Community Resources for Science

Bay Area Scientists Inspiring Students (BASIS) and Be a Scientist STEM Mentoring programs engage STEM professionals as volunteers in K-8 schools. Programs recruit, train, coach and place scientists, engineers, and other STEM professionals from academia and industry to serve as role models and mentors while leading students and teachers in authentic STEM learning experiences. Programs introduce K-8 students to STEM careers and pathways, illustrate connections between daily lived experiences and potential careers. In 2022, our STEM outreach programs engaged 800+ STEM professionals and directly reached 20,000 young learners. Lesson plans, materials, resource information, science content, and teaching strategies are shared with classroom K-8 teachers to build teacher capacity and empower educators to build on the BASIS and Be a Scientist lessons to extend learning. Students engage in authentic science and engineering practices, meeting California standards in science, math, language arts, and Environmental Principals and Concepts. BASIS lesson plans and related resources are available for teachers on the CRS website. Be a Scientist mentors guide middle school students through the process of designing, conducting, and communicating findings on independent, student-selected science and engineering investigations, activating student agency in STEM learning based on individual student interests.

Resource Development: Convening, consulting, and curriculum development and training projects targeting challenges and opportunities in K-8 science education. CRS provided professional development and curricular development services to schools, districts, and informal education organizations. CRS coordinated site-based projects, facilitated development of new teacher training collaborations, consulted with principals and district leaders to assess the needs and gather partners together to provide solutions, and mobilized resources to address critical challenges such as a lack of at-home science materials for students during distance-learning. Through regional, state, and national conferences and networks, CRS serves as a leader in advocating for high-quality science education for elementary and middle school students. CRS collaborates with partner organizations through STEM Networks in the region, state, and across the country. Convening of partners from science centers, academia, industry and school districts as CRS Elementary Science Advisory Council. Writing climate change and environmental justice curriculum for statewide K-12 project.

Teacher Services. CRS provided 2,000 TK and Kindergarten through 8th grade educators with comprehensive information services including news bulletins, curated online content, customized research, and resource guides regarding grants, lesson plans, field trips, training and more from over 200 science education partners in the region and beyond. We provided hundreds of teachers with professional learning, including research experiences with STEM professionals. CRS provides support for teachers in over 140 elementary and middle schools in the East Bay, impacting learning for 43,000 children. Professional development workshops, often in collaboration with science centers and environmental education partners, explored teaching pedagogy,standards, and content across all science disciplines as well as engineering. Our focus is on serving the needs of schools and districts with majority low-income, immigrant, and under-represented communities. Through our Champions of Discovery challenge CRS highlights best practices in STEM education, motivates and recognizes success for teachers implementing high-quality science learning for their students. Teachers call CRS 'the best friend a teacher can have and indicate that CRS support, training, and programs strengthen teacher confidence, skill, motivation and effectiveness in implementing strong science learning.