The 12^th annual Tennessee STEM Education Research Conference will be held Thursday and Friday, Feb. 1-2, in the MTSU Student Union.

The MTSU Tennessee STEM Education Center holds the conference so K-12 teachers can gain more insight into new concepts they can carry back to their classrooms to motivate their students.

Dr. Philip Sadler

College faculty and administrators attending the event can network and share meaningful dialog in breakout sessions in order to improve STEM education — science, technology, engineering and mathematics — though much of the conference focuses on math and science education.

Harvard University’s Philip Sadler, director of the science education department in the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, will be keynote speaker for the Feb. 1 dinner banquet.

Sadler will discuss “Separating Facts from Fads: How Our Choices Impact Students’ Performance and Persistence in STEM.”

Brian Craine, science coordinator with the Tennessee Department of Education, will provide the state’s K-12 education update Thursday afternoon.

Other experts speaking Feb. 1 include:

• 

  Dr. Ginger Rowell

  Distinguished professor Stacey Lowery Bretz of Miami University of Ohio, discussing “Inquiry and Meaningful Learning in the Undergraduate Chemistry Laboratory.”

• Gary Martin of Auburn University, MTSU’s Alyson Lischka, and James Martinez of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, all collaborating to discuss “The Mathematics Teacher Education Partnership: Inproving the Preparation of the Next Generation of Secondary Mathematics Teachers.”

MTSU, the Tennessee Space Grant Consortium and Lincoln Memorial University are sponsoring the conference.

Ginger Rowell, interim director for the Tennessee STEM Education Center, is coordinating virtually all aspects of the conference planning.

The center is located in Room 102 of the Fairview Building, just off Greenland Drive. For more information, call 615-904-8573.

— Randy Weiler (Randy.Weiler@mtsu.edu)