New CEP director seeks to increase center’s presence, offerings

February 16, 2018 | Jean Rudnicki

New CEP director seeks to increase center’s presence, offerings

Tucked inside the University of Houston-Clear Lake’s Arbor Building is a little known resource just waiting to be discovered. The Center for Educational Programs, housed in UHCL’s College of Education, offers academic and outreach services to students, schools, school districts, and members of the community. The center’s new director, Tonya Jeffery, is on a mission to make certain the word gets out, even as she works to further expand its offerings.

Jeffery, who joined the UHCL team in November, says her main role is increasing the center’s presence and its offerings to the community through collaborations and professional development partnerships that are representative of the College of Education programs and initiatives.

“We’re here, but not many know we’re here, nor what we have to offer,” she said.

The CEP currently provides professional development programs for area teachers, facilitates the Kids U summer program for children in grades K-12, offers educational diagnostic testing and a literacy-tutoring program for young students. Jeffery’s main intent is to increase the center’s professional development offerings to area educators based on needs assessments she’ll be conducting with local schools and districts.  She also plans to promote the center’s study and meeting facilities. The facilities are available to the university’s faculty, students and organizations, and also to local area school personnel for off-site meetings, as well as community organizations.

“The center is a great place for faculty to hold special planning meetings and it is also a safe and positive environment for students to congregate and meet in their own professional learning communities,” she noted. “We offer free laptop checkout, where students can use laptops for class and to study. We have quiet rooms where they can study in groups. We have office supplies students can utilize when working on class projects. We have a television. We have a kitchen. We even have hot chocolate! We want the center to be a place where students are embraced, feel welcomed and supported.”

Another huge CEP initiative Jeffery will be kicking off is a STEAM Academy, which will offer STEM+Arts-focused professional development for teachers along with fun, exciting summer camps for middle-school children. STEM includes science, technology, engineering and mathematics disciplines.

“We want to offer more STEM support and experiences, not only to our pre-service teachers, but to in-service teachers also,” she said. “We’re planning to offer professional development focusing on robotics and engineering design practices, working with faculty in the College of Education and College of Science and Engineering – getting everyone involved in a collaborative effort to help increase teachers’ content knowledge and self-efficacy in teaching STEM subjects.”

“We’re targeting middle school children for the STEAM summer camps because this seems to be the critical age, based on research, in which students begin to lose interest in the math and science fields. The goals of our summer camps are to pique students’ curiosity and interest in STEM by engaging them in hands-on experiences that make connections to the real world,” she said.

“Then hopefully students will be inspired and feel confident to take more of the challenging STEM courses in high school and actually go on to pursue STEM-related careers.”

Jeffery is no stranger to STEM education and activities. She was most recently the director of education for the non-profit organization, The Harris Foundation, and served as the national camp director for its 10 STEM summer camps held at universities across the country. Prior to the foundation work, she was an assistant professor of science education at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.  She also served as director of the Coastal Bend Regional Science Fair, which covered 11 counties and included more than 600 K-12 participants each year.

The center’s new STEM focus is in step with UHCL’s growing role as a leader in STEM education. UHCL will host its second Greater Houston Area STEM Conference March 3. Last year’s daylong event brought together participants from across the entire Houston area and included teachers, vendors and STEM professionals.

Jeffery is also currently making plans to organize a STEAM Festival for the fall, which she explains will be a fun, family event with lots of “hands-on and minds-on” engaging activities in which students can explore their interests and passions.

“I’m thrilled to be in this new role and part of the UHCL family,” she said. “I believe this position is just a great synthesis of all of my past experiences. We have exciting plans in store for the CEP. It’s going to be a great year.”

 

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