Collaborations

Ms. Chang joins the Advisory Board to the Annenberg’s The Habitable Planet Series, awarded to the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

Ms. Chang joined the Advisory Board of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics' on-line video series for teachers called The Habitable Planet. The Annenberg Foundation awarded the Harvard Center’s Media Group funds to produce a 13-part on-line environmental science course for teachers. The Science Media Group's course will be on the human impact on the environment and will feature top scientists from across the country, many of whom are also featured in theClassroom Encounters with Global Change Scientists series.

The Christa McAuliffe Center for Education and Teacher Excellence at Framingham State Teams Up with Classroom Encounters

The Christa McAuliffe Center for Education and Teaching Excellence has teamed up with Classroom Encounters to help disseminate videos of students interacting with world-class scientists and to find ways to introduce teachers to what they view as unique learning resources on climate and planetary change. "Whether you realize it or not, you've created a new and exciting way of learning about cutting edge science and we need to help get the word out about the Classroom Encounters DVDs," says Mary Liscombe, Associate Director of the Christa McAuliffe Center for Education and Teaching Excellence at Framingham State College.

"The mission of the Christa McAuliffe Center is to support teachers in their work. Classroom Encounters DVDs make first class science resources available in the classroom and inspire and model creative ways of learning. This is an incredible resource for Earth Science teachers to use in their classrooms."

Conversations are ongoing. In the meantime, a presentation for teachers this coming spring, and a 1-2 day workshop over the following summer -- both at the McAuliffe Center -- are planned.

Fund Raising Pilot Launched to Provide Free Copies of Classroom Encounters material to Massachusetts’ Schools through the Mass Technology Collaborative

EnergyTeachers.org Inc. is a Newton, MA based non-profit organization that provides free resources to teachers interested in teaching about renewable energy and energy use, including climate change topics (www.energyteachers.org). EnergyTeachers.org Inc. is sponsoring Classroom Encounters’ Free Distribution Program with the Mass Technology Collaborative (www.masstech.org). Donations to EnergyTeachers.org Inc. cover the costs of providing free copies of recent Classroom Encounters with Global Change Scientists materials to up to three hundred schools in Massachusetts. Please contact rita@classroomencounters.org or shawn@energyteachers.org for more information on how you can join civic minded citizens and businesses like Navigant Consulting to support teachers and schools by providing exemplary science resources on global change.

Dr. Robert Watson, one of the foremost scientists in the world on climate change agreed to be in the Classroom Encounters with Global Change Scientists series! Dr. Watson is a "Rock Star" of climate change! He's the former Chair of the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the authoritative body on climate change that has brought together thousands of climate scientists from around the world to monitor planetary change on an ongoing basis. He is currently the Chief Scientist and Director of the World Bank's Sustainable Development Network. As Chair of the Millennium Assessment, he oversaw the work of fourteen hundred scientists from ninety-five countries investigating the health of the earth's ecosystems. Four years in the making, the The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment's goal was to conduct a global inventory of the state of our ecosystems, quantify the effect that human activities have on them and make suggestions for the future. A date has yet to be set but hopefully Dr. Watson will launch the next video series sometime next year.

Volunteer Summit

The first Classroom Encounters Volunteer Summit took place January 14th and 15th at the luxurious conference room at the Wellesley Public Library. We want to thank all those teachers, parents, students and scientists who participated. To see pictures, click here.

Earthwatch Helps Spread the Word about
Classroom Encounters DVDs:

"Beam Top Global Change Scientists into Your Classroom

Beam world-class scientists into your classroom to model - face to face - how science and inquiry work, and to help you creatively teach the all-important concepts for must-know science. Pick and choose topic-driven chapter stops and video clips that enliven your lessons with current research, easy to understand visuals, and student art and music. Find frameworks-connected resources that let you engage your students' hearts and minds. These teacher-created and independently produced DVDs are the result of a ground breaking teacher-scientist-teen-filmmaker collaboration involving scientists from Harvard, MIT, Tufts, the New England Aquarium and over two hundred teens. NSTA, Booklist, and SLJ recommend Classroom Encounters as innovative and outstanding teaching resources. Visit www.classroomencounters.org or email rita@classroomencounters.org to learn more about this project, get involved, find teacher resources, or to order titles"