Skip to main content

From The Burke Museum: Professional Development Opportunity for K-12 STEM Teachers


participants in 2023 DIG Field School walk out to the field in Montana

The Discoveries in Geosciences (DIG) Field School is looking for applicants! The DIG is a professional development and scientific outreach program for K-12 teachers and students operated by University of Washington, Virginia Tech and the Burke Museum.


Over four days each summer, the DIG brings teachers from across the country out to active research sites in Montana or Arizona to participate in fieldwork with leading scientists in paleontology and geology. Teachers in the program have the unique opportunity to participate in authentic research, learn new ways to bring Next Generation Science Standards to their classroom, and can earn continuing education credits. 


The DIG Program also provides K–12 educators and their students with free educational resources available throughout the year. With these resources, students participate in real research as they look for microfossils in sediment samples, examine fossil casts, and connect with scientists from world-class institutions. 


We invite teachers of all age groups and backgrounds to apply to the program, and we encourage anyone from communities representing Black, Indigenous, and people of color to apply. Interested teachers can apply to the program here. The application closes on February 15 at 11:59 PST. Please feel free to forward this email to anyone who may be interested in the program and email us with any questions.


Best,


The DIG Team
 
DIG participant holds up fossils found during the program
Detail of plant fossils found by DIG participants
DIG participants do an activity in the field

2024 DIG Field School Timeline

Application period:
January 19 – February 15, 2024


Acceptance decisions
Mid-March 2024

DIG Petrified Forest Field School
June 5–8, 2024

 

DIG Hell Creek Field School
July 21–25, 2024

 

The application is open until Thursday, February 15 at 11:59 p.m. PST.
 

Land Acknowledgement

The Burke Museum stands on the lands of the Coast Salish Peoples, whose ancestors have resided here since time immemorial. Many Indigenous peoples thrive in this place—alive and strong.
 
Instagram Facebook Twitter YouTube LinkedIn


Popular posts from this blog

OSPI Bulletin 065-23: Learning Standards Review Update

Summary:  This bulletin provides an update to the information about the learning standards review project addressed by Superintendent Reykdal’s letter to district superintendents dated February 14, 2023. It includes current information about the reviews of the Washington state learning standards for English/Language Arts, mathematics, and science. It also includes a timeline for the review process. Key Audiences:  Educational Service District Superintendents, School District Superintendents, School District Business Managers, School District Curriculum Directors OSPI's Bulletin re: Math, ELA, Science: [ PDF ] Science Updates: [ PDF ]
Read more

[STATE-LEVEL] ASSESSMENT SHOULD NOT DRIVE INSTRUCTION

Regional Science Coordinators are developing an online orientation class for the new Washington Comprehensive Assessment of Science (WCAS). We have involved OSPI’s Science Assessment lead, Dawn Cope and OSPI’s Director of K-12 Science, Ellen Ebert, in the process as well as Lois Sherwood from WSTA. In our first planning meeting, I wanted to hear the most important message from each person at the [virtual] table. Dawn Cope of the assessment department was the first to speak up and quite pointedly said, “assessment does not drive instruction.” That pretty much spoke for the rest of us. What does that mean for teachers in Washington State where we’ve spend the last 13 years writing “powerful classroom assessments” that mirrored the content and format of the WASL and the MSP? Assessment systems serve specific purposes . They are developed to provide specific kinds of data for those purposes. And an assessment developed at the state level to inform state-wide decisions does not l...
Read more

Three-Dimensional Nature of the new Washington Comprehensive Assessment of Science (WCAS)

The new science assessment does NOT privilege content above practice or crosscutting concepts. We have heard from two different parts of the region that someone who self-identifies as an NGSS-assessment-item-writer has returned to their district and erroneously reported to supervisors and colleagues that the new NGSS-aligned assessment’s (WCAS) items focus solely on one of the three dimension of NGSS (namely, the Disciplinary Core Ideas, most closely related to our previous notions of “content”). This is idea represents a serious misunderstanding that could derail a district’s transition efforts around NGSS. Not being an item-writer myself, I reached out to OSPI. Dawn Cope of OSPI’s Science Assessment Team responded with wonder that anyone could come away from item writing with that idea and, explained that all the training materials and the process used reflect the 3-dimensional nature of the NGSS. She shared all the training items for me to examine so I could try and see wher...
Read more