Department of Secondary Education
Highlights

Congratulations!!

The following faculty received an Innovative Teaching Grant May 2008:

Dr. Steve Downey for "Worlds of Education

Dr. Cheryl (Kmiec) Ellerbrock for "The Middle to High School Transition"

Dr. Ann Barron received an Established Researcher Grant from the University.

Dr. Michael Berson along with Dr. Donna Elam, and Liliana Rodriguez-Campos have been awarded $487,512 from the School Board of Hillsborough County for a 15-month project “Educating Learners to Engage in Civics Today” (ELECT). Dr. Berson will oversee the grant K-12 Social Studies week-long Summer Institute, cybercitizenship instruction, resource and training development and oversight of the interactive CD-ROM and model lesson plan development.  

Dr. Bárbara Cruz is coordinator of the 4-year Global Schools Project (within the Patel Center for Global Solutions) funded by the Arthur Vining Davis Foundation. She has won the 2006 National Council for the Social Studies Carter G. Woodson Book Award for her book Cesar Chavez: A Voice for Farmworkers. She won before, in 2002, and in 2005 received an honorable mention with another book. Dr Cruz was also recognized with the USF Hispanic Heritage Faculty Award at a dinner on October 5.

Dr. Helen Gerretson received a Faculty International Travel Grant from the Universityof South Florida for her presentation at the International Conference on Science and Math Education in Malaysia.

Dr. Joan Kaywell received the Townsend Press Writing Award 5th place winner for essay, “There’s Hope in a Book!” June 14, 2007. Her book, Letters of Hope, was recognized as an NCSS Notable Book and made the 2007 VOYA Nonfiction Honor List

Dr. Gladis Kersaint was elected AMTE Board Member-at-large with term beginning January 2008.

Dr. Gladis Kersaint with the David C. Anchin Center/College of Education received a $5.9 million grant from the Florida Department of Education for Florida PROMiSE (Partnership to Rejuvenate and Optimize Mathematics and Science Education). This grant has the potential of an additional $8 million award each of the next two years, for a total of nearly $22 million! Dr. Kersaint will serve as the P.I. in this unique partnership with the University of Florida and Florida State University. Florida  PROMiSE will focus on preparing K-12 teachers in the much needed areas of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). This grant will also focus on helping students meet the new state math and science standards and will educate the public about these new standards.

Dr. Gladis Kersaint received a $211,731 grant from Hillsborough County Public Schools to design a professional development module and facilitate mathematics training for Hillsborough County K-12 teachers for the Achievement Through Content Expertise (ACE) project.

Dr. Deoksoon Kim received a Faculty International Travel Grant from the USF to the University of Guanajuato, Mexico.

Dr. Barbara Spector was elected to the status of Fellow in the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world’s largest general scientific society. Installation will be at the Feb 2007 annual meeting in San Francisco

Dr. Glenn Smith has a Patent Pending on FlyMap Book.
While reading this prototype book, (the commercially published, Chasing the Falconers by Gordon Korman) 5th and 6th grade students interact with maps on microdot paper, via FlyPen (www.flypen.com), designed to encourage them to create and maintain a more spatial situation model.

Dr. Stephen Thornton received the American Library Association's Choice Award for Teaching Social Studies that Matters .The award is given to "The Best of the Best in Published Scholarship."

Dr. Marcela van Olphen received a New Researcher Grant from the University.

Dr. Anete Vasquez was awarded the 2006/2007 Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award.

Dr. Dana L. Zeidler has been elected to the Executive Board of the Association for Science Teacher Education (ASTE) for a three year term by the general membership. (He currently serves on the Executive Board for the National Association for Research in Science Teaching (NARST)). These board positions are on the two top-tier international science education associations.

Dr. Dana L. Zeidler was honored at the International Meeting of the Association for Science Teacher Education in St. Louis, Jan. 2008 and received the “Mentor of the Year Award” for his work with doctoral students and new faculty from USF and other national and international universities.

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