Michael J. Padilla, associate dean for educator partnerships in the College of Education, will receive the 2003 Distinguished Service to Science Education Award from the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) at their annual conference in Philadelphia March 28-30.

Padilla, who has been a national leader and scholar in science education for the past 25 years, was a major contributor to the National Sciences Education Standards sponsored and released by the National Academy of Sciences in 1996. He was the primary writer of both the teaching and professional development components of the standards.

He also helped implement the National Standards by delivering workshops to groups of teachers across the nation. In the last three years, he has conducted in-service sessions for more than 1,200 teachers in Los Angeles, St. Louis, Tulsa, Dallas, New York, Salt Lake City and at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.

One of Padilla’s most outstanding accomplishments has been his ability to promote important science and teacher education programs by obtaining external funds. He has initiated numerous innovations by attracting more than $29 million in highly competitive grants – more external funding than any other education faculty member in UGA’s history.

 All of these grants addressed critical areas of need – science, mathematics and teacher education – and involved collaboration among faculty from K-12 schools and various colleges at UGA. Most of the grants also involved other Georgia universities and business interests. All of them concentrated on improving curriculum and teaching, both at the K-12 and university levels.

Padilla’s work in the field of science education has had an extraordinary impact, both locally and nationally. Beginning in the early 1980s, he wrote and implemented several local grants funded by the Eisenhower Higher Education program to work with science teachers in Georgia. These efforts led to more than 150 teachers receiving university credit in science and science education, strengthening their content knowledge and pedagogical skills, and laid the foundation for future efforts.

Padilla then developed a National Science Foundation proposal to improve the already highly regarded middle school teacher education program at UGA. Funded in 1986, the UGA Middle School Science and Math Teacher Education Program grant involved numerous local teachers, as well as arts and sciences and education faculty, who worked in tandem to both develop and teach program courses.

The impact of the program in innovative curriculum development, national/international visibility, prestige and reputation is reflected in these specific accomplishments over the past 15 years:
    • Creation of six new UGA courses – three in science and three in science education –  increasing the amount of             science-related course work taken by students by 50 percent.
    • More than doubling the number of students graduating with science as a middle school major emphasis from an average of 12 per year to more than 25.
    • Recognition by the NSTA Search for Excellence in Science Education award as one the top teacher education programs in the U.S.
    • Awarding of the NSTA Ohaus award for excellence in college science teaching for the innovative participation of middle grades teachers in the program.
    • Publication of five laboratory activities books and presentation of 15 research papers on various components of the program.

In the early 1990s, the National Science Foundation created its Statewide Systemic Initiatives program, aimed at reforming entire state systems of mathematics and science education.

Padilla assembled a team of important stakeholders from throughout Georgia and, over an 18-month period, fashioned a statewide consensus for the direction of the effort. As a result, the NSF awarded a $10 million grant to UGA, titled the Georgia Initiative in Mathematics and Science (GIMS).

Led by Padilla, GIMS created and validated major frameworks for implementing standards-based curriculum, instruction and assessment, for promoting diversity and for improving the state’s teacher education programs.

 GIMS’ frameworks also enhanced the ability of teachers and schools to provide highly successful, quality instruction by offering numerous workshops and programs for educators to implement standards-based instruction.

 In its five years, the GIMS network of centers delivered in-service directly to more than 13,000 Georgia teachers, reaching and influencing more than 26,000 teachers indirectly through its curriculum framework. As a result, GIMS dramatically improved student achievement among Georgia’s students.

 In recent years, Padilla’s efforts have grown to include teacher education encompassing all disciplines.

    • The Business to Teaching program, which emphasizes online and field courses, is intended to help alleviate the teacher shortage in Georgia by attracting qualified career-changing professionals into the field. ($2.4 million grant from State of Georgia)

    • The Georgia Systemic Teacher Education Program (GSTEP), which is reinventing teacher education at the University of Georgia by defining the experience of the “beginning teacher” as a seamless, six-year process from entry into college through the second year of teaching ($9.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education and state funds).

    • The UGA Center for Hispanic Educational Advancement will facilitate community-based efforts to increase the academic achievement of Hispanic children in Georgia schools and is a response to the 400 percent increase in Georgia’s Hispanic population ($3.5 million from The Goizueta Foundation).

 As a culmination of years of research and writing, Padilla has become the lead author on a middle grades science textbook series, Prentice Hall’s Science Explorer, which emphasizes an inquiry approach with a user-friendly format. It has been adopted by more school districts than any other program during the last three years.

Padilla, who received his Ph.D. in science education from Michigan State, joined the UGA faculty in 1978. He has been recognized as Aderhold Distinguished Professor in the College of Education and received a Walter B. Hill Award for Distinguished Achievement in Public Service and Outreach.
 

Monday, February 24, 2003
WRITER: Michael Childs, 706/542-5889, mchilds@coe.uga.edu
CONTACT: Michael Padilla, 706/542-4909, mpadilla@coe.uga.edu