High School Project Research Articles

Students Researching 'Problems That Matter' in Their Communities

In this article, the authors argue that curriculum needs to change, bringing school knowledge into greater proximity to community 'problems that matter' (PTMs) and gathering students, community members, teachers and academics with relevant knowledge to work on the problem. Illustrating this orientation through a collaborative project in a local high school, the authors provide a rationale that links school knowledge with community 'funds of knowledge' – those rich cultural resources that build across family and local-community networks as people apply intelligence to conditions affecting their lives. PTM curriculum activity thus builds capacities for socialjustice activism, driven by ethical care for the needs and aspirations of people in communities on the horizons of schools. However, despite the good intentions of many who educate in schools, they are not simply free to take up alternative curriculum practices, even when shown as more socially just, and effective in engaging students and building knowledge abilities useful in their present and future lives. Schools are caught up in power relations that help produce social inequality. Policies from 'above' press down into school leadership decisions and classroom practices, pushing schools into competition with each other rather than fostering care for local communities. The authors argue that schools owe an ethical duty of care to the communities, especially marginalised groups, that they are supposed to serve. Supporting young people's agency in collaborative work on meaningful PTMs can give schools impetus to align with better social purposes for curriculum knowledge activity.

Research ethics should be taught as part of the NSW Higher School Certificate curriculum

The Higher School Certificate is a certificate that recognises the successful completion of secondary education in New South Wales (NSW), Australia. The most recent enrolment information available suggests that at least 13,472 students undertaking the NSW Higher School Certificate (HSC) in 2019 conducted research projects that involved human participants. During the course of their high school education current HSC students are taught research design principles and statistics so that they are equipped to plan a research project and determine the meaning of the outcome; however, the students are not systematically taught the application of research ethics during their high school years. This article contends that the NSW HSC curriculum be expanded to include instruction in and application of the fundamentals of research ethics to these high school projects to ensure that all participants involved in these projects are accorded respect and protection as intended by the Australian National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research.

The HiSPARC experiment

The High School Project on Astrophysics Research with Cosmics (HiSPARC) is a large extensive air shower (EAS) array with detection stations throughout the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Denmark and Namibia. HiSPARC is a collaboration of universities, scientific institutes and high schools. The majority of detection stations is hosted by high schools. A HiSPARC station consists of two or four scintillators placed inside roof boxes on top of a building. The measured response of a detector to single incoming muons agrees well with GEANT4 simulations. The response of a station to EASs agrees with simulations as well. A four-scintillator station was integrated in the KASCADE experiment and was used to determine the accuracy of the shower direction reconstruction. Using simulations, the trigger efficiency of a station to detect a shower as function of both distance to the shower core and zenith angle was determined. The HiSPARC experiment is taking data since 2003. The number of stations (∼140 in 2019) still increases. The project demonstrates that its approach is viable for educational purposes and that scientific data can be obtained in a collaboration with high school students and teachers.

Effects of TiO2 Coating on WO3 Inverse Opal Photoelectrode for Dye-sensitized Solar Cells

This study is based on Research and Education (R&E) project in science high school. In this study, we compared the photoelectrochemical properties of pure WO3 and TiO2 coated WO3 inverse opal film after the development of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). That is, above the SnO2 inverse opal (IO), thin WO3 film was prepared by the facile electrodeposition, subsequently forming the TiO2 layer by dipping in the 0.05 M or 0.005 M TiCl4 solution. Their morphological, crystalline, optical and photoelectrochemical properties of the developed films and composed DSSCs were evaluated exploring the field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV-visible spectrophotometer and solar simulator. In particular, the fill factor of pure WO3 coated SnO2 IO, 0.005 M TiCl4 treated WO3/SnO2 IO and 0.05 M TiCl4 treated WO3/SnO2 IO existed in the similar value of approximately 32%. On the other hand, the TiO2 coated samples exhibit the more enhanced absorption and photocurrent, compared to that of pure WO3/SnO2 IO, resulting in the high conversion efficiency. This points out that the proper coating of TiO2 layer on the WO3 photoelectrode can induce to the high dye adsorption as well as the suppressed charge recombination, granting the possibility of the challenging photoelectrode.

