The learning sciences, as an academic community investigating human learning, emerged more than 30 years ago. Since then, graduate learning sciences programs have been established worldwide. Little is currently known, however, about their disciplinary backgrounds and the topics and research methods they address. In this document analysis of the…

A pressing problem facing regulatory agencies, academia, and the food industry is a shortage of qualified food science graduates, particularly those with advanced degrees (that is, M.S. or Ph.D.). In 2000, the Cornell Institute of Food Science established the annual Food Science Summer Scholars Program as an experiential summer research program…

The role of mentor development in implementing an out-of-school math and science Saturday program for middle-school girls is examined, using content analyses performed on journal entries that four college and graduate school-level mentors completed during the second year of the pilot program. Findings suggest that mentors matured and changed from…

Outlines the authors' experiences with designing and teaching a course on the nature of science to science education graduate students. Addresses questions on the creation of a new university course, the design of the course syllabus, and the transformation of the syllabus into instruction. (AIM)

A huge investment in public funding, approximately 10 million dollars for the 2002 fiscal year, has been dedicated to the implementation of the National Science Foundation's (NSF's) Graduate Teaching Fellows in K-12 (GK-12) program. In these GK-12 programs, graduate level scientists known as Graduate Teaching Fellows are placed in K-12 science…

Describes a wave of reforms set in motion by Nobel laureate Leo Esaki, to encourage industry to play a bigger role in graduate education through a new program that enables doctoral candidates to work in 31 participating corporate and government labs near the University of Tsukuba, Japan. (LZ)

Outlines the learning environments, interdisciplinary curriculum, and campus/schedules for the environmental education program at the New Jersey School of Conservation at Montclair State College. Major areas of study include environmental communication, advocacy, technology, and instruction, and participants range from third graders to university…

This book contains the proceedings of the Third Topical Conference of Department Chairs in Physics. Topics of the papers summarized include: (1) research centers sponsored by the National Science Foundation; (2) physics programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels; (3) the use of accelerators in education and research; (4) approaches to…

This report summarizes the characteristics of physics education in 12 countries: Argentina; Brazil; Canada; Chile; Colombia; Costa Rica; Ecuador; Guatemala; Jamaica; Mexico; the United States; and Venezuela. An introductory chapter describes the goals of the Council on Inter-American Conferences on Physics Education, historical background,…