BINAP is the BIg Nitarp Alumni Project
One thing that is missing from the NITARP experience is the production of concrete, sharable lesson plans based on skills learned during NITARP, specifically lesson plans that might be distributed within and beyond NITARP alumni. NITARP alumni are diverse, representing schools that are large/medium/small, urban/ suburban/rural, public/private; settings ranging among middle school/high school/community college/museum/ informal ed; physics/astronomy/earth science/ chemistry/math/computer science teachers; in classrooms (quarter, semester, year-long)/ clubs/ dedicated research classes/ individual mentoring contexts. Therefore, even the same individual concept may need several different implementations to work in these wildly different environments. The BIg Nitarp Alumni Project (BINAP) is a self-organizing group of alumni that has embarked on an effort to take a “typical” rich NITARP experience, break it into “bite-size” pieces, and develop at least one lesson plan based on each piece that will work in at least a few of these environments. This work addresses the gap in the literature of “exploring how teachers adopt or translate the curriculum or instructional approaches advocated in the PDP [professional development program]” (Luft & Hewson, 2014, p. 903).
Caltech, Pasadena, California
Caltech, Pasadena, California
New Philadelphia High School, New Philadelphia, Ohio Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, North Carolina
The Bay School of San Francisco, San Francisco, California
Oxford High School, Oxford, Connecticut Sacred Heart Academy, Hamden, Connecticut
Breck School, Golden Valley, Minnesota
Braswell High School, Aubrey, Texas Lake Dallas Middle School, Lake Dallas, Texas North Greene High School, Greeneville, Tennessee
Springside Chestnut Hill Academy, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Concord Academy, Concord, Massachusetts Lawrence Academy, Groton, Massachusetts Noble & Greenough School, Dedham, Massachusetts
Academy of Information Technology & Engineering, Stamford, Connecticut
Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute, Rosman, North Carolina
