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Welcome the 2025-2026 school year form the Department of Science Education!

We are excited to welcome our new students, whether they be first-year STEM majors, Liberal Studies majors, future teachers enrolled in the Multiple or Single Subject Credential programs, students entering our Master’s in Science Education program. This diversity of students, with different backgrounds, different experiences, and different goals reflect the variety of ways that Science Education supports É«ÖÐÉ« students, and science literacy more broadly.

This year, we continue development of a new major for É«ÖÐÉ« students—the B.A. in Multidisciplinary Science. This unique program will provide students with additional academic pathways that can support a variety of STEM and STEM-adjacent careers. These include science writing (with a minor in journalism), pre-law (allowing for focus on environmental and patent law) and of course, science teaching. The major will be 'on the books' by the end of this school year and students will be able to work toward this degree starting in Fall 2026. We look forward to serving our É«ÖÐÉ« students with these additional opportunities to foster students' passion for science and its ever-present role in our changing world.

The new year also brings new challenges, as we continue to navigate rapid and somewhat chaotic changes to both education and the sciences. An ongoing realignment of priorities at the national level at a magnitude unlike anything that we've seen in the past 60 years (or more) continues to have grave consequences. Efforts to support science learning and engage students from all backgrounds, from grades Pre-K to college, are now considered a waste of money and inconsequential. The important role that discovery and investigation has in bettering our society has been dismissed as unimportant. Medical research critical for human survival has been curtailed. And the growing prevalence of scientific misinformation makes any understanding of science as a way of knowing our world seems almost insurmountable.

I am hopeful that each of us can find our way through this confusion and remain steadfast in our resolve to support our students and our community. We will work together, perhaps even more than before, in ways that are consistent with our shared understanding of science, teaching and learning and in ways that allow all to succeed.

Jim

James Kisiel
Chair and Professor
Department of Science Education