[This is one of a series of blog posts about our six-year involvement leading the NASA Heliophysics Science Education and Public Outreach Forum.]

Since January 2012, a group of science educators, NASA mission scientists and education specialists have met monthly online to discuss current heliophysics research and share educational resources and best practices to incorporate into their classrooms.

Originally, this group began as a group of twelve middle and high-school science educators recruited to participate as Lead Teachers to establish a Heliophysics Community of Practice (HCoP). These teachers were previous participants in existing NASA SMD E/PO Heliophysics teacher professional development programs, such as the Heliophysics Educator Ambassadors (HEA), the Geomagnetic Event Observation Network by Students (GEONS), THEMIS professional development programs and Van Allen Probes workshops.

Several participants had kept in touch with each other informally, continuing the supportive relationships they had formed during their educator programs. Using multi-mission funding and efforts, NASA E/PO educator coordinators were able to establish a more formal opportunity for these educators to meaningfully engage with others and support them in continuing to teach heliophysics in their existing classrooms.

[This is one of a series of blog posts about our six-year involvement leading the NASA Heliophysics Science Education and Public Outreach Forum. ]

For the past six years, I have been a part of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) Education and Public Outreach (EPO) Forums. These forums were created to support NASA mission education teams in producing effective and efficient programs and materials for their audiences. In order to help NASA’s SMD EPO professionals develop the most effective programs possible, the Informal Education Working Group, which I chair, convened a literature review to gather the best practices from research, and to point our community members to professional organizations and resources that can guide their development of programs and activities for informal audiences.  We also conducted a national survey of informal educators to determine their needs for professional development sessions and materials.

[This is one of a series of  blog posts about our six-year involvement leading the NASA Heliophysics Science Education and Public Outreach Forum. ]

Evaluation for the NASA Science Mission Directorate Heliophysics Forum focused on the three main goals: 1) Engage and develop the education and public outreach (EPO) community,  2) Analyze heliophysics EPO products and projects, and 3) Coordinate communication about EPO work. Through multiple evaluation activities over multiple years, we found the Forum was able to support the EPO community with professional development, an online community of practice, collaborative projects, and a database of resources. Community members became more engaged over time with each other and with the forum’s activities. They asked for, and received professional development on topics such as social media, scientist engagement, misconceptions, evaluation, NGSS (Next Generation Science Standards), product review, 508 compliance (accessibility), and storytelling.  They met monthly online, and yearly face-to-face, and collaborative projects grew out of that to co-host events, develop new initiatives, and share audiences.

[This is one of a series of blog posts about our six-year involvement leading the NASA Heliophysics Science Education and Public Outreach Forum. ]

We often ask ourselves, “What do educators really want when it comes to their own professional development (PD)?” In order to get beyond what we think they want, the NASA SMD K-12 working group carried out a national survey of over 1,000 formal and informal educators in the summer of 2012. We sent out our survey through NASA and national education networks so we could get a sense of:

1. Who was using NASA resources
2. What educators were looking for when using NASA resources
3. What attracted them to NASA workshops and other educational opportunities

Here is a summary of what we heard back… It's well worth a read if you are thinking about creating professional development opportunities for educators in your area!

[This is one of a series of blog posts about our six-year involvement leading the NASA Heliophysics Science Education and Public Outreach Forum. ]

Only three weeks into my new job at UC Berkeley’s Space Sciences Lab, I was invited to attend the NASA Science Mission Directorate Education/Public Outreach (SMD EPO) Forum retreat. This gathering, which was held in Colorado in conjunction with the Astronomical Society of the Pacific conference in 2010, brought together top heliophysics scientists and educators from around the United States.

As it turned out, this retreat not only initiated me into the heliophysics community, it also set the stage for my work collaborating with NASA scientists and educators for the next five years. The community of practice that was forged at this retreat provided the basis for learning about heliophysics content, getting connected into the latest NASA mission news and events, and sharing of ideas, best practices and research regarding educating students, teachers and the public about the wonders of NASA heliophysics science.