Education & Outreach

High school students conduct high-level research with CU mentors

Megan Maneval — Wed, 30 Jul 2025 19:01:56 +0000

High school students conduct high-level research with CU mentors Megan Maneval Wed, 07/30/2025 - 13:01

Thirty-five high school students participated in Science Discovery’s annual summer STEM Research Experience at 91�� and CU Anschutz, which culminated in a poster session on July 25.

Students spent six weeks conducting mentored research projects in university labs and attending a research methods and science communication course. This hands-on lab experience allowed students to explore pathways in STEM, build relationships with professional researchers and develop a clearer picture of what it means to be a scientist. Many participants reflected on how research was different than they imagined prior to joining the lab and how working with CU scientists supported their development.

“I learned that research isn’t just about doing experiments, but it’s about being curious, staying organized and thinking critically. It made me appreciate how much work goes into the discoveries we hear about, and it definitely got me more interested in science and healthcare.” –CU Anschutz Research Experience Participant.

“My mentor really helped me understand a lot of very complicated concepts and was patient enough to walk me through how to run a lot of different experiments and analytical techniques. She also was very helpful in other ways as she gave me help with my poster and helped me meet a lot of the other people in the lab. It was a very positive experience” –91�� Research Experience Participant

In turn, participating researchers from 16 departments gained valuable mentorship experience and received an academic enrichment grant to support their projects. CU Science Discovery will be recruiting mentors for next year’s program in January 2026. You can also reach out to Steven Denham (steven.denham@colorado.edu) for more information about the program.

Thirty-five high school students participated in Science Discovery’s annual summer STEM Research Experience at 91�� and CU Anschutz.

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Research institute building the AI-literate workforce of the future receives major new grant

Daniel William Strain — Tue, 29 Jul 2025 20:52:57 +0000

Research institute building the AI-literate workforce of the future receives major new grant Daniel William… Tue, 07/29/2025 - 14:52

Daniel Strain

Illustration depicting students in small groups collaborating using an AI partner called "CoBi." (Credit: NSF iSAT)

In the not-so-distant future, artificial intelligence (AI) partners could sit in classrooms around the country—helping small groups of students engage in lively conversations and take charge of their own learning.

That’s the vision of the U.S. National Science Foundation National AI Institute for Student-AI Teaming (NSF iSAT). This pioneering research institute, led by the 91��, launched in 2020 to explore how classrooms could become more effective and engaging learning environments.

After a rigorous review process, the NSF announced today that it is renewing NSF iSAT’s funding for another five years, part of a $100 million investment by the federal government into AI research.

Sidney D’Mello, director of NSF iSAT, explained that the center meets a major need in the United States—to prepare students to enter a workforce that is being transformed in profound ways by AI technology.

NSF iSAT partner universities

Boston University
Brandeis University
Colorado State University
University of California Berkeley
Worcester Polytechnic Institute

“iSAT offers an exciting vision for 21st century AI-enhanced classrooms, where all students experience the joy of learning by working together to co-construct knowledge, making discoveries through inquiry, and developing their interests and passions,” said D’Mello, professor at the Institute of Cognitive Science and Department of Computer Science at 91��.

In its first five years, NSF iSAT has tackled that goal in a totally new way.

Currently, most AI tools in education focus on helping individual students develop content mastery through personalized learning, D’Mello said. To complement that approach, NSF iSAT focuses on developing AI tools that help students collaborate in ways that are both meaningful and productive.

NSF iSAT has already made impressive progress: Since 2020, institute researchers have engaged more than 6,000 middle school students and their teachers in hands-on, student-centered investigations in AI and STEM topics. The team has developed three AI literacy curriculum units, which together comprise a semester-long sequence. Units focus on environmental sensors, self-driving cars and moderating online communities.

The center’s researchers have also developed two AI “partners,” which they’ve tested in real-world classrooms. They are CoBi, short for “Community Builder,” and the Jigsaw Interactive Agent (JIA). These tools support students by providing feedback and prompts to help them build knowledge, share information and work through uncertainty and differences in ideas. CoBi and JIA also aim to help students improve their collaboration skills while learning—what the researchers call “learning to collaborate and collaborating to learn.”

“Our vision is about going beyond individual engagement with AI to collaborative engagement.” said Thomas Breideband, associate director of NSF iSAT at 91��.

Over the next five years, the NSF iSAT team, which includes scientists from 91�� and five partner universities, will enhance and expand its work on AI-enabled curricula to more schools across the country.

“We are thrilled that the iSAT team’s funding has been renewed for another five years,” said Massimo Ruzzene, senior vice chancellor for research and innovation and dean of the institutes. “The sophisticated approach to AI and its application in education undertaken by the team is truly groundbreaking and positions the project to achieve profound benefits for students and teachers, in addition to the many collaborating partners.”

Student driven and teachers in charge

NSF iSAT is unique, D’Mello added, because kids don’t just beta test these AI tools—they play a leading role in developing them from the ground up. Specifically, NSF iSAT adopts a “responsible innovation” framework in research and development that centers youth and teachers and is receptive to their needs and desires. It also empowers kids to think critically about how they use AI and its possible consequences.

