The Evaluation of My PAEMST Application: My Grades

I received an email note from the good people at the PAEMST program alerting me to the availability of the "grades" earned by my 2011 PAEMST application.

At this point, the pressure is off: I already achieved recognition as a national finalist; I am a PAEMST Awardee! But, of course, there is the curiosity. How are you not going to look at the assessment given by the evaluators?

Each section ("dimension") of the application was given a mark from a four-point scale. 

Excellent (4) - The applicant demonstrated outstanding knowledge, skills or performance with no errors or limitations.
Very Good (3) - The applicant demonstrated strong knowledge, skills or performance with no significant errors or limitations.
Good (2) - The applicant demonstrated limited knowledge, skills or performance with some errors or limitations.
Fair (1) - The applicant demonstrated limited knowledge, skills or performance with significant errors or limitations.

Three evaluators reviewed the application. The evaluators were part of the National Selection Committee (NSC) convened by the National Science Foundation. After each NSC evaluator gives his or her review, they meet to compare notes and develop a final, panel score.

My numerical scores:

Dimension 1: Mastery of their content appropriate for the grade level taught
Panel: Excellent (4) - NSC #1: Very Good (3) - NSC #2: Excellent (4) - NSC #3: Very Good (3)

Dimension 2: Use of instructional methods and strategies that are appropriate for the students in the class and that support student learning
Panel: Very Good (3) - NSC #1: Very Good (3) - NSC #2: Very Good (3) - NSC #3: Very Good (3)

Dimension 3: Effective use of student assessments to evaluate, monitor, and improve student learning
Panel: Very Good (3) - NSC #1: Very Good (3) - NSC #2: Excellent (4) - NSC #3: Very Good (3)

Dimension 4: Reflective practice and life-long learning to improve teaching and student learning
Panel: Excellent (4) - NSC #1: Very Good (3) - NSC #2: Excellent (4) - NSC #3: Very Good (3)

Dimension 5: Leadership in education outside the classroom
Panel: Excellent (4) - NSC #1: Excellent (4) - NSC #2: Excellent (4) - NSC #3: Excellent (4)

These scores must have 

1. qualified me as a PAEMST-worthy national finalist, and

2. distinguished me from my fellow California science candidates.

Outscoring one's fellow state candidates is not enough to be named as an awardee. Some states went without awardees in mathematics or in science. One state had no PAEMST awardees in 2011.

The complete report—with comments—is available as a PDF here:

Introduction to the PAEMST Evaluation document

Dean Baird's PAEMST Application Evaluation

For reference, my original application materials are here:
Dean Baird's Videotaped Lesson: "Why the Sky is Blue"

Dean Baird's Dimensions of Outstanding Teaching (with Supplements)

Dean Baird's PAEMST Résumé

Dean Baird's Letters of Recommendation

President Obama Announces Plans for a New, National Corps to Recognize and Reward Leading Educators in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math

Administration will also immediately dedicate $100 million to supporting STEM teachers

WASHINGTON, DC -- Today, the Obama Administration will announce the President’s plan for the creation of a new, national Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) Master Teacher Corps comprised of some of the nation’s finest educators in STEM subjects. The STEM Master Teacher Corps will begin with 50 exceptional STEM teachers established in 50 sites and will be expanded over 4 years to reach 10,000 Master Teachers. These selected teachers will make a multi-year commitment to the Corps and, in exchange for their expertise, leadership and service, will receive an annual stipend of up to $20,000 on top of their base salary. The Administration will launch this Teacher Corps with the $1 billion from the President’s 2013 budget request currently before Congress.

President Obama said, “If America is going to compete for the jobs and industries of tomorrow, we need to make sure our children are getting the best education possible.  Teachers matter, and great teachers deserve our support.”

Today, the Administration also announced that the President will immediately dedicate approximately $100 million of the existing Teacher Incentive Fund toward helping school districts implement high-quality plans to establish career ladders that identify, develop, and leverage highly effective STEM teachers. With an application deadline of July 27th, over 30 school districts across America have already signaled their interest in competing for funding to identify and compensate highly effective teachers who can model and mentor STEM instruction for their teaching peers, providing those teachers with additional compensation, recognition, and responsibilities in their schools.

These Administration plans build on a key recommendation of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), calling for a national STEM Master Teacher Corps to recognize and help retain America’s most talented STEM teachers, build a community of practice among them, raise the profile of the STEM teaching profession, and leverage excellent teachers to collaborate with their peers to strengthen STEM education in America’s public schools.

