Overview

To Whom This May Concern,


This blog was created to enhance my understanding of how technology can be incorporated into the classroom in order to enhance student learning, student interest, and the students' overall experience.  I believe that technology can be more beneficial than just acting as a shortcut, ie: a SMART Board, and this blog will document my steps in trying to figure out how technology, and more specifically, authentic scientific research, can be used effectively in an educational setting.

More specifically, this blog will focus on CarboSchools, educational establishments that have been developed in Europe with the intention of providing students the opportunity to work with professional scientists. Students are encouraged to develop their own research topics and engage in scientific inquiry to answer their questions.

In these CarboSchools, students teamed up with scientists from industry and educational institutions to perform experiments tailored towards subjects regarding global warming and climate change. There were nine research institutes in eight countries, with each country having different research topics.

Spain
- Students partnered up with the Climate Research Laboratory in Barcelona
- Main research topic: carbon dynamics

Netherlands
- Students worked with scientists at the Center for Isotope Research
- Main research topic: developing technologies to measure CO2

UK
- Students worked with scientists from the University of East Anglia's School of Environmental Science
- Main research topic: determining levels of CO2 around local schools

France
- Students partnered with scientists from The National Research Institute for Agronomy and the National Scientific Research Center.
- Main research topic: analyzing continental ecosystems and the carbon cycle

Germany
- Students partnered with scientists at the Max Plank Institute for Biogeochemistry
- Main research topic: investigate global biogeochemical cycles

Italy
- Students worked with professors from the Benevento Province Institute of BioMeterology
- Main research topic: CO2 emissions and effect on agriculture

Norway
- Students partnered up with scientists from the Bjerknes center for Climate Research and the Geophysical Institute at the University of Bergen
- Main research topic: investigating how CO2 affects marine ecosystems

Romania
- Students teamed up with graduate students from the Applied Physics Department at the National Institute for Research and Development of Isotopic and Molecular Technologies
- Main research topic: environmental studies regarding the global carbon cycle

The list of countries and their descriptions provides some insight on what students researched during their scientific inquiries. It may be difficult to replicate the environment in which students worked in, but this concept of allowing students to collaborate with professional scientists and researchers is something worth noting.



**Currently, the CarboSchools program is nonexistent due to a lack of governmental funding. Plans to develop another program to continue achieving the CarboSchools' learning goals are on-going. **