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When the American Association of Community Colleges unveiled its Next Big Things program earlier this year at the 95th AACC annual convention, many educators and community college administrators appreciated the breadth and depth of the vision. Goals included improving students' pathways to four-year institutions, better tracking student progress, sharing information between institutions on how best to retain students, and other essential steps toward improving outcomes for community college students. Following up on the early appreciation for the program, the AACC has now released a Next Big Things Toolkit, which includes sample press materials, in both PDF and Word format, as well as a colorful and informative 28-slide Powerpoint presentation that is designed to be adapted to the needs of any community college implementing the program. To learn more about the Next Big Thing Toolkit, or to download the resources, readers may click here.

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Diana Cowern went to MIT and worked in a hard science lab at Harvard before taking a job as a software engineer and eventually launching her own YouTube channel, Physics Girl, which boasts over one hundred thousand subscribers. This article from the U.S. News and World Report features some interesting background on Cowern, an embedded video about the Magnus Effect from the Physics Girl channel, and insight about the creation of a popular YouTube Channel. For ATE Projects and centers interested in drawing in more women, an interview with the Physics Girl herself offers some ideas about how to encourage girls to pursue STEM subjects.

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With recent calls from the White House to outfit a new generation of students for STEM careers, it’s no surprise that the National Science Foundation has just earmarked $12 million for the "revolutionizing" of six engineering and computer science departments around the country. The grants are part of the RED (Revolutionizing Engineering Departments) program, a multiyear initiative that seeks “to create and support an innovative and inclusive engineering profession for the 21st Century.” For more on the grant award, as well as links to the RED program and several videos of NSF assistant director for engineering Pramod Khargonekar’s words on the future of the field, readers may click here.

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A recently released report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reveals that, among students who earned their associate degrees and other certificates during the 2008-2009 school year, more than two-fifths went on to earn a bachelor’s degree within the next six years. 

The number was far higher for younger students. In fact, of those students who were age 20 or younger when they earned their associate degree, over 60 percent went on to earn a bachelor’s degree over the next years. That number fell to just over 40 percent for students between the ages of 21 and 24, and fell again (to just over 30 percent) for students over the age of 24. 

In addition, the report covers a number of other interesting data points, such as what percentage of students who completed a certificate went on to complete an associate degree; how long it took the average student to complete a bachelor’s degree after earning an associate degree; and other interesting facts. 

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The High Impact Technology Exchange Conference (HI-TEC) is a national conference on advanced technical education where technical educators, counselors, industry professionals, and technicians can update their knowledge and skills. Charged with Educating America's Technical Workforce, the event focuses on the preparation needed by the existing and future workforce for companies in the high-tech sectors that drive our nation's economy.

HI-TEC will uniquely explore the convergence of scientific disciplines and technologies including: Advanced Manufacturing; Aerospace; Agricultural, Environmental, and Energy; Biomanufacturing, Biotechnology, and Engineering; Geospatial; Information, Communications, and Security; Learning and Evaluation; Micro- and Nanotechnologies; and Optics and Photonics. The conference is supported by the National Science Foundation as well as by contributions from corporate and industry partners. Attendees will have the option to choose from approximately 15 preconference workshops and industry site tours during the first two days, followed by a two day main conference featuring keynote speakers and 60 breakout sessions.

This year’s conference will be held...

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Conferences and meetings play such an important role for all of us as we work to disseminate information about the valuable impacts and outcomes of our ATE projects and centers.

NISOD's annual International Conference on Teaching and Leadership Excellence provides a wonderful opportunity to spread the word about ATE. The conference attracts educators from around the world and serves as a gathering place for community and technical college faculty, administrators, and staff seeking to engage in deep conversations about best practices and promising approaches crafted to improve student achievement.

Regular conference registration will be open until May 22nd, with the possibility of onsite registration during the event.

We look forward to seeing you there – please stop by and visit us in booth 220!

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Join Nancy Maron, Program Director of Sustainability and Scholarly Communications at ITHAKA S&R, and Rachael Bower, Director and PI of ATE Central, for the final webinar in our spring series focusing on building partnerships. Partnerships may take many forms, from an informal collaboration among peers, to a highly structured transaction between organizations. They can offer an efficient way to punch far above your weight… or end up not delivering quite as much as planned.  For ATE projects and centers, industry partners in particular, can play a key role.  Join ITHAKA S&R and ATE Central to learn about the many shapes partnerships can take, hear examples of successful partnerships from the ATE community, and learn what to look out for when seeking to establish partnerships of your own.   We have some best practices to share with you about building partnerships, and we want to hear from you, too - we’d love to share your stories during the webinar! The webinar will be on Tuesday, April 14th, 2015 at 2:00pm Eastern, and will run for 90 minutes. Sign up here: http://www.matecnetworks.org/webreg/ate_central.php

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After months of hard work the ATE Central team is pleased to present our new website!  Highlights include more information about the archiving service, sustainability support, and the upcoming social media and technology survey.  We hope you'll take a look through the site and let us know what you think – we'd love to hear from you about the content as well as the look and feel.

We'll be doing usability testing on the site (as we always do when making major changes to the site) at the American Association of Community Colleges Convention coming up in April in San Antonio.  If you're attending and would like to give us some feedback in person (and join us for cookies and coffee) we'd love to set up a time to get together with you.  You'll learn more about ATE Central and gain some insight into the usability testing process that may be useful in your own work!  To set up a time on April 19th or 20th, please email us at [email protected].

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Join Nancy Maron, Program Director of Sustainability and Scholarly Communications at ITHAKA S&R, and Rachael Bower, Director and PI of ATE Central, for the second webinar in our spring series. Finding, recruiting and growing the “audience” for your work is a topic members of the ATE community have identified as absolutely critical to ongoing success. For some, this might mean recruiting students to enroll in courses or apply for internships. For others, this may mean convincing instructors and administrators that the curriculum that has been developed is something they should use too. We have some best practices to share with you about understanding and growing your audience, and we want to hear from you, too - we’d love to have some of you share them during the webinar!  The webinar will be on Tuesday, March 10, 2015 at 2:00pm Eastern, and will run for 90 minutes.  Sign up HERE. 

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Founded in 1848, The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), is the largest general scientific society in the world. The organization engages in a range of science-related activities, including the publication of the peer-reviewed journal Science, which boasts an estimated readership of around one million. This report, which is available for free PDF download, outlines the AAAS’s suggestions for jump-starting undergraduate biology education. The ideas focus on cultivating biological literacy, a student-centered approach to the curriculum, what the process of preparing campuses for upcoming challenges will entail, and the unity of purpose that will be necessary to accomplish the next steps in creating excellent undergraduate biology education. Originally published in 2009, the report still rings true today.