Mejora escolar, liderazgo y reforma sistémica: una retrospectiva (School improvement, leadership and systemic reform: a retrospective)

Mejora escolar, liderazgo y reforma sistémica: una retrospectiva (School improvement, leadership and systemic reform: a retrospective)

Пути совершенствования профессиональных компетенций педагогов в области обучения школьников проектно-исследовательской деятельности

The article reflects the current trends in education associated with the active development of project and research activities in a modern high school and the importance of identifying the most effective ways to improve the general professional and professional competencies of teachers in this direction. The newness of the study is in the disclosure of an approved system for improving the professional qualifications of teachers in the field of modeling project and research activities of schoolchildren. The theoretical significance of the study is in the description of the main elements of the teacher’s competence development modules on the basis of a theoretical analysis of educational design and the creation of an idea about the expertise of a research project as a form of assessing the level of forming the students’ universal educational actions. The practical significance of the article lies in the fact that the provisions of the study, reflecting the specifics of the development and support of children’s giftedness by the pedagogical community, can be widely used in the process of preparing and implementing programs of interaction between high schools and universities.

Analysis of Solar Activity and Atmospheric Pressure Competition Effects on Cosmic Radiation Events

In this paper, we analyze the influence of characteristic solar activity parameters as well as the competition effects in solar activity and atmospheric pressure on the records of cosmic radiation based on HiSPARC (The High School Project on Astro physics Research with Cosmic rays), a ground-based muon detector system monitoring secondary cosmic ray intensity. We gather the data from No.501 HiSPARC station situated at Nikhef in Science Park, Amsterdam, Netherlands (52.3558963{\deg}N, 4.9509827{\deg}E, 56.18 m of altitude). The accepted anticorrelation between solar activity and the intensity of near ground cosmic ray is confirmed by comparing the number of solar flares, relative number of sunspots and counting rates of the detector. The barometric effect has been considered to correct the number of events. Furthermore, a new empirical equation is given to show the correlation between the cosmic ray intensity and the characteristic solar activity parameters, including the number, the area and the latitude of sunspot groups. As for the competition effects of solar activity and atmospheric pressure, we find there exists a threshold in detector's sensitivity to the sunspot numbers. Above the threshold, the detector is more sensitive to the atmospheric pressure rather than the solar activity. Our discovery delineating the solar activities and atmospheric pressure competition effects on the event rate can provide a different way to monitor real-time space weather and cast light on the investigation of short-term solar activity forecast.

New Method to Define Urban and Rural over South Korea and Analysis on Long-Term Trend of Temperature Change

이 연구는 과학고에서 진행하는 Research & Education (R&E) 과제로 수행되었다. 본 연구에서는 기존의 인구수에 근거하여 도시, 교외, 시골을 정의하는 방법의 단점을 보완하는 새로운 정의 방법을 개발하였다. 새로운 정의 방법은 관측소 주변의 위치하는 건물 등의 인공구조물의 비율에 근거하여 도시, 교외, 시골을 나누는 것이다. 우리는 지구온난화로 인한 지난 50년간의 온도 변화의 관점에서 새로운 방법을 기존의 방법과 비교하였다. 인구수에 따라 도시, 교외, 시골을 나누었을 때에 비해, 건물 비율에 따라 도시, 교외, 시골을 나눈 결과에서 도시와 시골의 온도차이가 더욱 크게 나타났다. 즉, 본 연구는 지구온난화 중의 도시화 효과를 더욱 잘 잡아낼 수 있는 방법을 제시했다고 할 수 있다. 새로운 방법을 이용하여 도시, 교외, 시골에서의 계절별 지구온난화 정도를 분석하였다. 가을철의 지구온난화 경향이 가장 강하게 나타났으며, 도시, 교외, 시골의 온도 차이로 나타나는 도시화 효과는 봄에 가장 크고, 겨울에 가장 작았다. 지난 50년간 열대야 횟수의 변화는 건 물 비율이 높아질수록 많이 증가하는 경향을 보였으며, 도시, 교외, 시골은 각각 2.41회, 0.87회, 0.71회 증가하였다.This study is based on Research and Education (R&E) project in science high school. In this study, we developed new method to define urban, suburban, and rural, in which weakness of old method according to the population is resolved. In the new method, definition of urban, suburban, and rural is based on a ratio of artificial objects such as buildings surrounding with the observation sites. We compared surface temperature changes for the last 50 years under global warming in new method with that in old method. The temperature difference between urban and rural based on the building ratio is lager than that based on the population. That is, this study suggested more efficient method to capture the urbanization effect under global warming. Based on the new method, seasonal variation of temperature changes under global warming was also analyzed. The global warming in autumn tends to be the strongest. While the urbanization effect defined as the difference in temperature changes between urban and rural is the strongest in spring, it is the weakest in winter. In the last 50 years, the higher building ratio tends to leads more frequent tropical nights. The increased numbers of tropical nights in urban, suburban, and rural are 2.41, 0.87, and 0.71, respectively.

