National Institute of STEM Education

National STEM Certification

The national STEM certification, also known as the National Certificate for STEM Excellence is an award presented by the National Institute for STEM Education for campus’ who have achieved expectations governed by the organization.  The STEAM Academy @ KMS began this process in April of 2019 and completed all required activities by August 2020.  The process began by allowing the community to provide input through the completion of a survey to determine their vision of their school.  From the results of the survey, the campus created a vision statement that mirrored the profile of a STEM student.  

Vision
The Duncanville STEAM Academy at Kennemer Middle School provides a safe, innovative, collaborative, student-driven environment that ensures rigorous interdisciplinary learning while supporting a growth mindset for each scholar.

Through this process, five teachers completed 38 modules that equaled to approximately 60 hours of teacher professional development.  The work included classroom observations, video reviews, question response, and coaching feedback. The teachers that accomplished and receive recognition include Mrs. Amanda Torres, Science 6; Ms. Charelle Calloway, Math 6; Ms. Eika Johnson, Maker Engineering 6; Ms. Cynthia Johnson, Science 7; Mr. Herbert Moore, Robotic 7; Ms. Jouet Daniels, ELAR 8.  We currently have five additional teachers who have committed and started their process to completing the certification:  Mrs. Kim Duncan, Computer Science 6; Mrs. Myronda Mays, ELAR 6; Mrs. Jennifer Rust-Mason; Social Studies 7; Mr. Simon Obura, Math 7; Ms. Janet Webster, Science 8.  These individuals are scheduled to have their certificate completed by Spring 2022. 

The campus was responsible for completing three phases that included 27 different modules to ensure a focus, action, and vision for sustainability.  These activities also included weekly coaching, feedback, implementation, and documentation articles.  We received virtual and on-site professional development with on-going support from Jessica Morse, Brian Whitney, Heather Ross, and Jamie Long.  The STEAM Academy adopted three measurable goals to ensure progress to accomplishment. 

  • Goal 1
    The teachers and staff at the STEAM Academy will ensure they are providing opportunities for students to contribute to the execution of the lesson by providing student-centered instruction.

  • Goal 2
    The teachers and staff at the STEAM Academy will ensure lessons are developed using real-world connections.

  • Goal 3
    The teachers and staff at the STEAM Academy will assess the learning through the process of checking for understanding using aggressive monitoring.

The work completed ensures that we understand the components of STEM from a national lens as well as the objectives necessary for authentic STEM instruction.  It allowed us to evaluate the scope of how we interconnect our curriculum for STEM, build from an evidence-base framework, also provide common language for implementation and evaluation across the grade-levels as well as contents.  The relationship with NISE will continue next year as we create additional goals based on the 15 Teacher Actions.  The conversations began with the April orientation of the additional teachers who are beginning their certifications and scheduled conversations with NISE management set for July.

National Institute for STEM Education logo
National Certificate for STEM Teaching logo
I am STEM Certified logo