This three-year program has now come to a successful close. Read all about this amazing experience for teachers!
The program was offered to up to 10 teachers per summer for three years starting in 2022.
- Participants received a $6,000 stipend and classroom resources.
- Housing and meals were provided, and all program and research costs were covered.
- Travel funding was available, as well.
In the energy-themed program, teachers gained hands-on experience in state-of-the-art engineering research labs and visit energy facilities such as a hydroelectric dam. The field trips included visits to nearby American Indian cultural sites and discussions about Indigenous perspectives in engineering, with a focus on integrating STEM with Montana's Indian Education For All curriculum.
Research and field trips touched on energy topics including building energy systems; biomass energy conversion; fluid flow processes in oil refineries and hydroelectric dams; materials for energy conversion systems like fuel cells, batteries, wind turbines and solar cells; and, sustainable infrastructure materials and transportation systems.
For more details, visit the Program Information page.
RET in the news
Summer 2024: Our summer cohort ended on Aug. 8, 2024. Read this MSU news article featuring cohort members Sabre Alderete of Yaak and Kelsey Megerth of Billings. This
was the final cohort of the three-year NSF-funded program.
They spent five weeks on campus (following one week online), working in laboratories and considering how to incorporate Indian Education for All with engineering and energy concepts; then presented their work at Montana State University's annual STEM Summer Institute for K-12 teachers.
Feb. 2024: An article written by the RET team has been published in the Journal of STEM Outreach. You can read "Culturally Responsive Energy Engineering Education: Campus-Based Research Experience
for Reservation and Rural Elementary Educators" by Nick Lux, Becky Hammack, Paul Gannon, Sweeney Windchief, Suzi Taylor, Abigail
Richards and Douglas Hacker.
The article was written after the Year 1 RET, and indicates that the participating teachers showed significant gains in personal teaching efficacy beliefs in science and engineering;felt more comfortable teaching engineering after completing the program; and increased theircapacities to teach engineering and integrate culturally responsive practices.
November 2023: On Nov. 1, the RET project team presented to ASEE - the American Society of Engineering
Education. You can watch the presentation on YouTube and find the presentation slides for this webinar at https://bit.ly/EnergyEngEd
Our Summer 2023 cohort ended on Aug. 3, 2023. Read this MSU news article about recent Department of Education alumnus Savanna Wolff, soon to be teaching in
her hometown of Roundup, and her research partner, Mandie Steele of Polson.
Our summer Research Experience for Teachers ended on July 28, 2022. Our cohort included
seven in-service teachers from around Montana and four pre-service teachers. They
spent six weeks on campus, working in laboratories and considering how to incorporate
Indian Education for All with engineering and energy concepts; then presented their
work at MSU's annual STEM Summer Institute for K-12 teachers.
Read more about the 2022 RET program in this article from MSU News.
Thank you to partners and supporters!
NEED - National Energy Education Development trains and assists teachers in harnessing the energy of the classroom - the energy of students. NEED visited the MSU RET program, sharing information on fossil fuels, nuclear energy, renewable energy, energy storage, ocean energy, efficiency and conservation and much more! Teachers learned many energy-related activities that they can bring home to their classrooms.
USDA FireWorks is an educational program about the science of wildland fire, designed for students in grades 1-12. FireWorks provides students with interactive, hands-on materials to study wildland fire. It is highly interdisciplinary and students learn about properties of matter, chemical and physical processes, ecosystem fluctuations and cycles, habitat and survival, and human interactions with ecosystems. Thanks for training our RET teachers.
Additional thanks to Empower Center, Montana Space Grant Consortium, Montana State Parks, MSU Honors College, MSU Facilities, Museum of the Rockies, Northwestern Energy and many other individuals and organizations!