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The IU News lead story for May reports on teaching and collaboration underway this semester. At three East Bay high schools UC Berkeley graduate and undergraduate students are working in classrooms and at field sites to provide environmental education while also trying out new teaching approaches and implementing new information technologies. Berkeley instructor Mark Spencer, who is also East Bay Coordinator of IU's City|Watershed Project, teaches the ESPM 190 course that is doing the work at a number of sites around the Bay. Read more about this work and all the IU News for May. Visit the IU Main page where the lead story begins, and check out the rest of this month's news. Stories featured in this issue are:
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Environmental Education: UC Berkeley Works with East Bay High Schools
During the current Spring Semester, 17 Berkeley graduate and undergraduate students are exploring ways to bring a social component to environmental education. Led by UC Berkeley instructor Mark Spencer, the ESPM 190 students are working with three East Bay high schools: Richmond High, Oakland High, and the Oasis Charter School in Oakland.
Supported by IU's City|Watershed Project and Berkeley's College of Natural Resources, the UC Berkeley students are working to develop and present an environmental science curriculum in which research, teaching, and outreach are all brought into a framework that examines and analyzes local ecosystems high school students can initially be introduced to in class and then observe first-hand in the field.
In order to make the concept work, Spencer's students spend as much time observing and teaching in the field — along East Bay creeks or tidal marshes, in local parklands or high school classrooms — as they do studying and developing curriculum components at Berkeley. The approach is designed to introduce and foster — for both the University and high school students — the practice of thinking across disciplines. In turn, a multi-disciplinary approach leads to a primary focus on inquiry and the learning process rather than on the mastery of content.
One of the goals for the undergraduates is to use this approach to develop a blueprint for creating "teaching portfolios". The key to creating these portfolios is to collect, identify and analyze the kinds of data and experience essential for an environmental educator. With access to and an understanding of this information, environmental educators might better serve the public with knowledge that will enable an informed citizenry to understand, enjoy and protect local environments.
One facet of this spring's fieldwork has been gathering data from observation for later entry into a Web-based Geographic Information System (GIS). GIS is a technology to manage, analyze, and disseminate geographic knowledge. Data gathered from ESPM classes — past, present and future — is expected to contribute to an expanding geographic and environmental database that will become an important technology feature in an environmental "teaching portfolio".
Observers in the field, teachers and students alike, will be able to access and view stored data to assist in fieldwork and observation, as well as to enter new data and information from current observations. The IU, through the work of its Scholar's Box Project, is working to support and assist in the development of tools that will make practices like these a reality.
Oasis Charter School: Created to target Oakland high school dropouts and help them complete their high school education, the strategy of Oasis is to identify circumstances or issues that contributed to an individual student's leaving school, then attempt to address the student's needs and create an environment that will enable successful learning and development.
Oasis was started in Fall 2004 by Martha Diebenbrock, who also started the Los Angeles Conservation Corps before moving to the San Francisco Bay Area. During its first year, Oasis enrolls approximately 90 students. Oasis students meet in small classes that utilize a project-based curriculum. This semester Berkeley's ESPM 190 students have worked in two separate Oasis classrooms.
In an Oasis English class, two Berkeley undergraduates worked with the teacher and 12 students on an environmental writing project. The goal was not to produce a research report, but rather to write poems about places and things the students found in watersheds near their urban home. Beginning with classroom exposure to ecological and wildlands information and data, as well as some examples of poems written about the natural world, students then made field visits to Tilden Park in the Oakland/Berkeley Hills, and Dimond Park in Oakland to observe and write.
A second project at Oasis worked with science students to help them develop ties to a local ecosystem. Initially, class-time was used to introduce students to species, ecological processes, relevant literature and the theory of observation. After this classroom instruction, students visited a local field site where they observed and collected data. During subsequent class sessions, the data was prepared for entry into a Web GIS site. One goal in this process is to build a GIS database that will grow as each class adds its observation record, and over time become a valuable tool for future instruction in the classroom and the field.
Oakland High School: At Oakland High's Environmental Science Academy four UC Berkeley students worked with two classes (approximately 70 high school students). These classes participated in a curriculum cycle identical to that of the Oasis science class. They first spent classroom time learning ecological processes and theories, as well as being introduced to local species and observation methodology, then classes convened in Oakland's Dimond Park along Sausal Creek, where they observed and gathered data for later inclusion in a GIS database.
One additional event, that nearly 90 Oakland High students participated in, was restoration field work along Sausal Creek. The students returned to the site of their previous field trip and identified and removed invasive species in work aimed at clearing a way for native species to flourish uncontested in the riparian habitat.
Richmond High School: With funding from the Save the Redwoods League, Berkeley's ESPM 190 students hosted two classes of Richmond High English students for three day-long visits to Muir Woods National Monument in Marin County. In preparation for these trips, students read writing by John Muir, and other ecology related literature, as well as receiving classroom exposure to ecological concepts and practices.
