Applications for Summer 2023 Program for Teachers 

Applications for Summer 2023 Program for Teachers

APPLY HERE until May 26, 2023 (Rolling admissions after this date)! Please email engineeringoutreach@columbia.edu with any questions. 

The NSF COSMOS-NewLAW-CS3 Research Experience and Mentoring for Teachers (REM/RET) is an intense summer program for teachers who learn the basics of wireless technology and how to enhance the teaching material for their students using the predesigned online lessons/labs. The teachers are mentored by NYU, Columbia University, and Lehman College researchers and by the teachers who participated in the program in the prior years. Since Fall 2018, participating teachers have incorporated the science, math, and computer science lab experiments developed through this program within their classrooms, giving students hands-on experience with the next wave of mobile technology. More details are available on the COSMOS website and video. 

For 2023, the program will take place from July 10 to July 28. The teachers will be paid $4,000 for their time during the summer and for implementing their lessons during the school year.

Over the period of 3 summer weeks, the teachers will:

  1. Get training in the fundamentals of wireless communications.
  2. Learn about experiential COSMOS web-based lessons/labs created for teaching grade 6-12 students about STEM topics from the NYC STEM curriculum.
  3. Learn how to use the lessons/labs in their grade 6-12 classrooms.
  4. Get research and mentoring experience by interacting with the COSMOS research team and with other grade 6-12 teachers participating in the program.

Summer activities are followed up by teachers using the lessons/labs in their grade 6-12 classrooms during the following academic year.

The teachers will learn about basic principles of wireless communications, including topics such as radio propagation and networking. This will be done using the web-based online lessons/labs that were designed by grade 6-12 teachers who attended the program in prior years. The lessons are built to support NYC 6-12 curricula on STEM subjects such as math, physics, biology, and computer science. The teachers will learn how to use the lessons/labs and how to support their own 6-12 students in running the online labs during the academic year. The instructional material for teachers consists of lesson plans, slides, videos, and running the online labs. The teachers will be mentored by graduate students from research laboratories at the universities and by teachers who attended the program in prior years who developed the 6-12 lessons.

  • Must be math or science certified.
  • U.S. citizens or Permanent Residents.
  • Must teach at a public middle or high school located in NYC.
  • Must have at least three years of full-time teaching experience in science, math, or pre-engineering disciplines.
  • Must receive endorsement by the school administration.

Teacher Responsibilities:

  • Attend all summer program activities
  • Complete assigned research and curriculum project, final presentation, and report
  • Participate in academic year activities, such as presentations, meetings, and conferences
  • Implement a COSMOS lesson within classroom with grade 6-12 students during the academic year following the summer program
  • Submit program assessment
  • Completed application form
  • One reference letter from your school administration, submitted here
  • Current resume (submitted via application)
  • Completed essay questions
  • COSMOS Educational Toolkit – A great resource for free lessons, labs, and curriculum materials for math, science, and computer science classrooms — created from previous years’ COSMOS RET cohorts. 
  • COSMOS: A New Generation of Wireless Technologies – A video introduction to the research on wireless technologies. 
  • COSMOS Testbed Main Website – Main website for the COSMOS project. The COSMOS project is aimed at design, development, and deployment of a city-scale advanced wireless testbed in order to support real-world experimentation on next-generation wireless technologies and applications.