Building Our Collective Capacity: An HBCU Research-Practice Partnership for Increasing the Engineering Efficacy of Teachers of Color

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 6
  In Roundtable Session: Examining Relationships Between Teacher Knowledge, Practice, and Self-Efficacy

Abstract

Recent inclusion of engineering content into K-12 curricula has posed a challenge for teachers given the emphasis on 21st century disciplinary practice skills. In this paper, we discuss how an HBCU research-practice partnership grounded in critical race design fostered a community which prepared middle school mathematics and science educators to teach engineering. Middle school mathematics and science teachers were shown to have greater self-efficacy for teaching engineering than teachers from similar school contexts who taught engineering in their classrooms with no partnership support. By providing teachers with content knowledge, improving their outcome expectations, and improving confidence in their ability to teach engineering, this initiative shows promise in building the collective capacity for teaching engineering at the pre-college level.

Author

• Deena Khalil, Howard University