actions:
✓ Data Review Committee (DRC) completed review/report of stakeholder feedback regarding the 1st draft of the proposed 2023 standards
Next Steps:
- Standards Writing Team (SWT) scheduled to meet the first full week of February to review the DRC report and recommendations
- SWT members begin making additional edits and revisions to the draft standards
- 2nd draft of the the proposed 2023 standards released for public review end of February (tentative)
Stay tuned for updates through our listservs.
NC DPI Science Consultants
Dr. Debra Hall
K-5 Science
debra.hall@dpi.nc.gov
Gavin Fradel
6-8 Science
gavin.fradel@dpi.nc.gov
Benita Tipton
9-12 Science
benita.tipton@dpi.nc.gov
Alexis Wood
9-12 Science
kathryn.wood@dpi.nc.gov
Additional Contacts:
Dr. Charles Aiken
Section Chief K-12 Mathematics, Science and STEM
charles.aiken@dpi.nc.gov
Howard Ginsburg
K-12 STEM Consultant
howard.ginsburg@dpi.nc.gov
Marilyn Johns
Administration Specialist
marilyn.johns@dpi.nc.gov
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