"Science Buddies" get involved with classes at the Mosier School in South Hadley

New to the list of Community-Based Learning projects this year is "Science Buddies," a program which helps Mount Holyoke students to get integrated with the South Hadley Public School system and get their feet wet in the education field, all while assisting elementary school teachers and forming relationships between MHC and South Hadley's Mosier Elementary and its students and teachers.  Allie Lau relates her experiences in tackling the program this semester, and her hopes for its future.

By Allie Lau

Edited by Lauren Quirici

Created by Professor Rachel Fink in Mount Holyoke’s biology department, the “Science Buddies” program matches MHC students with classes at Mosier Elementary School in South Hadley.  Each student attends the classes weekly to help during science lessons.  The program was created as a way to share the science resources of MHC with local elementary school classes, and as a way to expose MHC science majors to the field of education. Science Buddies is new to CBL this year, the program has been operating for approximately ten years.

As a CBL Fellow, I recruit and manage all the Mount Holyoke Science Buddies.  Professor Fink continues to be involved in the program and helps me in running it.  In the beginning of the school year I matched all the Science Buddies up with classes at Mosier.  Throughout the semester I’ve been supporting the buddies by orienting them to Mosier Elementary School, organizing training sessions, and facilitating reflection meetings. I also am the primary liaison between Mosier and the Science Buddies program, so I check-in with the Mosier teachers and gather their honest feedback.

I was a Science Buddy myself last year, and it was a lot of fun.  When Professor Fink asked if I would be interested in being a CBL fellow for the program, I agreed because I thought it would help me learn many leadership skills and teach me about science outreach programs. I am very interested in science education, and working with Science Buddies has allowed me to not only see what science education is like in the elementary classroom, but also to experience the effect that being in the classroom has on MHC science majors.

I plan to be the CBL fellow for Science Buddies at least for the 2013-2014 academic year, if not for next year as well.  My goals for this semester were to establish Science Buddies as a reliable and useful resource for the Mosier teachers, and as a program that would allow them to expand their science teaching capacity. I also hoped for the Mount Holyoke students to learn about the importance of science outreach programs. By December, I wanted to have all the Buddies regularly going to Mosier and building relationships with their teacher and class.

Though it took a little longer than expected to get all the Buddies placed, they have now all been attending classes at Mosier for over a month.  We have oriented them to the school and held a reflection meeting in which we discussed the rewards and challenges of their work in the classrooms. This month we have arranged a training session for the buddies and we will touch-base with the Mosier teachers.

Accomplishing my goals for the program has been coming along gradually, and understandably so.  I am hoping to build a strong relationship with the Mosier teachers, and strong relationships will take more than one semester to establish.  The biggest challenge I've faced has been coordinating schedule differences between the Mosier and Mount Holyoke calendars.  We want the buddies to be able to go to Mosier as many times as they can before the end of the semester, but not all of our school holidays match up with Mosier’s, and the length of our semester limits the amount of time that MHC students can be with the Mosier students in December.

I have realized that things can take longer than you expect them to, even if you have planned for them. This experience has taught me to be more direct in communicating my expectations.  I have also learned a lot about when and where to be flexible with my plans and goals.

I have become more comfortable in my role as CBL fellow.  I have learned to communicate more effectively, and I have enjoyed getting to know the Buddies this semester. Though we ran into some challenges, we were able to have 12 Buddies work at Mosier this fall, which I am proud of.  I love supporting the Buddies and the Mosier science classes.