NSF grant approved, VCS named partner with UAF Geophysical Science Dept

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has approved the grant request the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Science Department has submitted and named Valdez City Schools as a partner. The project encourages students/communities to envision how unmanned aerial systems (UAS) can be used to address local priorities (i.e. wildlife management, search & rescue, hazard monitoring). Place-based education constructs and community engagement strategies are applied to the development and implementation of technology-rich teaching resources: a 1-credit teacher professional development (PD) course; 3 place-based, culturally inclusive STEM curricular units; and a UAS-focused career exploration. Backwards design is used for content-development to ensure