The researchers emphasize that they don’t want these tools to replace teachers, but to support them as class sizes and workloads swell. Teachers will always remain the primary driver of students’ learning, D’Mello said. As such, NSF iSAT also researches how to prepare teachers to implement a triple innovation challenge: how to orchestrate classrooms with AI tools, AI curriculum and student-centered inquiry.

“NSF iSAT’s innovative co-design processes have not only enabled teachers and district leaders to directly shape the technology and curriculum they use in their classrooms,” said Tamara Sumner, professor of cognitive and computer science at 91��. “Participating in these processes has cultivated a new generation of educational leaders prepared to integrate AI into their teaching practices and to support their colleagues along their learning journey.”

In the next phase of its evolution, NSF iSAT will expand toward building a next-generation, AI-ready workforce for the United States. The team will also conduct case studies to understand what practices and conditions help schools take up and implement AI-enhanced learning. The researchers hope that these case studies will help them scale their work up to more schools across the nation. They will also expand partnerships with industry to accelerate innovation and workforce readiness for AI.

Beyond the Story

Our research impact by the numbers:

$742 million in research funding earned in 2023–24
No. 5 U.S. university for startup creation
$1.4 billion impact of 91��'s research activities on the Colorado economy in 2023–24

Follow 91�� on LinkedIn

Founded in 2020, the U.S. National Science Foundation National AI Institute for Student-AI Teaming (NSF iSAT) explores how AI can help K-12 students collaborate together in ways that are meaningful and productive.

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Science inherits the wind of century-old verdict

Megan Maneval — Wed, 23 Jul 2025 19:55:27 +0000

Science inherits the wind of century-old verdict Megan Maneval Wed, 07/23/2025 - 13:55

Colorado Arts and Sciences Magazine

On the 100-year anniversary of the Scopes Evolution Trial, 91�� scientist Andrew Martin reflects on science education and on "same issues, different players."

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Tucked in the heart of campus, 91��'s hidden gem turns 50

Megan Maneval — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 13:08:15 +0000

Tucked in the heart of campus, 91��'s hidden gem turns 50 Megan Maneval Thu, 07/17/2025 - 07:08

Katie Miller , Liz Berube , LJ Werner

If you’ve ever strolled past Fiske Planetarium on 91��’s campus, you may have unknowingly passed by one of the university’s most cherished treasures. Nestled in the Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences (SLHS) building, just steps from the bustle of campus life, is a small but mighty early childhood program that’s been shaping young minds—and future educators—for half a century.

This year, the Child Learning Center (CLC) proudly celebrates 50 years of serving children and families across 91�� and the greater Front Range. More than a preschool and toddler play group, CLC is a place where children aged 1.5 to 5 years and their families are uniquely and playfully supported to thrive by a dedicated team of early childhood specialists, including an early childhood special educator, a speech language pathologist, an occupational therapist and an early childhood teacher.

A unique approach to early childhood education

The CLC is an inclusive early childhood setting, meaning it welcomes a diverse group of children: those with typical needs, those with special needs, and children and families who are diverse in other ways. All children benefit from this model, as it promotes empathy and appreciation of differences. It prepares children to be in community with people who think and communicate in different ways, and to value the strengths and challenges that exist in all of us.

The highly qualified and collaborative team relies on evidence-based best practices for supporting learning and growth in language and literacy development, social and emotional skills, cognitive development, and fine and gross motor skills. Through observing the children’s interests and needs, as well as incorporating family priorities, the teachers embed rich and purposeful learning opportunities across play and daily routines.

While the children lead the play, the adults provide just the right kind and amount of support at the right times to meet both individual and group needs.

A training ground for the future

While the children are at the heart of the CLC, the program plays a vital role in training the next generation of speech language pathologists and educators. Each year, more than 20 91�� undergraduate and graduate students from the SLHS department join the CLC’s multidisciplinary team to gain hands-on experience under the guidance of seasoned professionals.

These future therapists and teachers don’t just learn theory—they learn how to connect, adapt and create meaningful learning experiences based on each child’s interests and needs. The CLC classroom is a living lab of play-based learning and collaboration.

A legacy of learning and love

Rita Weiss

The CLC first opened its doors in 1974 under the direction of Elizabeth “Tikki” Heublein to support the work of the late Rita Weiss. As a speech language pathologist, Weiss was devoted to supporting the language development of young children with a particular focus on the value of providing intervention within the classroom setting rather than removing children for individual therapy.

Shortly after separating from the Department of Speech and Drama in 1969, the Department of Speech Pathology and Audiology, along with the Speech and Hearing Center, acquired several small buildings on campus. It was in the basement of a renovated house at 924 Broadway, still located just north of Regent Drive, where the preschool found its original home.

