National Science Foundation grant supports the Alaska Tech Learners program at PWSC
by Jessica Young |
It’s Official! The National Science Foundation has awarded Prince William Sound College (PWSC) a $600,000 three-year grant to support the Alaska Tech Learners project. The project will support up to 20 certified teachers and 120 high school students throughout Alaska who take courses in commercial web site development, mobile applications development, or some other closely aligned STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, or Math) program of study. The outcome of Alaska Tech Learners is to provide instruction that builds a local workforce of content developers and computer technicians throughout Alaska or prepares Alaskan students for further study in a STEM program. The main innovation of Alaska Tech Learners is to use PWSC’s “shared teaching model”, which allows the project to combine the teaching expertise of certified high school teachers with the content expertise and direction of PWSC’s computing faculty. This model also allows small rural schools throughout Alaska access to the same courses that are offered in large urban high schools. The NSF grant covers each participant’s tuition, fees, and course materials.
In addition to offering classes during the school year, the project will also offer two summer tech camps. These camps will allow teachers and students to come to Valdez for one week of intense instruction in a specific topic with travel, tuition, fees, and housing expenses being paid by the NSF grant. For further information, please contact Steve Johnson at (907) 834-1633 or swjohnson@alaska.edu.
A special thank-you goes to Teresa Barton for all of her work in the writing of the grant!