Grant equals math models tied to science

STORY TOOL

By JONATHAN GOLDSTEIN, Staff Writer

DURHAM - An educational foundation that for years has trained local teachers, students and parents to harness the power of computers and advanced mathematics soon will take its lessons to a national scale with a $2.7 million grant from the National Science Foundation.

The grant, announced Tuesday, has allowed Durham's Shodor Education Foundation to create the National Computational Science Institute, which will work primarily with undergraduate faculty at universities, community colleges and other institutions across the country. Faculty members trained through institute workshops and seminars then will be expected to teach their own students what they've learned about the software, hardware and methods that scientists apply in their jobs.

"By targeting undergraduate teachers, that's going to help their students who will become scientists and engineers," said Kirstin Riesbeck, project manager for the institute.

Mathematical models that the teachers will learn about through the institute can be applied to such complicated topics as weather systems, the formation of tidal waves, the effects of various drugs on the human body and even sociological studies, such as the results of peer pressure.

Shodor officials said the grant will allow them to work with as many as 1,000 faculty members and others each year for the next three years. Some will come to Durham for training at the N.C. Supercomputing Center. Others will learn at participating universities in the Carolinas and across the country. Still more will learn through video conferences or the World Wide Web.

Robert Panoff, Shodor's founder and director, said better instruction for faculty means better learning in the classroom and, some day, better science in the laboratory.

"We will promote better science research and better science education," Panoff said. "And since many of the undergraduate faculty are teaching our next generation of teachers, we will see the positive results of curriculum reform at all levels of education."

Shodor, which Panoff started in 1994, works with schools, teachers, parents and students to improve math and science education through workshops, internships, summer programs and other offerings. The foundation also provides schools and other organizations with free educational software and lesson plans through its Web site, http://www.shodor.org

More details about the institute are available on the Web at http://www.computationalscience.net

Staff writer Jonathan Goldstein can be reached at 956-2401 or jgoldste@newsobserver.com