As part of the announcement, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, White House Domestic Policy Council Director Cecilia Muñoz, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Dr. John Holdren, and PCAST Co-Chair Dr. Eric Lander will meet on Wednesday at the White House with outstanding math and science teachers to discuss efforts to strengthen teaching and learning in science, technology, engineering and mathematics and build up the STEM education profession.

More details in the full White House press release.

NSF PAEMST Press Release Upgraded

The National Science Foundation's press release concerning the Presidential Awards for Mathematics and Science Teaching has been newly fortified with interviews with some of the awardees.

Check the first paragraph under the article's dateline.

Outstanding Science and Mathematics Teachers Recieve Presidential Awards

UPDATE: You can see the videos right here! (I'm so good at the Internets!) I reversed the order relative to the NSF's post, just to be sporting.

Robert Samuel Ettinger: Washington Science


Matthew Owens: South Carolina Math


Judith Martinez: Puerto Rico Science


Angela Miller: Kansas Math

The PAEMST Eagle Flew Today

In addition to last week's recognition events in Washington, DC, the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching includes a $10,000 deposit into each awardee's personal bank account.

That deposit was made to my account today.

One of the PAEMST meet-and-greet small group discussion prompts last week Wednesday was "What are your plans for the prize money?" By that point in the activity, we were very comfortable with each other—impressed and delighted with the dynamism and affability of the assembly. So that particular prompt quickly disintegrated into joke-making. I recall asking my group if they thought "Candy and magazines" would be an inappropriate response. I don't recall serious feedback being offered!

The monetary prize is a wonderful benefit of being selected as an awardee. Who among us couldn't find a use for $10,000? I do not know the exact reason that it's part of the award, but it is likely an acknowledgement that teachers spend a non-trivial amount of their own money on classroom materials. With 97 awardees, there are probably 97 different ways the money will be handled.

In any case, I'm off to the store to get my candy and magazines!

Post-PAEMST Wednesday: Air & Space and Fireworks

Jean was stay close to the Beacon and visit the National Geographic Museum and give her legs a rest this day. So I headed out alone. The streets up at Dupont Circle were dead on this holiday morning.

Our little sidewalk cafe was open, so I had a bite of breakfast before heading to the Metro and on to the Smithsonian stop. I headed directly to the Air & Space Museum, so I could be there when it opened.

The marching bands were readying for the parade. They were decked out in thick felt and heavy boots. And decorative hats. They were dressed for winter, but it was heading toward 90+° F. And the humidity! I hope they managed to keep hydrated and were prepared to burn those unis.

I got into the museum with a sizable crowd. I knew it would only get more crowded as the holiday went on. I meandered and photographed as best I could.

When lunch rolled around, I asked a docent for a tip. He recommended the food court next door, the one at The Museum of the American Indian. Good call! It wasn't cheap, but no museum food court food is. But it was arranged by various Native American regions. The variety was excellent, and the fare was yum! It's called Mitsitam. I wandered through the expansive gift shop and found a few T-shirts. There were other alluring treasures, but the new camera (and lenses) set me back a bit.

I returned to Air & Space for more meandering and photography. So much aerospace goodness in that place! I was happy to see some recognition of the Ranger and Surveyor missions to the Moon: the unmanned probes we sent in the run up to Apollo. Of course I spent time in the Wright Flyer gallery, enjoyed a show at the planetarium, touched the Moon Rock, and wandered through several other robust displays.

I found an appealing T in the basement of the museum store, where there was also a giant model of NCC-1701.

I returned to the Beacon to strategize and gear up for the evening's fireworks display. I surmized the rockets were to be launched somewhere over The National Mall. I had been told that that place tended to be extremely crowded during the show. No interest at all. It looked like I'd have a good shot if I crossed the Potomac and shot from the Mount Vernon Trail near the Arlington Metro stop.

When I arrived (hours before sundown), the west bank of the Potomac was tripod-to-tripod thick with photogs already in place. I found a breach and plugged my Gitzo in. The view included the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument, with the boat-laden Potomac in the foreground. All that was left was waiting for dark.

The show started around 9:15pm, I think. Once it began, there were "bombs bursting in air" non-stop for about 20 minutes. My rig was the Nikon D800E + Nikkor AFS 24-70mm. I set it fairly wide (I didn't have a sense of how high the bursts would go), knowing that with 36 MP, I could crop as needed. I'd read somewhere that f/11 and ISO200 were good settings for fireworks, so I went with that. The shutter was in bulb mode, and I had a cable release.

