Models help local science teachers bring science lessons to life houmatoday.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from houmatoday.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Three Nicholls State University professors are working to create 3-D models that will help Houma-Thibodaux area science teachers and their students bring their lessons to life.
Aimee Hollander, Justine Whitaker and Sarah Bergeron received a $69,056 grant for the project from the state Board of Regents for Higher Education.
They re creating a model teachers can use to construct molecules, something that will help drive home lessons on the structure of matter, chemical reactions and information processing.
When Hollander first learned about the 3D models, she wished they were available when she was teaching biology. For her, the models are a powerful tool to introduce to students because the objects are easy manipulate and visualize.
At Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, women are working to help tear down roadblocks they have had to overcome themselves in science, technology, engineering and math.
Studies show that these so-called STEM fields have traditionally been dominated by men. Women are slowly closing that gender gap, but while they make up just over half of the U.S. population and 57% of college graduates, they represent only 39% of STEM bachelor’s degree recipients and lower percentages in specific fields such as physics, engineering and computer science..
Here are a few of the women at Nicholls who are making a difference through their STEM teaching and research.