Sandra Preiss, is the Coordinator for the Dayton Regional STEM Center. She has served the STEM Center since December 2008 in various capacities. Her current role includes operational management; program management; innovation management; educator professional development; and curriculum generation and editing. Sandra, a licensed high school science educator, has taught in academic and informal educational settings ranging from early childhood through high school. ABSTRACTManufacturing is a key pillar to economic vitality and growth in the United States (US). However, the US faces increasing competition in the area of manufacturing from across the globe. As such, the future of the US's role in manufacturing requires innovation, cutting-edge and sustainable technologies, and new materials. Furthermore, this new era of manufacturing will require a well-educated and well-prepared STEM workforce. Since the task of inspiring and preparing K-12 students in STEM falls largely on K-12 teachers, it is critical that the teachers understand the role of materials and manufacturing in the US and are provided with the tools and knowledge that will empower them to get children excited about STEM as well as careers in materials and advanced manufacturing. The main objective of the Collaborative Research Experience for Teachers Program entitled Inspiring The Next Generation of a Highly-Skilled Workforce in Advanced Manufacturing and Materials was to provide current and future middle and high school teachers with the skills required to successfully engage their students in STEM learning experiences by immersing these teachers in real-world engineering research that was thematically centered around materials and advanced manufacturing. This collaborative RET site placed teachers and pre-service teachers with research mentors at one of three regional universities to work on engineering research projects that connect with regional strengths in advanced manufacturing and materials. Participating teachers and pre-service teachers joined other professionals in the region in an immersive materials "boot camp" facilitated by ASM prior to the start of their research experience. Field trips, guest speakers and group work that produced K-12 curriculum complemented the teams' research experience. During the culminating activities, the groups presented the STEM curriculum developed, the final laboratory project results and provided regular guided reflections regarding their efforts during the six-week program. Local System Change (LSC), Mathematics Teaching Efficacy and Beliefs Instrument (MTEBI) and Science Teaching Efficacy and Beliefs Instrument (STEBI) surveys were administered to identify changes in attitudes, beliefs and practices. Results of the evaluation suggest that this collaborative RET program was successful at meeting a majority of its nine objectives. Evaluation data shows that there was no significant changes at the 0.05 level in the teachers' responses to the MTEBI or STEBI. For the LSC, teacher responses were significantly h...

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Three regional institutions of higher learning are entering into their third year of a grant funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) which provides authentic research experiences in materials and manufacturing for community-based teams comprised of STEM educators from urban, rural and underrepresented school districts as well as undergraduate and graduate students majoring in STEM disciplines and STEM education. The assimilated teams worked collaboratively with program principal investigators, research faculty mentors, STEM curriculum experts and evaluators to engage in real-world research activities related to the manufacturing of materials from natural products, medicinal plants as well as the scaled-up additive manufacturing of three-dimensional components for various industrial applications. This successful model of collaborative community engagement actively partners with local manufacturers involved in forging and heat treating of materials, the high-tech fields of medicinal and aerospace materials, state of the art printing of three-dimensional objects as well as conventional sheet fed print media. Essential components of engineering design from the team research experiences are incorporated into the Teach Engineering transformative STEM curriculum for implementation in the classroom to foster greater interest among students in pursuing careers in STEM disciplines, especially among female and minority learners. Multi-faceted STEM curriculum placing greater emphasis on critical thinking and engineering design skills that match current materials and manufacturing trends is a prescription essential to man (woman) power transformation. Team reflections support program revisions which include civic minded components of research ethics and engineering for the good of society, as well as the benefits of community-based learning teams for workforce development of the next generation of STEM professionals. IntroductionAdvanced manufacturing and materials science education is directly related to pre-college engineering education in that it involves the implementation and integration of new technology to improve products and/or processes, with the relevant technology described as 'advanced,' 'innovative,' or 'cutting edge', into innovative teaching strategies and robust learning materials.1,2 A major constraint to the implementation and integration of new and emerging topics in manufacturing education is that in order for it to be sustainable engineers and scientists are required to develop novel materials that are compatible with these new manufacturing techniques and still be stronger, lighter, more energy-efficient, and more durable than currently available materials. In order to maintain global competitiveness, adoption of cutting-edge manufacturing technologies and advanced materials will require a workforce with advanced training in related specialized fields. Studies on the efficacy of research experiences for teachers (RET) suggest RET programs aid teachers is maintaining currency in their fi...

The current collaborative National Science Foundation Research Experience for Teachers (NSF-RET) site placed seventeen in-service and pre-service teachers with research mentors at one of the three regional universities WSU, CSU, and UD to work on engineering research projects. These research projects were chosen in such a way so that they were relevant to regional strengths in advanced manufacturing and materials. In addition to research, the RET teachers participated in various professional development (PD) activities such as “boot camp” facilitated by ASM Materials Education Foundation prior to the start of their research experience, field trips, seminars given by guest speakers and group work that produced K-12 curriculum related to the teams’ research experience. The teacher groups also presented the developed STEM curriculum and the final laboratory project results, and provided regular guided reflections regarding their efforts during the six-week program. This paper presents a brief overview of the collaborative RET project and details the achievement during the first project year. Emphasis is given to the collaborative PD activities of all seventeen teachers and the research projects performed by the two WSU RET groups comprised of four in-service and two pre-service teachers.

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