I've never really shot fireworks, so the proper technique is not intuitive to me. You want to be able to expose for several seconds while not losing color saturation. I was also in Live View, which was probably a mistake. I kept the camera/lens an autofocus; most shots were spot on, others were a touch soft. With more confidence and better technique, I would have set the focus to the one that works and locked it in. But when the show is on, it's a race to gather as many images as you can. All I wanted to think about was when to open and close the shutter.

When it was over, it was back to the Metro. But the crowds that had taken hours to assemble were now in a hurry to depart at the same time. And there was a failure somewhere near Arlington. So the steaming masses were forced to wait. As 11pm approached, it was still hot and very humid.

I was pleasantly surprised by how well most of the fireworks shots turned out. I was shooting something I don't shoot on a camera that was unfamiliar to me.

So closed the last full day in The District.

Developing(!): My DC Photo Albums

These are very much in the preview stage, and will eventually be better organized. But for now:

PAEMST-related
Non-PAEMST-related

DC Fireworks!

Post-PAEMST Tuesday: NPR to Trolley Touring

After a nice breakfast at a Golden Triangle sidewalk café, we traveled to National Public Radio's DC headquarters at 635 Massachusetts Avenue. We were a bit early for the Tuesday public tour. But that gave us time to gather a few photographs.

NPR Weekend Edition Saturday host, Scott Simon, probably thought he was safe from pestering fans when he arrived to his workplace at 10am to conduct an interview for Saturday's broadcast. But as he tried to fly through security, I recognized his voice. His face was turned away from me, and he was wearing sunglasses, but he's a radio host and I do have bionic ears. Knowing what a big fan Jean is, I bellowed out—more as a declarative than an interrogative, "Is that Scott Simon?"

Jean leapt into action, accosting Mr. Simon with praise and appreciations. Since I am such a hep youngster, I snapped a few groupie pics on my iPhone during the assault. In fairness, he was very gracious and slowed down enough ask where we were from and remove his stylish Ray-Bans. I felt bad keeping him from his work, so I didn't try to get a groupie shot, myself. Jean's a much bigger Scott Simon fan, so we got the right pic.

By the time the tour was set to launch, the group was up to about 40. Unwieldy holiday crowd, but our guide made it work. You start at the top floor (6th) via elevator, and work your way down through the triangular building. (Triangular buildings are not so uncommon in DC due to the layout of the streets.)

The group encountered Political Junkie (Talk of the Nation's political trivia wünderkind/ScuttleButton curator), Ken Rudin, Morning Edition (NPR West) Host, Renee Montagne. It's always funny to see the people that these very familiar voices come from.

We were allowed to paw through and purchase some of the "employee swag," an opportunity likely prompted by the size of the group and NPR's impending move out of 635 Mass Ave. I bit on a quirky, hand-died orange All Things Considered T.

One of our group was allowed to play the piano under our guide's talk in Studio 4A. She was quite good. It was nice to see NPR's impressive setup and know they're readying for the future.


We navigated our way to a Five Guys Burgers & Fries for lunch. There was no shortage of construction cranes at work in the downtown. We hopped onto a trolley to see some city sights.

We jumped off at Jefferson Memorial. I like its circularity and proximity to the water.

Next we spent some time at the Lincoln Memorial with the rest of humanity. That one looks good day or night.

The it was back on the Metro to Farragut North on the Red Line. We stopped at Nando's Peri Peri (Portuguese bistro) for dinner before heading back to The Beacon.

Post-PAEMST Monday: A Day at the Zoo

I had the chance to meet up with an actual student from my PAEMST video while in DC. Her family moved from Sacramento to Pennsylvania during the interval between PAEMST 2011 application submission and the award announcement.

Jean and I Metroed a couple of stops up the Red Line to the Smithsonian Institution's National Zoo, where we met Rio Phyz alum, Morgan Lambert and her friend Stephanie Portmann. They left early that morning to ride a series of trains from Chambersburg, PA.

We toured the zoo, making it through the bird house, panda exhibit, big cats, orangutans, and elephant space. As was true of all the days I was in DC, it was hot and humid. (Some days, records were set.)

After a few hours at the zoo, Steph and Morgan set out for Georgetown Cupcake before heading back to Chambersburg. They were on a mission.

Jean and I stayed at the zoo and shot as many animals as we could for the rest of the day.

As a photographer, I enjoyed the Invertebrates more than most zoo visitors. Chasing the butterflies in the Pollinarium was great fun.

Among the big cats, the tigers proved elusive. But I did get a couple of nice yawning lioness shots.

The zoo trail ends at Amazonia's watery and tropical exhibit space. Then it was back up the hill and onto the Metro. We dined at the Shake Shack on our way back to The Beacon.

