Two Wichita-area teachers who graduated from ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½βs School of Education were recently recognized for their outstanding work in the classroom by the White House with the . PAEMST is the highest award kindergarten through 12th grade mathematics and science teachers can receive from the U.S. government.
Callie Harris, who earned her bachelorβs in elementary education from ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ in 2004 and her masterβs of education at ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ in 2008, is assistant principal at Pray-Woodman Elementary School in the Maize School District. She started as assistant principal in fall 2021. Prior to that, she served as the math interventionist for the school, training staff to use student data to meet individual student needs. Harris worked with more than 100 students a day with mathematical needs. In 2019, she won a nearly $12,000 grant to implement a Stop Everything and STEAM Day for her school building. Those funds allowed all students in the school to participate in monthly STEAM events and opened doors for community partnerships with the ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ College of Engineering, which has continued through the 2021 school year.
Zerrin Oelze, who earned her bachelorβs in Elementary Education from ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ in 2001, is a science teacher at McLean Science and Technology Magnet Elementary in Wichita. Oelzeβs students collaborate on and engage in hands-on learning in the science lab. Oelze incorporates place-based science in an Outdoor Wildlife Learning Site (OWLS), as well as with an indoor honeybee hive in the science lab. She coordinates schoolwide science events each quarter, a yearly STEM Night for families and family workdays in the OWLS.
ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ serves as the Kansas urban-based research university, enrolling more than 16,000 students from every state in the U.S. and more than 100 countries. Wichita State and ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ Tech are recognized for being student centered and innovation driven.
Located in the largest city in the state with one of the highest concentrations in the United States of jobs involving science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ provides uniquely distinctive and innovative pathways of applied learning, applied research and career opportunities for all of our students.
The Innovation Campus, which is a physical extension of the ΒιΆΉ΄«Γ½ main campus, is one of the nationβs largest and fastest-growing research/innovation parks, encompassing over 120 acres and is home to a number of global companies and organizations.
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