5C Academy and University of North Florida College of Education and Human Services (UNF COEHS) partnership to educate underserved students in STEM

2020 is a trying year for many organizations in the US.  5C is no exception for being affected by the pandemic.  Most affected are the in-person coding classes at the Ponte Vedra Beach library and three local underserved elementary schools in Duval County School System.

 

During this downtime for after-school coding classes, 5C has been busy working on both short and long-term plans to increase the number of computer coding instructors to teach when the pandemic is finally over and in-person coding classes begin.

 

In 2020, 5C Academy and University of Northern Florida (UNF) College of Education and Human Services (COEHS) (To learn more about UNF COEHS, https://www.unf.edu/coehs/) established a partnership to address the problem in STEM education in this country and especially in the underserved population.  The 5C and UNF COEHS partnership consist of the following three goals:

 

  1. UNF COEHS commits to developing a Professional Development (PD) courses to train more in-service and future teachers to address the shortage of qualified instructors across the K12 educational system.  This is both a short and long-term solution.
  2. UNF COHES will develop grade and age-appropriate after-school computer courses to address what the current system isn’t able to provide.  UNF COEHS will develop methods to establish a pathway from pre-K to 12th-grade students interested in acquiring the knowledge and skill.  This pathway will allow the students who have gone through all the developed courses from 1st to 12th to gain a high-tech entry-level job upon high school graduation.
  3. UNF COEHS will also develop a research study on how to retain learner’s interest in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), improve teaching methodology in STEM, and what course content works for students at different age and grade.  This is also important to address the underserved population so more of the students can be successful in STEM.

 

The 5C and UNF partnership can have a lasting impact to address the current crisis in the K12 educational system when it is done successfully.