The COVID-19 pandemic did not stop the Rice University School Mathematics Project (RUSMP) from offering its highly popular Summer Campus Program (SCP) for precollege teachers. The camp went virtual and successfully ran June 8–18, with the enlisted help of the Rice/NSF Robert Noyce Master Teaching Fellows (Grant #1556006) to co-teach.

Teachers from the Greater Houston area and beyond enrolled in the SCP and were placed into three cohorts: elementary grades 2–5, middle school grades 6–8 or high school geometry-calculus. Each cohort convened on Zoom for three hours each morning and worked individually or virtually in groups for three hours each afternoon. A variety of technologies and websites were used.

The SCP camp has been running for 33 years and all the activities it offers transitioned seamlessly to an online environment: readings and discussions, independent and group work, lesson development, integrated math and art activities in the elementary and middle school cohorts, and colloquium talk in the high school cohort.

The Noyce Master Teaching Fellows also jumped in to plan, facilitate, and present during the RUSMP Fall 2020 Networking Conference and the RUSMP Spring 2021 Networking Conference. Nearly 150 educators attended the webinar to gain on the important issues of today’s virtual teaching:

• Planning and setting up your online classroom
• Creating an inviting environment
• Techniques to actively engage your students in an online community of practice
• Technology that works
• Effective formative assessments

This video describes the professional development during the pandemic – the technology, the content, the challenges, and the successes.

NSF Awards: 1556006

Presented in: 2021 (see original presentation & discussion)