The success of the Laboratory and the region as a whole depends on a skilled workforce. To help produce better education outcomes for students, the Laboratory supports initiatives from elementary school through higher education, including robust teacher professional development initiatives.
Education
Investing in the future
Los Alamos is committed to investing and partnering in science, technology, engineering, and math education initiatives and programs that have a positive impact on student achievement while addressing community pipeline and regional workforce needs.
Recent highlights
- In the fourth year of the Regional Partnership School program with partners Pojoaque Valley School District and New Mexico Highlands University:
- In-class support by LANL Math & Science Academy (MSA) team
- Professional development program for teachers and principals received a $40,000 grant from the LANL Foundation to offer sessions throughout the year and during the summer, and provide support for teachers as they apply their new skills and practices in the classroom
- New after-school math program recruited five high school students to work with four Pojoaque Valley Intermediate School teachers and education specialists from the MSA to provide extra math instruction for 30 fourth- and fifth- grade students.
- Virtual Mindset Math Summer Camp for 36 students in grades 6th-9th
- Six Northern New Mexico teachers comprised the first-ever cohort to graduate with the new Master’s Degree in Educational Leadership with an Emphasis in K-8 Mathematics Teacher Leadership from New Mexico Highlands University, a collaboration between the teachers, the University, and the Laboratory’s MSA program.
- Bradbury Science Museum’s educators brought creative hands-on activities for more than 400 kindergarten through sixth-grade students at six Española district elementary schools under the Bradbury Science Museum’s Summer Science on Wheels program.
- 200 LANL employees provided 2,342 service hours to nonprofit and educational organizations in Northern NM, impacting an estimated 2,620 students, teachers and community members.
- Lab employees Nicole Lloyd-Ronning and Mark Galassi, who have devoted much of their free time to STEM education programs for students from underserved communities in Northern New Mexico, were named as the first winners of the Los Alamos Community Relations Medal. Galassi was also named one of the ‘10 Who Made a Difference’ for 2021 by the Santa Fe New Mexican.
- Free two-week virtual Summer Physics Camp for 40 high-schoolers from schools in the region and in Hawaii
- The Los Alamos Employees Scholarship Fund awarded $811,750 in scholarships in 2021