High-tech workforce grant funds new lessons in schools

New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman visited with Newark teachers and administrators at Stevens Institute of Technology on Sept. 20. The governor participated in an interactive demonstration and talked with teachers and Stevens program officials about how classroom lessons that use the Internet can enhance learning experiences for students.

The visit took place in a high-tech classroom in Stevens' Peirce Building, near the corner of Sixth and River streets in Hoboken.

The governor's visit highlighted grants recently awarded to New Jersey colleges and universities to bolster the state's future workforce.

Stevens was awarded two of the competitive High-Tech Workforce Excellence Grants by the New Jersey Commission on Higher Education.

One of the grants, totaling $1,078,560, went to Stevens' Center for Improved Engineering and Science Education (CIESE) to help equip and train teachers to enhance K-12 education in New Jersey schools that need it most.

"The governor and the New Jersey Commission on Higher Education have recognized the tremendous resource for New Jersey's high-tech workforce that resides in our educational system," says Dr. Edward Friedman, director of CIESE.

"Through this award, Stevens will be helping to increase the pool of students who have the educational preparation, specifically in science, mathematics, and technology, to go on to make a significant contribution to New Jersey's high-tech economy," he adds.

The grant awarded to CIESE supports a three-year program that will provide intensive professional development on the use of the Internet to science teachers from the Abbott district schools in New Jersey, the state's 30 school districts designated for enhancements because of economic disadvantages. In the first year of the program, the grant will support middle and high school teachers from the Newark Public School system.

The funds will be used to provide training, on-site classroom support, and hardware to teachers in the neediest schools in the state, thereby helping to create the human capital needed to fuel New Jersey's high technology workforce. Nearly half of the funds will go directly to fund computers and Internet connections for use at the schools.

For the past six years, CIESE has been engaged in regional and national programs to train teachers to integrate Internet resources into effective classroom learning. To date, the center has worked with more than 6,000 teachers.

During the Sept. 20 demonstration, the governor and teachers saw a lively, interactive Internet lesson titled "The Stowaway Adventure," which teaches students to use real-time data from the Internet to track a real ship at sea, determine its destination and predict when it will arrive. The lesson, one among several shown, also allows students to monitor weather conditions and predict when rough weather might impact the ship's arrival time.

In total, the New Jersey Commission on Higher Education awarded nine grants totaling $14.3 million. The only other institution to receive two grants was Rutgers University. The grants are intended to help New Jersey colleges and universities develop nationally recognized programs in technology and to give area businesses the quality workforce they need.

Besides the CIESE grant, Stevens was awarded $1,341,800 for "Implementation of Technogenesis in the Undergraduate Engineering Curriculum," a program that will enhance Stevens' undergraduate engineering programs by aligning them with the institution's strategic direction to involve students, faculty and partners in industry jointly in the development of new technologies. That grant, under the direction of Dr. Bernard Gallois, dean of Stevens' School of Engineering, includes provisions to implement project-based learning across the undergraduate engineering curriculum, develop learning materials for entrepreneurship, and create a Product Innovation and Realization Center to develop student projects from concept to prototype.

Lessons used by CIESE during the governor's visit are available online at: ciese.org.

About Stevens Institute of Technology

Founded in 1870 and celebrating 140 Years of Innovation, Stevens Institute of Technology, The Innovation University TM , lives at the intersection of industry, academics and research.  The University's students, faculty and partners leverage their collective real-world experience and culture of innovation, research and entrepreneurship to confront global challenges in engineering, science, systems and technology management.

Based in Hoboken, N.J. and with a location in Washington, D.C., Stevens offers baccalaureate, master’s, certificates and doctoral degrees in engineering, the sciences and management, in addition to baccalaureate degrees in business and liberal arts.  Stevens has been recognized by both the US Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security as a National Center of Excellence in the areas of systems engineering and port security research. The University has a total enrollment of more than 2,200 undergraduate and 3,700 graduate students with almost 450 faculty. Stevens’ graduate programs have attracted international participation from China, India, Southeast Asia, Europe and Latin America as well as strategic partnerships with industry leaders, governments and other universities around the world.  Additional information may be obtained at www.stevens.edu and www.stevens.edu/press.