The Power of Partnerships: A Guide from the NSF GK-12 Program

This guide provides effective practices for anyone — university faculty member, K–12 teacher, or administrator — who wants to create a project that partners science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) graduate students (Fellows) with K–12 teachers on a sustained basis. These recommendations come from the community of faculty members, graduate students, K–12 teachers, program managers, and evaluators who participated in the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate STEM Fellows in K–12 Education (GK–12) Program from its start in 1999 through 2012. The guide was written to capture the knowledge and experiences of the GK–12 alumni community, which now includes more than 10,000 graduate students, 1,000 principal investigators (university faculty), 300 project evaluators, and 12,000 K-12 teachers. It is our hope that the GK–12 approach will be implemented broadly and that this guide will provide clear details for how to create a successful GK–12 type of project anywhere. Starting a GK–12 project is a serious undertaking, but it is one that provides tremendous professional and personal rewards for all participants. For many, it has been a seminal career experience. The appendix of this report includes evaluation instruments used in the study including survey tools and self-assessments/tests.