The recent ACT Report, The Forgotten Middle, states that “fewer than two in ten eighth graders are on target to be ready for college-level work by the time they graduate from high school.”

Such statements speak to the need for greater attention to middle school students and support for teachers of these grades. For our December NSDL Brown Bag, Mary Henton, Director of Integrated Media Initiatives for the National Middle School Association and Dr. Kim Lightle, Director of Digital Libraries at Ohio State University shared other data related to the needs of both students and teachers for the middle school years and how the work of the Middle School Portal will continue to address those needs as a social learning network for middle school level educators. Thirty-one people attended the live webinar on December 10, 2009. An archived version of the webinar will be available soon.

The NSDL Brown Bag Series is a free professional development webinar scheduled monthly. These 60-minute programs highlight trends and best practices in STEM education with programs at both K-12 and higher education levels.

The January webinar directed at college level educators, Supporting Connections Between Research and Learning,will feature Dr. Laura Bartolo, a professor at Kent State University and PI for the NSDL Materials Science Digital Library on January 29, 2009 at 1pm Eastern.

For more information, contact us through the NSDL contact form.