Five optional pre-conference workshops will be held on Wednesday, October 23. Advance registration and a fee are required for all attendees.
Workshop A – Getting Started for New Grantees
1:00–5:00 p.m.
Registration Fee: $50.00
This workshop is recommended for all principal investigators, co-principal investigators, and other team members involved in newly awarded projects and centers in FY19. Others who may find the workshop useful include new awardees in FY18 and other project personnel from prior years who have recently become involved in ATE projects and centers. The workshop will be divided into three parts: (1) ATE Program Issues. Topics to be covered include reporting requirements, such as annual and final reports, working with NSF program officers, changes in project personnel or scope, data collection, FastLane and other reporting systems, use of advisory boards and national visiting committees, preparing project highlights for NSF and others, institutional review boards (IRBs), and many other relevant topics. (2) Financial Management and Grant Management Issues. This section will focus on financial accounting issues and discuss in detail problems often seen in monitoring visits, such as participant support, time and effort accounting, subawardees, record keeping, changes in scope, overload, and use of consultants. (3) Evaluation. This segment will address building in evaluation from the start of your project or center. The ATE program conducts an annual survey of all projects and centers that have been active for more than one year. Additional evaluation topics to be addressed include, but are not limited to, evaluation design, methods and instrumentation, resources for learning about productive evaluation, the roles of internal and external evaluators, and evaluation challenges.
Workshop B – ATE PI Survival Guide: Surviving and Thriving in the ATE Program
1:00–4:00 p.m.
Registration Fee: $50.00
This workshop is designed for ATE PIs and co-PIs entering the second or third year of their grants who could use assistance and guidance in elements of grants award management in order to “Survive and Thrive” in the ATE program. Come talk with experienced ATE PIs to learn successful tips and hear lessons learned in troubleshooting common challenges such as implementing budget and personnel changes; engaging administrators in support of your efforts; navigating grant guidelines and documents such as the Proposal and Award Policies and Procedures Guide (PAPPG); preparing annual reports; and understanding NSF expectations for ATE awards. There also will be time set aside for small group discussion for participants to bring their own challenges to the table for discussion, feedback, and guidance.
Workshop C – STEM Makeover with Accessibility and Universal Design for Learning
1:00–5:00 p.m.
Registration Fee: $50.00
Be inspired to learn accessibility skills to make your ATE project and center STEM curriculum materials, including documents, graphics, and videos, more usable for all learners. Led by experts from CAST (the Center for Applied Special Technology), this interactive workshop will focus on practical uses of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), a framework to improve and optimize teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights into how humans learn. As UDL begins with a strong foundation in accessibility, the first half of the workshop will focus on the four accessibility principles of POUR (Perceivable, Operable, Understandable, Robust). POUR will be applied to STEM-related course content through a series of material makeover demonstrations. Common examples of educational materials will be first displayed in traditional formats, followed by POUR-aligned accessible versions. Building on the accessibility best practices from the first half of the workshop, we will then help you think about how to teach learners to transfer accessible information into usable knowledge and will focus on selecting multiple media to reach and engage all learners and providing supports for executive functioning and self-regulation, particularly important in STEM classrooms using active learning. Please bring a laptop or tablet to this workshop.
Workshop D – Leading for Equity in ATE: Transforming Systems to Broaden Participation in STEM
1:00–5:00 p.m.
Registration Fee: $50.00
The NSF ATE program is a powerful mechanism to broaden participation of students in STEM pathways through community and technical college education. This special preconference professional development will build the capacity of ATE PIs, project staff, and partners to lead for equity in ATE. Participants will be equipped with the tools and mechanisms to interrupt systems that hinder progress and outcomes for underrepresented students, including women and girls, students of color, students with disabilities, English language learners, and people from low socioeconomic backgrounds in higher education. You will walk away with actionable ways to leverage ATE-grant funded programs and projects to build towards equity in CTE and STEM. Join national experts Drs. Ben Williams and Ricardo Romanillos of the National Alliance for Partnerships in Equity (NAPE) for this highly interactive preconference workshop. All participants will receive NAPE’s workbook, Micromessaging – Leading for Equity Edition.
Workshop E – Impact Evaluation Essentials: Why, What, and How*
1:00–4:00 p.m.
Registration Fee: $50.00
Impact evaluation can be a powerful way to assess the long-term or broader effect of a project. Attention to causal inference, which requires determining if a change can be attributed to the project and its activities, sets impact evaluation apart from other types of evaluation. This workshop is an introduction to impact evaluation and a forum for discussing how it can be realistically implemented in ATE projects. Two examples from ATE evaluations will be highlighted as case studies. ATE principal investigators, project and center staff, and evaluators who attend this workshop will learn (1) the basic tenants of impact evaluation, (2) how to identify impact measures for ATE projects, (3) strategies for determining causal attribution, and (4) the resources needed to implement impact evaluation for your project.
*ATE Evaluation Fellowship
EvaluATE will provide funding to up to 12 evaluators to enable them to attend the 2019 ATE Principal Investigators Conference, including the pre-conference workshop, “Impact Evaluation Essentials: Why, What, and How.” To learn more and apply for the funding, opens in a new windowclick here.