During the visits to Muir Woods, students were given time to wander, to observe, and to write. After these field trips, student poetry and writing were discussed. In these post-trip sessions, students explored how the recording and shaping of observation into the social experience of shared words might help establish personal connections to public places in a manner that is different from the understanding developed by scientifically recording and analyzing data.
Proposing and teaching environmental curriculum from a literary as well as a strictly scientific perspective helps the ESPM 190 students integrate a social component into environmental education, a strategy that instructor Mark Spencer hopes will be valuable in helping to determine what differences, if any, are measurable in environmental literacy when student teachers learn and present a curriculum that emphasizes both physical and social components in environmental studies.
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UCB, USC and Monterey Institute for Technology & Education Will Study "Digital Kids"
In a project funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, UC Berkeley's School of Information Management & Systems (SIMS) will team with the University of Southern California's Annenberg Center for Communication and the Monterey Institute for Technology and Education to study how young people aged 10 to 20 employ digital media in learning, and from this work offer some opinions about the consequences for higher education.
The three-year study will look at several tools and technologies, including: cell phones and camera phones, web-logging and instant messaging, and various games and game devices.
Jonathan F. Fanton, president of the MacArthur Foundation, commented: "Technology is changing all our lives, but it may be revolutionizing the way that young people think, learn and experience education. Common sense suggests that exposure to digital media affects young people in formative ways, reflected in their judgment, their sense of self, how they express their independence and creativity, and in their ability to think systematically. So far, there is little empirical evidence to back this up."
Read the UC Berkeley press release, written by Kathleen Maclay, about this project.
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UC System Struggles to Attract Minorities
Tanya Schevitz writes in the May 2, 2005 San Francisco Chronicle: UC campuses — the highly competitive UC Berkeley and UCLA in particular — saw a decline of black, Latino and American Indian students after the 1996 passage of Proposition 209 banning racial preferences in public university admissions. They have since rebounded systemwide — except at Berkeley and UCLA, where officials struggle to increase the numbers.
This SF Chronicle article tells the stories of a number of high school seniors who have been admitted to UC campuses, but at the same time have also been admitted — and vigorously courted, often with lucrative financial aid packages — by other prestigious colleges or universities.
The examples cited by Schevitz make it clear how hard it will be for Berkeley, and other UC campuses, to fulfill new Chancellor Robert Birgeneau's promise to make Berkeley a more diverse place. Read the entire San Francisco Chronicle story.
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Bancroft Library Exhibits Extraordinary Work of Women in California
The following article first appeared in the Berkeleyan, a weekly newsletter distributed to UCB faculty and staff. For the entire article and photos of some of the women profiled at the Bancroft, visit the Berkeleyan website, or the Bernice Layne Brown Gallery before June 3.
The Bancroft Library has mined its extensive collections on the history of California and the American West to prepare its new exhibit, “Our Collective Voice: The Extraordinary Work of Women in California.” The exhibit, which also salutes the Bancroft’s centennial, opens April 4 in the Doe Library’s Bernice Layne Brown Gallery and runs through June 3.
The gallery’s display cases are filled with journals, maps, oral-history transcripts, dance cards, photos, letters, manuscripts, posters, paintings, sketches, and life-size cutouts — all of which help tell the stories of women native or new to the state who made their marks as artists, explorers, scientists, activists, and philanthropists.
The productive lives of the women highlighted in the exhibit (five of whom are depicted below) are sorted into various categories, including Alta California, “Be-Mused” artists, “Cal Grrrls” (women students and their mentors), advocates and activists (such as Dolores Huerta of the United Farm Workers), “Designing Women” (among them Julia Morgan and Catherine Bauer Wurster), “Literary Lionesses” (such as Maxine Hong Kingston and Gertrude Stein), and “Pioneering Women” (including Lillie Coit, Lola Montez, and Lorena Lenity Hays, a Gold Rush-era newspaper columnist).
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Berkeley Campus Announces 'Principles of Community'
As published on the UC Berkeley Website
These principles of community for the University of California, Berkeley, are rooted in our mission of teaching, research and public service. They reflect our passion for critical inquiry, debate, discovery and innovation, and our deep commitment to contributing to a better world. Every member of the UC Berkeley community has a role in sustaining a safe, caring and humane environment in which these values can thrive.
- We place honesty and integrity in our teaching, learning, research and administration at the highest level.
- We recognize the intrinsic relationship between diversity and excellence in all our endeavors.
- We affirm the dignity of all individuals and strive to uphold a just community in which discrimination and hate are not tolerated.
- We are committed to ensuring freedom of expression and dialogue that elicits the full spectrum of views held by our varied communities.
- We respect the differences as well as the commonalities that bring us together and call for civility and respect in our personal interactions.
- We believe that active participation and leadership in addressing the most pressing issues facing our local and global communities are central to our educational mission.
