The IPaT education initiative accelerates the transformation of education through innovations like open courseware, inverted classroom teaching, and individualized instruction. This spirit of experimentation allows educators and academics to strive for a real-world impact on curriculum, teachers, students, and programs.
Transforming Education
Researcher: Jessica Pater
To stimulate interest in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education among K-12 students, Georgia Tech researchers and scientists have worked with a Barrow County K-12 technology leader Ed Morrison and Barrow teachers on a unique technology outreach program that allows Georgia Tech to bring research labs directly into K-12 classrooms.
Titled "Direct to Discovery" (D2D) this program enables researchers at Georgia Tech to share their work and research with both national and international classrooms using high-speed videoconferencing technology. Coordination for D2D activities at Georgia Tech are led by Marshall Chambers and Warren Matthews. The mission of D2D is to reach schools that do not have the resources to provide students... Read More
Researcher: Ashok Goel
Could the study of a Namibian beetle, which can use the ridges on its back to collect water from fog, lead scientists to a natural solution that could help replenish the world’s limited supply of water? Professor Ashok Goel, the director of Georgia Tech’s Design & Intelligence Laboratory and the co-director of the Center for Biologically Inspired Design, studies how biological processes found in nature can offer scientists and engineers viable solutions to many of the complex problems facing our society today. To explain biological concepts in a way that is useful and applicable to engineers and their projects, Goel and his team are developing an interactive, online repository—the Design by Analogy to Nature Engine (DANE)—that will serve... Read More
Researchers: Mark Guzdial, Richard Catrambone, Barbara Ericson
Despite the increasing need for experienced technology professionals, computer science is one of the lowest-ranking fields of interest among today’s high school students. College of Computing Professor Mark Guzdial’s research attempts to understand and combat this growing problem, investigating new ways to improve the quality and availability of computer science education in high schools across Georgia. Guzdial works with Barbara Ericson, Director of CS Outreach, to create outreach programs for students and professional development for teachers.
To make computer science courses more accessible to students, however, schools across the state have to place a greater emphasis on hiring or retraining high school... Read More
