News - United States of America
The Re-Establishment of GLOBE in Alabama
Contributed by Jodi Haney, U.S. GLOBE Partner at Xcite Learning and GLOBE U.S. Coordination Office Trainer/Mentor Trainer and Partnership Sustainability Lead, on behalf of the U.S. GLOBE Partnership at AMSTI.
Alabama was once a highly active state in The GLOBE Program, with over 970 participating schools. After the retirement of the Partnership Coordinator in 2019, participation in GLOBE declined. The Alabama Math, Science, and Technology Initiative (AMSTI) has been working to re-build their GLOBE training team and provide sustainability for the Partnership. Through three hydrology workshops funded through the GLOBE U.S. Coordination Office mini-grant program, five specialists are now certified GLOBE Trainers, 31 Alabama science teachers and six specialists are certified GLOBE Educators, and new specialists are being identified to begin the GLOBE Candidate Trainer process. AMSTI plans to hold three GLOBE trainings each year with guidance from the GLOBE U.S. Coordination Office to ensure sustainability of these efforts. This model will be shared with U.S. Partners as an exemplary path to grow their GLOBE team and ensure Partnership sustainability.
The first AMSTI hydrology training workshop funded by the mini-grant was held in Montgomery, Alabama, on November 16 and 17, 2023. The second workshop took place March 13 and 14, 2024, at the Weeks Bay National Estuary Reserve near Gulf Shores, Alabama. The final hydrology training workshop will take place on August 29 and 30, 2024, in North Alabama. At the trainings, Alabama science teachers and AMSTI science specialists earned GLOBE Educator certification.
Congratulations to Chelsea Bailey, Roger Birkhead, Natalie Burt, Jill Chambers, and Aaron Casby as the first five AMSTI-GLOBE science specialists to earn GLOBE Trainer status.
The goal of the GLOBE Partnership Mini-Grant Program is to support U.S. Partner activities to help achieve the GLOBE Strategic Priorities and contribute to the evaluation of the impact of GLOBE within the United States Access the Mini-Grant Award Padlet to learn about how Partnerships that have been awarded a mini-grant are using the funding.
Photo captions (top to bottom)
- Photo 1: Educators at an AMSTI hydrology training workshop search for macroinvertebrates.
- Photo 2: Educators at an AMSTI hydrology training workshop empty a net into a bucket in their search for macroinvertebrates.