Times Thirty: Access, Maintenance, and Justice

Based on an ethnographic project in a public high school in a low-income neighborhood in South Los Angeles, this paper argues that access to information and communication technologies (ICTs) cannot be taken as helpful or empowering on its own terms; instead, concerns about justice must be accounted for by the local communities technology is meant to benefit. This paper juxtaposes the concept of technological access with recent work in feminist science and technology studies (STS) on infrastructure, maintenance, and ethics. In contrast to popular descriptions of ICTs as emancipatory and transformative, in the setting of an urban school, access produced extensive demands for attention, time, and information. This paper focuses on the labor of a group of student workers, Student Technology Leaders (STLs), and how they became responsible for the significant amount of repair and maintenance work involved in keeping hundreds of new computing devices available for use. An expanded process of accounting can more realistically frame issues of justice and its relationship to ICTs. I use a town hall meeting held with these students as an example of a processual vision of justice, one that encourages the beneficiaries of technological access to evaluate costs, benefits, and ethical concerns together.

Self-perceived assessment skill of prospective physics teachers

Assessment skills are an important component of assessment practice, without adequate assessment skills it is unlikely that teacher assessment practices will produce desired student learning outcomes. This study was conducted to reveal self-perceived assessment skills of prospective physics teachers by using quantitative descriptive analysis, and involving 92 prospective physics teachers who were experiencing teaching practice in junior high school and final project related to assessment. Data was collected by using Self-Perceived Assessment Science Skills Questionnaire consisted of 29 items related seven assessment competencies was developed and used in the study. Internal consistency reliability coefficient for the total scale scores was 0.87 as measured by Cronbach’s alpha. Determination of self-perceived assessment science skills detected from prospective physics teachers was carried out in descriptive statistics, in the form of respondent average values. Research findings show that self-perceived assessment skills of prospective physics teachers was categorized as transition.

Turning in or tuning out? Listening to silences in education for critical political consciousness

What happens when a team of university education researchers initiates a social justice learning project in a local high school, and – despite the overall project’s considerable successes in cultivating students’ critical political ‘voice’ – is confounded by the periodic, apparent ‘silences’ of some of its young female students? Drawing on eight years of fieldwork in a groundbreaking high school social justice education classroom, this article examines the presumptions inherent in certain forms of social justice pedagogy, and the ways in which ensuing classroom disjunctures may, in fact, lead to deeper insights about education for youth critical social consciousness. The article focuses on two, interrelated issues: the unsettling and sometimes confounding ‘silences’ of female students and the correlation between such silences and social justice educators’ attenuated ability to recognize and support the myriad ways in which minority female students may encounter, negotiate, and articulate their own particular forms of Freirian conscientización.

Personal microbiomes and next-generation sequencing for laboratory-based education.

Sequencing and bioinformatics technologies have advanced rapidly in recent years, driven largely by developments in next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology. Given the increasing importance of these advances, there is a growing need to incorporate concepts and practices relating to NGS into undergraduate and high school science curricula. We believe that direct access to sequencing and bioinformatics will improve the ability of students to understand the information obtained through these increasingly ubiquitous research tools. In this commentary, we discuss approaches and challenges for bringing NGS into the classroom based on our experiences in developing and running a microbiome project in high school and undergraduate courses. We describe strategies for maximizing student engagement through establishing personal relevance and utilizing an inquiry-based structure. Additionally, we address the practical issues of incorporating cutting edge technologies into an established curriculum. Looking forward, we anticipate that NGS educational experiments will become more commonplace as sequencing costs continue to decrease and the workflow becomes more user friendly.

