Contemplating criteria for science education reform: The case of the Olympia school district

School Science and Mathematics, Nov 1998 by Tippins, Deborah, Weiseman, Katherine, Nichols, Sharon E

Context of the Study

A Demographic Picture of the Olympia School District

The Olympia School District is a medium-sized urban school district with its hub in a university town. The two largest ethnic groups in the state of Georgia, Caucasian and African American, are represented in both teacher and student populations. The district has 11,002 students, including 54% African American, 40% Caucasian and 6% other (Hispanic, Indian, and Asian). The district has a teacher population which includes 800 teachers from 13 elementary, 4 middle and 2 high schools, including 30% African American, 69% white and 2% other (Hispanic, Indian, and Asian).

Significant Events in the District

Late in 1994, the Olympia School District administration extended invitations to teachers throughout the district; community representatives from local businesses, the local park system, and the Regional Education Service Agencies (RESA); and individuals from a university's science education department to become members of a "Dream Team." This group began planning the district's science curriculum reform initiative and attempted to acquire additional sources of funding to support the initiative. In January 1995, the Dream Team's work resulted in the birth of the K-8 Science Curriculum Committee (SCC). (A separate high school task force was created to deal with curriculum reform issues unique to that level.) This study documents the work and experiences of members of the K-8 SCC.

Methods

Research Perspective

Theoretically, curriculum was framed as an ongoing process of social negotiation concerning educational roles and goals among stakeholders. Accordingly, an interpretive research approach (Erickson, 1986) was perceived to be appropriate for this study, as the goal was to examine the nature of a science curriculum reform initiative in light of the perspectives of its participants, the SCC members. An interpretive methodology allowed exploration of members' understandings of reform criteria and their meanings of key aspects and events occurring in the context of the district's science curriculum reform process. This approach also enabled an examination of the evolution of members' views about reform in the context of one of the first attempts by a school district to place the Framework at the center of its reform initiative.

Participants

Participants in this study included the 54 members of the Olympia School District's SCC. The SCC was comprised of 42 classroom teachers (23 elementary, 10 middle, and 9 high school), 1 media specialist, 2 building level administrators (1 elementary and 1 high school), 2 central office administrators, 2 community members and 6 university representatives from (2 from science and 4 from science education departments). High school representatives were involved to support coherency and communication across grade levels. Building principals identified teachers to participate on the SCC based on their impression of the teachers' potential to serve as leaders at their school. Efforts were made to have teacher representation of all elementary (13) and middle (4) schools across the district. Teachers represented a range of teaching experience spanning 1 to 32 years. Teachers agreed to participate based on a variety of personal and professional motivations (e.g., history of past involvement on district-level committees, professional development, leadership opportunity, perceived expectation as grade-level representatives).