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On August 13-14, 2025, the Jackson School of Geoscience hosted the inaugural North American Workshop on Critical Mineral Research, Development and Education, in the Thompson Conference Center on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin, USA. The workshop was funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and was attended by 230 participants. 176 participants attended the workshop in-person while another 54 participants attended online via Zoom. Twenty-two participants (including 10 students and 7 early career researchers) received travel support through the NSF grant to attend the workshop in Austin. Out of the 230 workshop participants, 134 participants were from academia (34 students), 66 from the private sector and 30 from federal- and state-level government agencies. The workshop was divided into four topical sessions that discussed current issues in critical minerals research, development, and education: (A) Conventional and Unconventional Sources of Critical Minerals. (B) How to grow the U.S. critical minerals workforce. (C) Innovations in Critical Mineral Extraction and Recycling. (D) Policy and Supply Chain Economics. The topical sessions were composed of two keynote lectures and complemented by oral and poster presentations by the workshop participants. A panel discussion and breakout session explored recent developments in critical minerals research, development and education in the U.S., with particular focus on the implications of recent Presidential Executive Orders. The discussions highlighted, for example, that: (i) The recent critical mineral-related Presidential Executive Orders by the Trump-Vance administration are encouraging steps towards fast-tracking US-based critical mineral production. (ii) Lengthy permitting timelines and limited transparency in the decision-making process – with often unpredictable outcomes – remain major barriers for mining and mineral processing operations in the U.S. Workshop participants suggested the development of policies specifically aimed at streamlining permitting processes. (iii) Funding initiatives are too often aimed at increasing short-to-mid-term critical mineral production while generation of ‘pre-competitive data’ to support and guide mineral exploration is largely neglected. Workshop participants recommended that future funding cycles place greater emphasis on generating fundamental geoscience data and insight that can be leveraged by the private sector for green and brownfield exploration. (iv) The persistent negative image of the mining and mineral processing sector remains a major obstacle to attracting and developing a skilled critical minerals workforce. As possible starting points for long-term solutions, workshop participants suggested launching a media campaign, implementing industry-led K-12 outreach programs, and stronger and closer collaborations between academia and the private sector through student-centered research projects. 

Pre-college engineering teachers bring unique backgrounds to their teaching practice. Many engineering teachers follow a non-traditional route to teaching engineering, often coming to engineering from teaching other subjects or from careers in other fields. Among the many variations influencing engineering teaching practices is pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), defined as the “the knowledge of, reasoning behind, and enactment of the teaching of particular topics in a particular way with particular students for particular reasons for enhanced student outcomes [1]”. This multiple case study explores the PCK of five middle school engineering teachers implementing the same middle school engineering curriculum, STEM-ID. The 18- week STEM-ID curriculum engages students in contextualized challenges that incorporate foundational mathematics and science practices and advanced manufacturing tools such as computer aided design (CAD) and 3D printing, while introducing engineering concepts like pneumatics, aeronautics, and robotics. Drawing on observation and interview data collected over the course of two semester-long implementations of STEM-ID, the study addresses the research question: What variations in PCK are evident among engineering teachers with different professional backgrounds and levels of experience? Five teachers were purposively selected from a larger group of teachers implementing the curriculum because they represent a range of professional backgrounds: one veteran engineering teacher, one former Math teacher, one former Science teacher, one former English/Language Arts teacher, and one novice teacher with a background in the software industry. The study utilizes the Refined Consensus Model of PCK to investigate connections between teacher backgrounds, personal PCK (pPCK), the personalized professional knowledge held by teachers, and enacted PCK (ePCK), the knowledge teachers draw on to engage in pedagogical reasoning while planning, teaching, and reflecting on their practice. Observation, interview, and survey data were triangulated to develop narrative case summaries describing each teacher’s PCK, which were then subjected to cross-case analysis to identify patterns and themes across teachers. Findings describe how teachers’ backgrounds translated into diverse forms of pPCK that informed the pedagogical moves and decisions teachers made as they implemented the curriculum (ePCK). Regardless of the previous subject taught (math, science, or ELA), teachers routinely drew upon their pPCK in other subjects as they facilitated the engineering design process. Teachers with previous experience teaching math or science tended to be more likely than others to foreground the integration of math or science within the curriculum. Comparison of ePCK observed as teachers implemented the curriculum revealed that, in spite of having a more fully developed pPCK in teaching engineering, the veteran engineering teacher did not exhibit more sophisticated ePCK than novice engineering teachers. In addition to contributing to the field’s understanding of engineering teachers’ PCK, these findings hold implications for the recruitment, retention, and professional development of engineering teachers.