STEM Applications in Turkish Science High Schools

The idea of establishing High Schools in Turkey was discussed in a multilateral project at the beginning of 1963. The Ministry of National Education (MoNE), Ford Foundation, Middle East Technical University (METU), Ankara University, and International Development Agency (AID) participated in this project to establish these schools. In Ankara, High School project was a US funded and technically supported project, carried out jointly by the Florida State University, METU, and Ankara University. High Schools’ organizational goals were: (1) to improve students’ ability and increase their intelligence in science (2) to increase the number of qualified personnel in higher education and industry, and (3) to develop more laboratories by increasing students’ scientific knowledge in order to be the center of research and development. MoNE created the Science High School Project Advisory with six members from Ankara University and four members from METU to contribute to the scientific and curriculum aspects of the project. The Advisory Board selected 30 teachers from Mathematics, Chemistry, Physics and Biology disciplines by written and oral exams from the existing high schools of MoNE from all over the Turkey. Selected science teachers received special training for the development regarding the assessments of subjects and provided with opportunities to study on the curriculum at some universities in the United States (U.S.). To train teachers in Turkey, a modern building was constructed at METU campus and the education at Ankara High School started in 1964. After the success of the Ankara High School, the MoNE started the High School Projects in Istanbul and Izmir. Today, there are 238 High Schools serving as public schools and the same amount of schools serving as private schools. In the U. S., the training of 100K STEM teachers started in 2012. In this article, High Schools’ development and their innovation activities, the STEM projects and the vision for increasing the STEM education in Turkey and other developed countries were discussed.

Scaling up STEM Academies Statewide: Implementation, Network Supports, and Early Outcomes

This article presents a case study of scaling up the T-STEM initiative in Texas. Data come from the four-year longitudinal evaluation of the Texas High School Project (THSP). The evaluation studied the implementation and impact of T-STEM and the other THSP reforms using a mixed-methods design, including qualitative case studies; principal, teacher, and student surveys; and a quasi-experimental approach to examining the effects of the programs on student achievement and achievement-related behaviors. The article presents a brief description of T-STEM characteristics and early outcomes on math and science achievement. It then examines variation in the local interpretation and enactment of the blueprint designed to guide T-STEM academy development. A multidimensional infrastructure supported T-STEM implementation and provided needed technical assistance. Yet T-STEM academies’ primary affiliations through their district or external support network provided the strongest context for implementation, shaping priorities and affording resources and know-how. The article offers key lessons for policymakers and practitioners engaged in supporting STEM efforts in particular and new school models in general.

Sintezna biologija za proizvodnjo biobutanola

In 2015, the first-ever Slovenian high school team competed at the iGEM (international Genetically Engineered Machine) competition in synthetic biology. The team was carefully selected from a list of candidates proposed by their high school teachers of chemistry and biology. Composed of eight students from 7 high schools from across the country, the team split into two groups, working in two institutions but with regular common meetings. The group of four students who worked at the National Institute of Chemistry focused on biotechnological production and the second group was preparing genetic constructs at the University of Ljubljana Faculty of Chemistry and Chemical Technology. The central problem that students tangled was the conversion of C-4 acids that are side-products of anaerobic waste degradation, into the corresponding alcohol. In the biotechnological part of the project students tested butanoic acid production in an anaerobic fermentation broth using a 15-channel computer-controlled bioreactor system, configured to allow online analysis of gaseous products (by GC) and frequent analysis of dissolved compounds (by HPLC). Next, at optimal butanoic acid production conditions (c = 1 g/L butanoic acid) growth of E. coli was examined in terms of medium composition, temperature and pH in order to obtain optimal operational parameters for biotechnological transformation of butanoic acid to butanol. Overall, E. coli growth was analysed in 72 different growth media in microtiter plates. Students followed inhibition of E. coli growth by butanol, acetone and isobutanol in the presence of butanoic acid and glycerol. The synthetic biology group started with PCR amplification of three genes ( ctf A and ctf B encoding two polypeptide chains of Co-A transferase, and bdh B encoding butyraldehide dehydrogenase for a two.stage conversion of butyril CoA to butanol) from anaerobic microbial community. Amplification failed, probably due to contaminants in the broth and a low number of bacteria harbouring these genes. Consequently, synthetic genes were designed with appended sequences for easier cloning, for a hexahistidine tag for detection of recombinant proteins using specific antibodies. Synthetic genes were inserted into pSB1C3 vectors and for each of them a strong promoter- ribosome binding site region was inserted in front of the enzyme coding region. Such combined constructs were further transferred into vectors with double terminators of transcription. In total, 9 different DNA constructs were prepared and deposited in the Registry of biological parts. All final expression constructs efficiently directed production of recombinant enzymes in E. coli DH5α under aerobic conditions. The giant jamboree of competing teams took place in Boston, USA, from September 24 to 28 with more than 260 teams from around the globe. In the high school track the Slovenian team presented the project entitled “From waste to fuel: Reprogrammed E. coli for sustainable production of biobutanol from butanoic acid”. The project received high recognition, as it was awarded a gold medal for completed tasks and was nominated among five best teams in categories Best Integrated Human Practices, Best Wiki, Best Presentation and Best High School Project.

