by
Copyright 2008-9 by the author.
Dissertation defended on February 7, 2008, in the Department of Mathematics and Science Education, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia
Significant conclusions include: the number of regular classes are about 3200, totaling up to 4000 when a ‘hidden’ single-digit-sized classes population is added in; fully 20% of all classes may be with 10 or fewer students. A course is found in 2500 schools, 12-13% of all U.S. high schools.
Many of Sadler’s numbers are unchanged in 22 years. However, the ratio of male to female teachers has gone from 88:12 to 67:33. Many teachers now come from the bioscience and geoscience majors, not physics. We tally 3-4% more schools now than Sadler, and nearly twice the teachers (3200).
Schools with astronomy are more often Passing in Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) than the national norm. Classes generally reflect racial, gender and ethnic demographics of their schools and the nation.
More than half of all teachers claim no direct effects from NCLB on their courses, most of the rest seeing negative effects, generally dependent on how other science, math and language courses fare.
A growing number supplant conventional planetariums with computer "planetarium" software, currently at the same rate as portables ownership.
Twenty-eight percent of teachers are not ‘highly qualified’ in that they have never had an astronomy course, let alone an astronomy degree.
Teachers are generally more optimistic than pessimistic but their optimism is mostly for their school, not for the fate of courses around the nation.
A six-part plan for starting a class is developed and six defensive arguments are also offered.
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| A second survey went out in the Fall of 2007 via postal rather than electronic means. That research was published in the same issue of Astronomy Education Review in December 2009 as The Modern U.S. High School Astronomy Course, Its Status and Makeup II: Additional Results. That file is here. |
A list of resources that teachers use to keep up with astronomy, astronomy education pedagogy, and the community of astronomy educators (the subject of a January 2008 AAPT presentation) can be found at here. |
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A
last, third
survey went out in the Spring of 2008 to principals (or other
schedule
deciders) at schools without
astronomy. An article based
on this survey has been published by Astronomy Education
Review (Vol 9,
#1, 2010) and went online January 2010 entitled as What It Would Take to
Increase the Number
of High School
Astronomy Courses: A Survey of Principals and a Comparison to
Astronomy Teachers, and
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An article on No Child Left Behind's effects on high school astronomy courses appeared in The Science Educator, Fall 2009 issue. It can be read here. |
The Magazine for Astronomy Teachers |
Click the above to find out where the next of our workshops will take place, or invite us to your school! |
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