- We embrace open and equitable access to opportunities for learning and development as our obligation and goal.
UC Berkeley’s "Principles of Community" statement was developed collaboratively by students, faculty, staff, and alumni, and issued by the Chancellor. Its intent is to serve as an affirmation of the intrinsic and unique value of each member of the UC Berkeley community and as a guide for our personal and collective behavior, both on campus and as we serve society.
Read a recent article from the Berkeleyan that explains the sources and process of drafting the principles, and which includes this statement by Chancellor Birgeneau: “Though Berkeley is made up of many varied communities — an aspect that offers the campus much strength and depth — it is also a broad community coming together for the purposes of teaching, research, and service. How we engage in these activities together, whether within or between our smaller communities or between individuals, is the heart of the ‘Principles of Community.’”
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Inauguration of Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau
Stating "the most significant challenge that Berkeley faces today is that of inclusion," Robert Birgeneau officially became the ninth chancellor of the University of California at Berkeley on April 15. Though the difficult issues of inclusion and expanded diversity — and how to acheive them — have been central to Birgeneau's public statements in recent weeks, he also celebrated with campus colleagues, official guests and family and friends for several days in the middle of April.
There are a number of sites and much information about campus inaugural events. Among those that may be of interest are:
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Upcoming Events
Lots of events are coming up on the BAWP calendar. In addition to the final Saturday Seminar in this year's series, there is new information about Summer 2005 Young Writers' Camps and Workshops for Teachers.
Join BAWP on Saturday, May 7th at Albany Middle School for a morning of free workshops for all teachers and educators. No registration is required. This event will be BAWP's final Saturday Seminar for the current academic year. Check this BAWP page for details. Visit this site to be added to the BAWP email distribution list for program information.
Information is now available for the Summer 2005 Bay Area Writing Project's Young Writers' Camps, held this year from June 27-July 15. This summer program offers a unique opportunity for students entering grades 4 to 8 to develop their writing talents. Under the guidance of experienced UC Berkeley/Bay Area Writing Project (BAWP) Teacher Consultants, students will have a chance to grow as writers. In an atmosphere that is optimal for young writers, students will become better writers in the process of practicing their craft.
The Bay Area Writing Project's Young Writers' Camp offers students the time and opportunity to explore their writing interests, discover their strengths and learn more about the craft of writing. The camps provide in-depth writing instruction, structured writing workshop time, flexibility in writing assignments, and daily opportunities to share writing with peers. Through the camps, students discover the conditions and habits needed to do their best writing and grow in their confidence and skill. For more information visit this page at the BAWP site.
Summer 2005 Workshops for Teachers: This summer join colleagues from throughout the Bay Area to learn in programs that are teacher-centered, interactive and collaborative. Explore and question, write and revise, read and discuss--recharge your batteries by learning with other teachers. All BAWP summer programs are led by BAWP Teacher-Consultants who are experienced classroom teachers with special expertise in the teaching of writing.
The first of 16 workshops -- most one or two weeks -- begins on June 20, so be sure to choose and register early. A registration form (in PDF format) is now available for BAWP's Summer Workshops for Teachers.
Visit the BAWP site for details about upcoming programs. You will also find a link at the site to the Bay Area Science Project (BASP) which shares dates and locations with BAWP for Saturday Seminars. The BASP site has a list of offerings for the March and May dates.
Registration is now open for the Office of Resources for International and Area Studies (ORIAS) Summer 2005 Institute for Teachers — PERSONAL NARRATIVES: Studying Cultural Interaction, Exchange And Migration Through First Person Accounts. As stated at the site: the theme for the 2005 ORIAS Summer Institute will be teaching and learning about world history, cultural interaction, exchange and migration through personal narratives.
The study of interaction among cultures and populations provides a fabric for holding the sequence of area studies in world history together and offers coherent threads for planning the overall curriculum. Illustrating the opportunities, events and systems that drive this interaction through eyewitness accounts engages students in the sense of historical empathy and promotes academic literacy by framing questions of research, evidence and point of view. Primary sources such as letters, diaries, interviews, autobiographies, and travelogues have long provided unique insights and perspectives on world history. Most recently, weblogs have added further raw material for analyzing current events as they are experienced and debated across borders.
The Summer Institute runs from July 25 - 29, 2005. Find out more here.
EarthTeam, is an environmental network for teens, teachers and youth leaders. The EarthTeam Restoration Initiative (ETRI) creates restoration projects for SF Bay Area teens throughout the year at different sites around the Bay area. The next event is a canoe trip on Saturday, May 7, at Arrowhead Marsh. This trip requires advanced registration, check this link for information and details.
Ongoing ETRI restoration events offer students a chance to do hands-on environmental work locally, support teachers who want to promote environmental learning and stewardship, and help local habitat restoration efforts of government, nonprofit, and private organizations. For more information about EarthTeam check out their website.
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