Will High School Projects Help to Choose a Way to Science for Students?

Project-based approach is the way to overcome the gap between school education and modern science. This pathway allows students to be a part of modern scientific research and obtain valuable results. The best efficiency would lead to full collaboration between school and research centers.

High-school students believe school physics helps in developing logical but not creative thinking: Active learning can change this idea

This study is based on two exploratory questions with the aim of determining the relative effectiveness of two different student activities, called Reading, Presenting and Questioning (RPQ) and Experimenting and Discussing (ED), in changing students' perceptions and attitudes about the impact of physics learning on the development of logical and creative thinking. One-semester of data from this high school project for RPQ group (91 students) showed a shift of 11% in their attitudes related to the development of logical thinking, while student attitudes about the development of creative thinking showed a shift of 20.9%. The results for the ED group (85 students) showed a considerable shift in positive attitudes about the role of physics in the development of logical thinking of 31.7% while student attitudes towards the development of creative thinking made a ​​significant progress of 36.4%. These results indicate that both forms of active learning improve student perceptions about the impact of teaching physics on the development of logical and creative thinking, although students in ED group show much bigger improvements.

Teaching Tolerance Without Pushing the Envelope: The Laramie Project in High School Theatres

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) representations in theatre for young audiences are rare, so it is important to examine the components that make LGBT representation considered acceptable on the high school stage. This article examines the prevalence of The Laramie Project in high school theatres through the lens of multicultural education and explores which aspects of the play make it considered acceptable for high school audiences. This article looks at different aspects of multicultural education theory and argues that the victim narrative and lessons of tolerance rather than radical change make the play considered acceptable for school audiences.

身近な森林を使ったSSH課題研究授業における環境教育と講師の負担軽減に関する研究

Discussing ways of collaborative education between high schools and universities is one of the important targets in the Super Science High School (SSH) project. For producing better educational effects, it is desirable to collaborate between them as frequently as possible. However, frequent collaboration causes additional burden to the teacher on the university side as the result of effort made to prepare lectures and time for giving them. This study aims at reducing these burdens by adopting two approaches. Firstly, several graduate students were employed as teachers and the lectures were given by these teachers whilst paying attention to keeping the quality of the local forest research program. Secondly, a database lecture records was established so that several teachers can share what they conducted in the lectures with each other. As a result of the first approach, the burden of time required for implementation was not reduced sufficiently. However, the burden caused due to preparing for the lectures was eased. On the other hand, the trial establishment of the database showed its effectiveness from the viewpoint of sharing information on lecture content among several teachers, although some problems remain to be solved.

Freqüência à escola por estudantes ensino médio: análises e percepções a partir de culturas juvenis

Neste texto procura-se analisar as relações entre culturas juvenis e frequência à escola. Para tal, aborda-se a temática cultura juvenil, as diretrizes curriculares nacionais para o ensino médio e o projeto pedagógico de duas escolas de Santa Maria/RS. O objetivo geral do trabalho é compreender quais concepções e intenções jovens estudantes, de escolas de ensino médio de Santa Maria, manifestam em seus discursos acerca da instituição escolar. A metodologia de pesquisa centrou-se na perspectiva do estudo de caso e a coleta de dados envolveu a realização de entrevistas e a criação e manutenção de um perfil numa rede social denominada Facebook. O trabalho partiu do pressuposto de que há necessidade de conhecimento das culturas e comportamentos juvenis, em especial de quais as concepções que um grupo de jovens tem em relação ao ambiente escolar do qual participam, com vistas a promover maior envolvimento e mobilização para a aprendizagem. Após a realização do trabalho foi possível concluir que a escola apresenta distanciamento da vida social dos jovens e poucos atrativos em relação às tecnologias atuais e que, embora as diretrizes se fundamentem no pleno desenvolvimento do educando, algumas vezes os estudantes percebem a escola distante de suas expectativas.Palavras-chave: culturas juvenis, escolarização, Facebook, diretrizes curriculares, projeto pedagógico.