Expressions of Intent for International Polar Year 2007-2008 Activities

Expression of Interest Details

PROPOSAL INFORMATION

TEACHERS’ DOMAIN -- POLAR SCIENCES Digital Library Collection  (Teachers' Domain)

Outline
The WGBH Educational Foundation will support K-12 teachers and students in learning about the focus, findings, and implications of current research efforts in polar regions by developing and pilot testing the prototype of a digital library collection of relevant media-based resources. The project will integrate with proposed research, education, and outreach activities associated with the International Polar Year 2007-08 (IPY), leveraging the inherent appeal of the Arctic and Antarctic regions to teach about related science issues and their relevance to the Earth system. This initiative will build upon and expand the power, scope, and established user base of WGBH’s Teacher's' Domain (www.teachersdomain.org), a featured portal in NSF’s National Science Digital Library (NSDL). This award-winning online service currently presents nearly 1,000 annotated rich-media resources selected and produced specifically for K-12 educators, organized by commonly taught curriculum topics in the Life, Physical, and Earth/Space Sciences. The new “Polar Sciences” collection prototype will include approximately 20 video segments, interactive activities, and other rich-media drawn from the archives of WGBH, PBS, and a range of organizations, agencies, universities, and other media outlets involved in polar studies, all fully contextualized in the Teachers' Domain model (e.g., with background essays, standards correlations, lesson plans, etc.). Structured to serve as a platform for additional media-based educational resources developed during and after the course of the IPY term, this prototype collection will also include a new “guided exploration” component that features multimedia resources produced as part of field studies conducted through the Teachers and Researchers Exploring and Collaborating (TREC) program at the Arctic Research Consortium of the United States (ARCUS).

What significant advance(s) in relation to the IPY themes and targets can be anticipated from this project?
Teachers' Domain now reaches teachers and students in over 1/3 of all US K-12 schools. It is our expectation that this project can serve as a way to reach this target educational audience, to inform them of significant research activities occurring in IPY and to relate these to the K-12 curriculum.

What international collaboration is involved in this project?

FIELD ACTIVITY DETAILS

Geographical location(s) for the proposed field activities:

Approximate timeframe(s) for proposed field activities:
Arctic: n/a
Antarctic: n/a

Significant facilities will be required for this project:

Will the project leave a legacy of infrastructure?
Teachers' Domain is an well-developed and evolving digital library platform particularly targeted to K-12 audiences. It will continue on after this project to provide access to materials developed here and can serve as a platform for similar efforts documenting major scientific investigations.

How is it envisaged that the required logistic support will be secured?

Has the project been "endorsed" at a national or international level?

PROJECT MANAGEMENT AND STRUCTURE

Is the project a short-term expansion (over the IPY 2007-2008 timeframe) of an existing plan, programme or initiative or is it a new autonomous proposal?

How will the project be organised and managed?
This project uses the existing structure and methods of Teachers' Domain, which WGBH has established in the creation of three major NSF-funded collections and several smaller ones funded by other sources.

What are the initial plans of the project for addressing the education, outreach and communication issues outlined in the Framework document?

What are the initial plans of the project to address data management issues (as outlined in the Framework document?
50 words max [project is not generating its own data, but representing data collected by others where possible]

How is it proposed to fund the project?
Grant awarded by National Science Foundation.

Is there additional information you wish to provide?
None

PROPOSER DETAILS

PI and Executive Producer Ted Sicker
WGBH
WGBH Interactive West
55 Federal Street, Suite 260, Greenfield, MA
01301
USA

Tel: 1-413-774-2422
Mobile: no
Fax: 1-413-774-9888
Email:

Other project members and their affiliation