Assistantship Supervisor: Sara Windjue Graduate

Program Advisor: Dr. Becca Franzen

Graduate assistant goals: The successful applicant will dedicate 20 hours per week to improving environmental education in Wisconsin through research efforts. They should have an interest in environmental education and improving K-12 student environmental literacy, as well as strong interpersonal, organizational, and communication skills.

Responsibilities

• Assist with research protocol design and development, on-site data collection, data analyses, report writing, and overall project coordination and logistics related to environmental literacy (including energy literacy) and teacher efficacy. Specifically, the GA will work with the following projects:
  • Teacher Educators Network for Environmental Education (TENFEE)—assist with development and piloting of an evaluation tool to measure K-12 energy literacy. The GA will work directly with 20+ faculty at teacher education institutions across Wisconsin who have partnered with a K12 teacher to implement energy education in the classroom and measure the change in energy literacy after implementation. Teacher efficacy will also be measured.
  • Undergraduate educators and their audiences—coordinate and collaborate with undergraduates to study teacher efficacy and program participant environmental literacy.
  • Wisconsin Center for Environmental Education—assist with research related to their multi-year place-based program, assessing student environmental literacy and teacher efficacy in environmental education. The GA will coordinate research efforts and collect data, including surveys, observations, and interviews from teachers and students at participating schools.
• Meet with advisor and supervisor to develop a work plan for each semester.
• Serve as a staff member of the WCEE and KEEP.

Benefits

Collecting, analyzing, and reporting on data (including peer-reviewed publication) related to environmental literacy of students and the efficacy of teachers related to environmental education will lead to a number of benefits:

• Improved understanding of impact of educator professional development opportunities.
• Improved understanding of influence of environmental education teaching.
• Increased energy education in K-12 schools and teacher education programs.
• Potential support for policy decisions related to environmental education.

Timeline

The assistantship will begin in June 2019 (consideration may be given to those interested in a start date later in the summer or in September) and will be completed by Summer 2021 (two years/four semesters of coursework).

Continuation

KEEP and the WCEE will maintain the rights to continue to disseminate and offer any materials and professional development opportunities developed as part of this graduate assistant project through online, digital and face-to-face means.

Work Expectations

The graduate assistant will work 20 hours/week during the academic year. Approximately 10 hours per week will be committed during the summer months and during academic breaks. Ultimately, this will be approximately 1,400 hours of work over the two years of this project. Specific arrangements regarding oncampus versus home work are negotiable, but at least the equivalent of one day per week will be spent on campus available to meet with KEEP staff and faculty regarding the project (outside of course time). The schedule will be varied and may require driving to research locations.

Evaluation

Evaluation will occur semester-by-semester at a meeting between graduate assistant and supervisor using the position objectives as a basis for evaluation.

Questions? Contact:

Becca Franzen

715-346-4943

bfranzen@uwsp.edu

Sara Windjue

715-346-4163

swindjue@uwsp.edu