SOE Faculty Inspire Students to Do Science

Exciting scientific investigation and engineering design work has been flourishing in Garden City Public Schools during the 2012-13 school year!

Under the leadership of Gail Luera, SOE associate professor, ASPIRES (After School Program for Inquiry and Research with Elementary Students) has brought together a group of elementary/middle school students, university students, and university faculty to bring to life hands-on, applied science.

Across the 2012-2013 school year, 22 UM-Dearborn students have participated as undergraduate instructors, with mentorship from Drs. Luera and Mary Starr, SOE lecturer. They have engaged 40 elementary and middle school students with a range of enriching, inquiry-oriented science.

Each five-week ASPIRES session employs project-based inquiry science and focuses on a different science discipline while engaging students as they learn how scientists “do science” by designing, conducting and communicating the findings of investigations.

The fall sessions introduced this method of learning as the elementary and middle school students created a book support out of limited materials and documented their design process in a quest to understand how scientists answer big questions and solve big problems.

In the first winter session, which will just completed, students investigated factors that affect the formation of craters as they explored the very timely question of how to know when objects in space will collide. The next five-week session will focus on genetics as students use scientific principles and procedures to investigate how genetics can help feed the world.

ASPIRES is supported by funding from the Garden City Public Schools, the UM-Dearborn School of Education, and the UM-Dearborn Civic Engagement Project.