100Kin10 is constantly collecting what we hear from our nearly 300 partners and the broader field. We compile and disseminate these learnings back to the network in order to help us all better understand what is and isn’t working in preparing and supporting STEM teachers. 100Kin10 has recognized, however, that there is a key voice missing: STEM teachers themselves.
Teachers have a singular expertise in the STEM teaching and learning field. To ensure that we are infusing our insights and priorities with teacher voice and experience, we have launched the 100Kin10 Teacher Forum to gather teacher perspective on an on-going basis. Through the Forum, we intend to hear from teachers about the opportunities and challenges they are facing in classrooms and schools around the country. We will turn this experience into actionable insights for hundreds of leading STEM organizations and use learnings gathered to inform our work as a coordinating hub.
Members of the inaugural 100Kin10 Teacher Forum have agreed to contribute a 12-month term, during which 100Kin10 will host bi-monthly listening sessions focused on a major theme, opportunity, or pain-point identified by the teachers and informed by the work of our partners. Alongside the opportunity to help guide the conversation around STEM education nationally, Teacher Forum members will receive invitations to participate in special events, leadership positions, and other opportunities from 100Kin10 and our partners.
We are excited to learn from the Teacher Forum and continue to improve our approach to amplifying teacher voices. Along the way, we will be sharing our insights and takeaways from these listening sessions or “Conversations”. During our Kick-off Conversation, we learned that Teacher Forum members have a keen interest in the following areas:
- Making STEM teaching a more prestigious, lucrative, and desired profession
- Empowering teachers to get involved in policy discussions and advocate for the issues they care about most
- Creating leadership opportunities that allow teachers to take on greater responsibility within their school or district while continuing to teach
- Ensuring that all teachers enter their classroom on day one fully prepared to confidently teach high-quality STEM content
- Better drawing on the expertise of master STEM teachers to mentor and support novice STEM teachers
- Creating school environments and schedules that enable innovative instruction and teacher collaboration
- Supporting teachers to form partnerships with universities, local businesses, and STEM experts in their community
- Enabling teachers to experiment with innovative instructional strategies
- Improving access to current STEM content that connects classroom learning with real-world experience as well as supports ongoing teacher learning
We will build on these interest areas to guide future Conversations and, together with Teacher Forum members and partners, explore how to use our learnings to support 100Kin10’s vision of excellent STEM teaching for all.