Outstanding Science and Mathematics Teachers Receive Presidential Awards

Awardees meet the Bidens during White House visit

July 2, 2012
Recipients of the Presidential Awards for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching (PAEMST) came to Washington, D.C., on June 25 for a week of recognition activities and professional development. Highlighting their trip was a visit to the White House, where they met with Vice President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill Biden, a longtime educator. The week's activities also included meetings with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and National Science Foundation (NSF) Deputy Director Cora B. Marrett. (See the White House blog for additional details and photos.)

On June 28th, the awardees received certificates signed by President Obama at a ceremony at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington, D.C.

"America's success in the 21st century depends on our ability to educate our children, give our workers the skills they need and embrace technological change," the President said when announcing the awards last month.

"That starts with the men and women in front of our classrooms. These teachers are the best of the best, and they stand as excellent examples of the kind of leadership we need in order to train the next generation of innovators and help this country get ahead."

PAEMST represents the highest honors bestowed by the U.S. government specifically for K-12 mathematics and science teaching. Awardees serve as models for their colleagues, inspiration to their communities, and leaders in the improvement of mathematics and science education. In addition to the presidential certificate, awardees received a trip for two to Washington, D.C., and a $10,000 award from NSF.

Of the 97 teachers selected for this year's awards (see list below), there are 51 science teachers and 46 mathematics teachers from across the country, including the four U.S. jurisdictions of Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, Department of Defense Education Activity schools and the U.S. territories as a group. U.S. territories include: American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

PAEMST applications are reviewed at the state and national levels by selection committees of outstanding scientists, mathematicians, and educators. Nominees are then sent to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and to the President for final selection. Each year the awards alternate between elementary (kindergarten through sixth grade) and secondary (seventh through 12th grade) teachers.

Since the program's inception in 1983, more than 4,200 teachers have received this honor. NSF administers PAEMST on behalf of OSTP.

Full NSF Press Release

Post-PAEMST Sunday: Constitution to Capitol

After a unexpectedly challenging brunch at the Beacon, Jean and I Metroed to the National Archives to see The Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution, and The Bill of Rights. Upon approaching the Charters of Freedom Rotunda wherein these documents are displayed, one queues into a group. The group is given a stern talking to by a security guard before being allowed into the Rotunda. You are expected to have your go at the documents within about 10 minutes and move on.

As all visitors observe, the originals are highly faded and difficult to read. I thought it was interesting that there were no photographs or depictions of the Archives' Rotunda that did not show the two guards standing stoically at either end of the Constitution. There were photographs and video showing the Rotunda devoid of visitors. But the guards were always in place.

After the Archives, we wandered through the National Gallery of Art's Sculpture Garden, just across the street. We admired and photographed the amusing variety of true 3-D art as best we could. And met a man who had been "around the world" over a hundred times. Seems he made most of these pseudo-circumnavigations by jogging in circles while near the South Pole, as you do. But he did so with a witness! His name badge indicated he was in town attending a geosciences conference of some sort. And it's not the kind of thing you'd make up.

From there, we strolled past the Air & Space Museum and the Museum of the American Indian. We also passed the National Botanical Gardens en route to wander the grounds of the US Capitol Building. It was Sunday, so things were closed and relatively mellow. But still well-populated with wandering tourists.

A huge temporary bandstand at the edge of the Capitol's reflecting pool prevented any attempts at clever reflection photography, but Independence Day was close at hand, and preparations for the celebration were well under way.

Post-PAEMST Saturday PM: Moving, Pictures

Jean and I Metroed back to The Willard, collected our luggage, and took a taxi up to the Beacon Hotel & Corporate Quarters near Dupont Circle, in the District's northwest quadrant. We were near Embassy Row.

After settling in, we walked over to Julia's Empanadas for some food. It was a hole in the wall, but highly rated. And the empanadas were baked with love. And deliciousness.

With a bit of fuel in me, I ventured into the heat and humidity in search of some photographs. I Metroed down to the National Mall and took some shots at the Washington Monument, the World War II Memorial, and the Lincoln Memorial. Though it was nearing midnight, neither the heat nor the crowds showed signs of dissipation.

I did my best and made my way back to the Beacon. I was all manner of thirsty and a wee bit hungry, so I was happy to see Julia's was still open after midnight. The street front along Connecticut Ave. that had been quiet hours before was now throbbing with twenty-somethings cruising and clubbing it up. A throng of hipsters flooded the sidewalk, keen to get into the thump-club next to Julia's. Tightly dressed young ladies were stacked several deep buying empanadas to help them pass the time waiting for admission into the club.