Category: Education & Outreach

Our very own Education and Outreach Coordinator, Selena Connealy, wrote a blog for the website InformalScience.org, an online community and collection of informal STEM learning projects, evaluation, and research resources. The blog focuses on the NM EPSCoR–funded Informal Science Education Network. Read an excerpt here.

Energy is everywhere! Science teachers and their students wrestle with energy concepts at nearly every grade level. The Framework for K-12 Science Education (NRC, 2012) provide a foundation for K-12 teaching and learning about energy as a crosscutting concept across the disciplines. The New Mexico Informal Science Education Network (NM ISE Net) educators used the Framework for the first Energize New Mexico Teacher Institute, held in Albuquerque on June 9-13, 2014.

During the month of July 2014, the NM EPSCoR Uranium Transport and Site Remediation component team mentored three minority undergraduate students at UNM by providing hands on experience on a geochemical extraction experiment of mine waste to understand desorption chemical concentrations and kinetics.

New Mexico EPSCoR is proud to partner with smaller colleges around the state in order to provide research opportunities to students at non-research schools. Mesalands Community College in Tucumcari, NM is a new participant in the WC-WAVE Undergraduate Visualization and Modeling Network (UVMN) program.

STEMAP ended last week in celebration of 11 undergraduate students’ summer research with 50+ people at the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge. Students spent eight weeks working with NM EPSCOR researchers at UNM, NMT, and NMSU to gain valuable, in-the-field research experience their current colleges do not provide. It all culminated in a morning full of presentations to fellow researchers, faculty, NM EPSCoR staff, friends, and family.

Fifteen students and five faculty researchers from New Mexico Tech, New Mexico Highlands University, and Eastern New Mexico University congregated at the New Mexico Tech Environmental Engineering Laboratory, June 9 – 11 to learn the basics of membrane fabrication and characterization. The first in a series of technical workshops, this three-day intensive workshop was designed to establish and nurture a vibrant research infrastructure in New Mexico for osmotic power development.

Happy Summer! Diversity has been the word here at NM EPSCoR’s office during the month of May. I am excited to share that our Diversity Team is in the midst of creating our very own Diversity Strategic Plan. Five diversity advocates from across the state joined the Diversity Team to focus and strategize NM EPSCoR’s diversity work. I will share this document with you when it is finalized on our Diversity page by the end of this month.

And they’re off! Eleven bright-eyed undergraduates from seven New Mexico Primarily Undergraduate Institutions (PUIs) reported to New Mexico Tech (NMT) on Sunday, June 2 to begin their participation in STEMAP. STEMAP, which stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math Advancement Program, gives undergraduates from non-research universities the opportunity to work in the labs of NM EPSCoR researchers. The nine-week commitment involves a week of training at NMT and eight weeks of research followed by a final conference at which the students present their research experience.

Last week was a busy one for the Western Consortium for Watershed Analysis, Visualization, and Exploration (WC-WAVE)! Along with the Tri-State Western Consortium Meeting at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History, two different groups of WC-WAVE participants gathered in separate classrooms at the University of New Mexico for specialized training.

The first All Hands Meeting of the New Mexico EPSCoR Energize New Mexico project was a great success! Over 100 project participants and guests attended to listen to talks on diversity, collaboration, data management, and all 7 components of the Energize New Mexico project.