Program areas at NCSE
Supporting Teachers: Our Supporting Teachers program worked to provide professional development opportunities to teachers around the country focused on its newly minted lesson sets that help students resolve common misconceptions about climate change, evolution, and the nature of science. NCSE staff presented at large-scale conferences hosted by groups such as the National Association of Biology Teachers and the National Science Teaching Association, as well as at the local school and district level. Simultaneously, the program began refining its lesson sets into modular, easily-digestible, and more flexible units of practice called Story Shorts. The first set of Story Shorts, focused on climate change, will debut in 2024. Additionally, the program began developing a set of ?Teacher Toolkit? resources designed to guide teachers towards improved pedagogical practices, particularly in the science classroom. The program also continued to send its monthly educator newsletter with resources and other items of interest to more than 6,000 subscribers.
Catalyzing Action: Our longest-tenured program, Catalyzing Action monitors state and local actions affecting science education and is the go?-to source for the public generally, and the news media in particular, for up-to-date information on threats to the integrity of the science classroom. By providing advice, resources, and connections, NCSE has a long history and proven track record of success in helping students, parents, administrators, and concerned citizens block threats to accurate evolution and climate education. In 2023, NCSE helped defeat antiscience bills in 10 states and rallied support for quality state science standards and textbooks in 3 states.
Communications: NCSE is the go-to source for the public generally, and the news media in particular, for up-to-date information on threats to the integrity of the science classroom and proactive solutions to helping students better understand climate science and evolution. In 2021, we continued to send our monthly e-newsletter, which had a subscriber list of about 25,000. We also email a quarterly digital publication to our supporters, Reports of the National Center for Science Education. The high-production, 16-page PDF includes news about our programs, our members, and other articles of interest. NCSE?s work was featured in external media such as The Washington Post, Science, Scientific American, and The New York Times. We ended the year with 160,000 Facebook and 46,000 Twitter followers.