The mission of the OER Education Program is to support OER's vision and mission by reaching out in new ways to stakeholders to improve the literacy of learners of all ages with respect to ocean issues. The Program strives to engage educators and students in learning more about ocean exploration and how they can use science, technology, engineering, and mathematics associated with exploring the ocean in their classrooms. This requires high-quality, effective collaborations between ocean explorers and America's teachers to provide a variety of learning and teaching tools focused on the science of ocean exploration and discovery. The Program offers onsite and online professional development in the use of these materials through formal Education Alliance Partnerships with aquariums and science centers located throughout the country.
Contact Information for OER Education Program:
Paula Keener, Education Program Director
NOAA/OAR/OER
Hollings Marine Laboratory
331 Fort Johnson Road
Charleston, SC 29412
phone: (843) 762-8818
Or submit your questions to paula.keener-chavis@noaa.gov
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NOAA's Ocean Exploration Education Program has developed Alliance Partnerships with aquariums and science centers to offer ocean science and exploration professional development opportunities to educators nationwide. These day-long professional development offerings help build regional cadres of ocean exploration teacher leaders. Online professional development has also been offered in partnership with the College of Exploration. |
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Standards-based education materials have been developed that bring entire classrooms "on board" for deep ocean exploration and discovery. Using new technological "eyes" to see, sense, measure, image, and describe a little known ocean world, scientists and educators are bringing the excitement of late-breaking ocean discoveries into classrooms through lesson plans, curricula, Expedition Education Modules, NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer Materials Collection and more. The NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer offers unparalleled opportunities to the scientific and education communities for "reaching out in new ways to stakeholders to improve the literacy of learners of all ages with respect to ocean issues" (Discovering Earth's Final Frontier: A U.S. Strategy for ocean Exploration, 2000) and for enhancing awareness of Ocean Literacy Principle #7 - "The ocean is little explored." As a first step to achieving this vision, and in celebration of the 2008 commissioning, a two-day Okeanos Explorer Education Forum was held at the NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory Western Regional Center Campus in Seattle, Washington, with the goal of developing the building blocks for a five-year education program. |
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The OER Education Program serves to enhance education internally within NOAA through serving on the NOAA Education Council, working closely with the NOAA Office of Education, and other NOAA Line Offices. Agency-wide collaborations are also developed to leverage funding/efforts to enhance ocean science literacy both within and outside of the Agency. |
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In addition to the Education Alliance Partners, the OER Education Program has formed national partnerships with the Smithsonian Institution's Smithsonian Sant Ocean Hall/National Science Foundation Center for Ocean Science Education Initiative, the Marine Technology Society, and Mystic Aquarium/South Carolina Aquarium/University of Rhode Island, among others. In addition, OER Education Program members serve on the National Marine Educators Association (NMEA) Board of Directors, NMEA Editorial Committee, Co-Chair of the NMEA Publications Committee, NSF Centers for Ocean Science Education Excellence National Council, and various other committees and working groups at the national level. |
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The OER Education Program is committed to continued assessment of program effectiveness/direction and to staying the course on future directions of NOAA and efforts in ocean science literacy at the national level. As such, OER Education offerings are formatively and summatively evaluated.
In fall of 2003, NOAA's Ocean Exploration (OE) Program began conducting Professional Development
Institutes (PDIs) as part of the OE objective to "reach out in new ways to stakeholders to
improve the literacy of learners of all ages with respect to ocean issues." The PDIs were
conducted with a network of partnering institutions or Alliances Partners. Surveys containing
quantitative and qualitative affective and demographic items were administered pre and post to
participants in the Learning Ocean Science through Ocean Exploration PDIs. This
A Case Study for NOAA's Designing Education Projects Professional Development Trainings NOAA's Designing Education Projects Professional Development Trainings are conducted for NOAA employees and partners through an online course and in-person workshop format. As part of the trainings, a variety NOAA programs were selected as examples for the training participants to follow. These examples were described in the form of a case study. OER's education program was chosen as a case study to showcase how a NOAA program can align with the recently adopted (by NOAA's Education Council) Targeting Outcomes of Programs (TOP) Model. This case study highlights OER's education program's Professional Development Opportunities' goals and objectives and how the TOP Model (a Logic Model), Evaluation Plan and performance measures fit together and program outcomes are assessed using specific items targeting the program objectives. See: OER Case Study: A New Era of Ocean Exploration Begins
The OER's Professional Development Offerings
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