The Council for Opportunity in Education (COE) and its partners, the Waters Foundation, University of Massachusetts Lowell, Pathlight Associates, and Rutgers University – Center for Effective School Practices, as well as TRIO Upward Bound (UB) pilot sites from University of Massachusetts Boston, University of Kansas, Family Centered Education Agency in Chicago, and University of Georgia, are pleased to announce that they have been awarded a $1.2 million three-year NSF grant. The project is entitled: iStronG (Inclusive, Strong and Green): A student-centered systems thinking, place-based and technology driven curriculum.
"Inclusive, Strong and Green" are the words used at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) ministers meeting in 2015 to describe their critical strategic goals. These goals echo the insight expressed in the Foreword to the landmark OECD PISA report, Green at 15, that "never before" has the need to increase STEM understandings in youth been so critical. The iStronG project proposes to develop, refine, implement, and iteratively test the effectiveness of an out-of-school, systems modeling technology-driven curriculum designed for low-income and first-generation early high school students who have traditionally been underrepresented in STEM fields.