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Reaching 6 th through 8 th Grade Students through the National Science Foundation Research Experiences for Teachers Program

The National Science Foundation instituted a novel program recently called Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) which allows principal investigators to request a funding supplement to existing grants to enable interaction with K-12 teachers. At Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama, the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering received funding for two teachers for the summers of 2002 and 2003. A science teacher of 6 th and 7 th graders and a math teacher of 8 th graders joined the research team on the project “Relating Field Data to Accelerated Life Testing”. The project aimed to correlate wear and degradation of solder connections on under the hood electronic components with that expected through accelerated testing using temperature cycling. Besides conducting research, the other primary goal of the RET was for the teachers to develop classroom modules based on their research experiences. This experience has been enriching, not just for the teachers and their young students, but for the Auburn University industrial engineering faculty and students. This paper will describe how the RET program works and the possibilities for benefits to both K-12 and higher education in math, science and engineering.