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DDC and DOE Educators Help Bring New STEAM “Saving the Shore Coastal Resiliency” Curriculum to City Students

August 7, 2018

Educators from the NYC Department of Design and Construction (DDC) and the NYC Department of Education (DOE) came together at Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan this week for a three-day professional development program in which 16 public middle school and high school teachers were introduced to the DDC’s new “Coastal Resiliency” curriculum’s hands-on engineering- and architecture-related activities with a focus on how Hurricane Sandy devastated parts of New York City and in the process raised awareness of the effect Global Climate Change and extreme weather can have on coastal areas. New York City has begun to develop ways to protect the shoreline, and the DDC has created a curriculum: "Saving the Shore." In this workshop, teachers learned to ‘trouble spots’ in their respective communities and explore methods of protecting New York City, and create a “redesign” of New York City’s waterfront. This new curriculum exemplifies Project-Based Learning, Built Environment projects and the science of Global Climate Change.
 
The training program was organized under the DOE’s STEM Institute. DDC educational programs are conducted through its STEAM initiative, which partners with DOE and the NYC Department of Youth & Community Development (DYCD) to bring initiatives such as the Young Engineers Program to students citywide. Overall, DDC STEAM has engaged over 2,500 students in various programs since its inception in 2015, working exclusively with Title I schools.
 
“By teaching the teachers we can greatly increase the number of young people we can engage with our STEAM programming, introducing them to career opportunities they may not have imagined for themselves before. Our goal with DDC STEAM professional development is to bring math and science concepts to life and to bring engineering and problem solving to NYC students. In our Train the Trainer sessions, we give educators, in this case, New York City Public School teachers enrolled in the DOE STEM Institute, the opportunity to explore the concepts and methodologies in a fun environment so they are confident implementing the program”. said DDC Deputy Commissioner for Community Partnerships & STEAM Initiatives Lee Llambelis.