STEM Academy

What We Do

The School of Education at St. John’s University, in collaboration with St. John’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, has recently been awarded the National Science Foundation (NSF) Robert Noyce grant. The NSF Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program is a prestigious national award that provides funding to institutions of higher education in the form of scholarships, stipends, and programmatic support for recruiting and preparing STEM majors and professionals to become K–12 teachers. The key goal of Noyce is to increase the number of K–12 teachers with strong STEM content knowledge who will teach in high-need schools and districts.

The term “high-need” refers to school districts that have at least one school in which 50 percent of students are eligible for free or reduced lunch, 34 percent or more teachers are not licensed or certified or are teaching out-of-field, and/or there is a 15 percent or higher attrition rate for teachers within the last three years.

Now more than ever, the US direly needs to improve the safety, stability, and overall well-being of students and their families in high-need districts—with particular focus on preparing girls, students of color, LGBTQ+ youth, and students with special needs. It is our goal, then, to enrich students of high-need families with a powerful education so that they can give back and improve the lives of people in their communities. Of note is the fact that our goal aligns well with the St. John’s University Vincentian mission: “We strive to provide excellent education for all people, especially those lacking economic, physical, or social advantages.”

The St. John’s University NSF Robert Noyce Academy for Preparing Effective K-12 STEM Teachers: Spatial Thinking in STEM (hereafter the Noyce Spatial Thinking Academy) is a five-year project—with the possibility for another five-year extension—designed to motivate talented students in the STEM disciplines and STEM professionals to become successful STEM teachers in high-needs public schools.

The Noyce Spatial Thinking Academy team has partnered with several high-need districts and schools within the New York City metropolitan area. Currently, we work with secondary and elementary schools in the vicinity of the University’s Queens, NY, campus; Districts 28 and 29 in Queens; District 31 in Staten Island; and the Yonkers School District.

Some of the many benefits that our grant initiative offers our partners include

1. A pool of the best STEM students to serve as student teachers;
2. Professional development workshops on spatial thinking skills and STEM teaching and learning for faculty, administrators, and staff of our school district partners;
3. Possibilities of full-time placement of some of the best new science and mathematics teachers for the students of our school district partners.

During each year of Noyce, we will host several events with keynote speakers who are experts in spatial thinking in STEM. First, we will organize hands-on workshops that enable STEM educators to learn about and implement spatial thinking skills so that they can enhance student success. In addition, we will host an annual Noyce Spatial Thinking Academy Conference in May of each year to share clinically rich, tried-and-true insights with the St. John’s University community and the communities of each of our school district partners.