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The Billion Oyster Project and Curriculum and Community Enterprise for the Restoration of New York Harbor with New York City Public Schools (BOP-CCERS) program is a National Science Foundation (NSF) supported initiative that involves multiple stakeholder collaborations and is led by Pace University. Within Pace, the initiative crosses over three different schools and colleges and across multiple departments. Pace University’s NSF project of focus in this article is the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program. The purpose is to increase student motivation and preparation for pursuing STEM careers. This article presents results of programming to increase student scientific identity. Findings revealed that students in the 11th grade had the highest level of scientific identity compared to other high school grades. These findings indicate that 11th grade may be an ideal timeframe for interventions to improve scientific identity. Moreover, project participants had higher levels of engagement in STEM-related activities, were more likely to watch videos made by scientists, and read articles written by scientists than those in the control group. 

The Billion Oyster Project and Curriculum and Community Enterprise for the Restoration of New York Harbor with New York City Public Schools (BOP-CCERS) program is a National Science Foundation (NSF) supported initiative and collaboration led by Pace University. One of Pace University’s NSF projects is STEM+C (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics plus Computing) designed to work with teachers and students in New York City public schools. This article presents results of a study conducted on the STEM Summer Institute at Pace University in Summer 2022. The purpose was to engage both teachers and students in harbor restoration and experiential learning in New York City including learning about vital ecology projects related to New York’s harbor such as oyster restoration, which is critical to cleaning pollutants in the New York Harbor. Findings revealed that students indicated improved oyster knowledge and restoration skills, scientific skills, collecting and analyzing data, and knowledge about STEM careers. Participating teachers indicated a positive impact on their knowledge of content and harbor restoration, pedagogical knowledge used to engage students in hands-on scientific learning, and methods of engaging and motivating their own students. Moreover, teachers indicated a positive outcome for exposing their students to STEM career options. 

The Billion Oyster Project and Curriculum and Community Enterprise for the Restoration of New York Harbor (BOP-CCERS) program is a National Science Foundation (NSF) supported initiative and collaboration of multiple institutions and organizations led by Pace University and is in collaboration with New York City Public Schools. This large-scale project, Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST), generated a large amount of data through programming that engaged both teachers and students. This article presents the third part to the study with focus on the Digital Platform and results from the student Symposium presentations. Part 1 focused on Underrepresented Minority (URM) student interest in STEM as motivated by the original project. Part 2 focused on URM student engagement with teachers to support students in teaching science through experiential learning and lessons that connect science to the real world, particularly through science in the New York Harbor. Moreover, the second part of the study focused on teacher engagement in the program, and what the researchers had learned in the process. The third aspect of the study, and primary focus on this paper, had found additional positive results cited by the teachers in the study both using the Digital Platform and after the project outcomes from the student Symposium presentations. 

The Billion Oyster Project and Curriculum and Community Enterprise for the Restoration of New York Harbor with New York City Public Schools (BOP-CCERS) program is a National Science Foundation (NSF) supported initiative and collaboration of multiple institutions and organizations led by Pace University. The NSF project, Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST), had generated a large amount of data through engagement with teachers and students throughout New York City public schools. This article presents the second part to a large data collection study with focus on Underrepresented Minority (URM) student interest in STEM and engagement with teachers to support them in teaching science through experiential learning and lessons that connect science to the real world, particularly through science in the New York Harbor. The first component of the study focused on URM student interest in STEM. This second component of the study focuses on teacher engagement in the program, and what the researchers had learned in the process. Overall, teachers reported very favorable options on the impact of the BOP-CCERS activities as ways to generate student interest in STEM majors and careers. Teacher participants were generally positive about the amount of support and resources they received as members of the project, as well as the oyster-related knowledge and practices they learned to use with their own students in oyster field research. Data from the study provided evidence that the teacher activities were successful and met the project’s goals to provide support and resources for teachers to engage students in oyster restoration research. 

The Billion Oyster Project and Curriculum and Community Enterprise for the Restoration of New York Harbor with New York City Public Schools (BOP-CCERS) program is a National Science Foundation (NSF) supported initiative and collaboration of multiple institutions and organizations led by Pace University. The NSF project, Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST), had generated a large amount of data through engagement with teachers and students throughout New York City public schools. One purpose of this project is to engage with middle and high school science teachers to assist them in using project-based learning and real-world data collection in their classrooms with their students through harbor restoration initiatives. It was found that Underrepresented Minority (URM) students reported having higher levels of interest in STEM and science than did the non-URM students. While this is a success, it was found that the URM students had lower expectations for success in STEM courses and interest in STEM careers. It was concluded that URM students may need additional support in order to build their confidence and help them to become aware of opportunities in STEM education and careers. 

Propolis is a natural resinous substance collected by honeybees from buds and exu-dates of trees. The material has attracted much attention in recent years as a functional food component since it possesses various biological properties, including antimicro-bial, antioxidative, and anti-ulcer properties. In this study, the performance of accel-erated solvent extraction (ASE) was assessed and compared with varying methods of extraction: soaking (maceration), ultrasonication, and microwave-assisted methods. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and other spectroscopic tech-niques, such as absorbance and fluorescence, were employed to assess the efficiency in the extraction of natural products. The antioxidant activity and phenolic content of the different extracts were also determined. Results showed samples obtained from the microwave method showed the highest yield in the extraction of bioactive com-pounds. Although microwave showed the best method in this study, some issues and recommendations on ASE application for extracting natural products from bee prop-olis were discussed. Given the ease in controlling extraction temperature with ASE, this technique has a great potential to be a better method for extraction of heat-labile natural products from propolis should optimization of conditions for extraction were further performed. 

Student research in STEM education is an important learning component for both undergraduate and graduate students. It is not sufficient for students to learn passively in lecture-based classrooms without engaging and immersing themselves in the educational process through real-world research learning. Experiential learning for STEM students can involve conducting research, alongside and through the guidance of their professors, early in a student’s undergraduate or graduate program. The authors consider such experiences to be the hallmark of a high-quality STEM education and something every student, undergraduate and graduate, should have during the course of their programs. The purpose of this case study is to document the faculty authors’ experiences in student-faculty research and provide guidance and recommendations for best practices based upon the authors’ experience, data, and literature findings. Moreover, the study presents the experience of the faculty authors’ international student researchers in STEM with focus on two student researchers, one undergraduate and one graduate, who are international STEM. The students served as co-authors on this project. Findings from this case study indicate that students were highly engaged in the research process and found these skills valuable preparation for further study and career. Moreover, the students expressed enthusiasm and engagement for the research process.