Weiss received funding for a model project from the Handicap Children’s Early Education Program administered by the Bureau of Education for the Handicapped (U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare). The project ran for three years, 1974–77, with the overarching goal of “improv[ing] the language and related learning skills of 3- to 5-year-old language handicapped and bilingual (Spanish) children by a naturalistic, non-stigmatizing method.” Additionally, outcomes of the project had the potential to revolutionize the way speech language pathologists conducted therapy in the school-based environment.

Weiss based her work on the cutting-edge ideology that a child’s innate predisposition to learn language can be cultivated through purposeful interactions in a natural, active learning environment. These philosophies laid the framework for which she developed the INte-REActive Learning (INREAL) strategies. The INREAL strategies encouraged a balance of interaction between child and adult (verbal, nonverbal or both).

Tikki Heublein in the 1980s

Previously, school-based speech and language intervention occurred outside the classroom, incorporating almost exclusively adult-led activities in which children received tangible reinforcements or praise for correct speech production. In this new method, the adult followed the child’s lead by matching their communication within play then gradually scaffolded the child’s language to a higher level. The interactions occurred in a natural but intentional manner.

Following the conclusion of the project, the results were clear: The children who participated had shown significant growth in their language skills. Furthermore, longitudinal data collected between 1977 and 1980 confirmed the preschool and kindergarten children who previously received learning supported by the INREAL strategies needed fewer remedial treatments later on and were less likely to be held back a grade compared to their peers.

Spearheaded by Heublein and guided by Weiss, the INREAL program set its sights on bringing the strategies to early childhood educators throughout the country. Incredibly, between the years of 1975 and 1986, the CLC secured more than $1,000,000 in various federal grant monies to sustain INREAL training programs, along with the preschool operations. As a result, thousands of school teachers and early childhood specialists received intensive training in the INREAL techniques across more than 30 states, as well as several foreign countries including Japan, Germany, Costa Rica and Canada.

While formal training in the INREAL strategies no longer takes place outside the CLC, this groundbreaking approach helped shape the way children’s language, cognitive and social development is understood and nurtured. It continued on to inspire subsequent studies across the country and has been incorporated into several early language intervention programs that are still widely used today.

The storybook journey

Sue McCord

In 1980, the department moved to its current location along Kittredge Loop Road. It was here that another exceptional educator became embedded into CLC history.

Sue McCord was hired as the CLC director in 1986 where she remained in this position until 2000. After graduating from Boston University’s Wheelock College in early childhood education, McCord spent 17 years at Cornell University teaching both university students as well as preschoolers in the on-site classroom. She moved to 91�� with her family in 1981 where she began work initially at the local Mapletree Preschool and later as the lead instructor of the demonstration preschool within Denver University’s speech pathology and audiology program.

It was through these experiences where she first conceptualized a classroom curriculum centered around the impact of learning and play through storybooks. The CLC provided the perfect match for continuing to shape her ideas into what eventually became the Storybook Journey (SBJ) curriculum, first published in 1995 (revised in 2011).

Gradually, the curriculum attracted attention and today has found a niche within a handful of small preschools nationwide who prioritized literature-based, child-centric learning.

Within the SBJ, providers use a storybook as a springboard to plan experiences that build on all areas of development. The book is selected based on the interests of the children and is explored over an extended period of time (one to four weeks). Each storybook serves as a vehicle to take the classroom on a collective journey, weaving common language throughout activities such as role-play, art, science, music and nature to expand their learning from the story. Over time, the story begins to come alive in the classroom, and the themes and language permeate the home environment as well.

Celebrate with us

The CLC looks forward to celebrating its storied history in August 2025. If you have previously been part of the CLC community, or an affiliate of the SLHS department, and would like to attend, please contact clc@colorado.edu for more information.

Join our community

The CLC is always looking to welcome new families into our preschool and toddler programs. For enrollment inquiries, please contact clc@colorado.edu.

The repetitive yet flexible nature of the SBJ allows educators to support each child’s unique developmental needs while simultaneously building a shared learning experience that includes all children.

Still going strong at 50

Over the years, much has changed at the University of Colorado. New buildings are continuously popping up to accommodate a rapidly growing student population, and technological advances have driven a fast-paced learning and social environment. Despite this, the CLC continues to be a timeless stronghold for the children of our community, embedded in the fabric of 91��’s campus.

The program has been thoughtfully refined over time; however, its foundation remains unchanged, rooted in what children need most: a natural, inclusive and play-based environment that fosters early development and lifelong learning.

Graduate and undergraduate students in the CLC still implement the INREAL strategies, supplemented with newer research supporting best practices in language development and social skills. The joy of the SBJ continued to guide the CLC classroom this past school year with books such as "We’re Going on a Bear Hunt" by Mem Fox, "Abiyoyo" by Pete Seeger and "Pete’s A Pizza" by William Steig.

The CLC holds steadfast to its roots largely due to many inspirational individuals who have passed through its doors over the past 50 years. While they each brought their own unique experiences and perspectives, they all were devoted to instilling in children a passion for curiosity, learning, creativity and, most importantly, connection with others.

To this day, the CLC community remains dedicated to not only bringing rich, educational experiences to our youngest learners but also training and inspiring the next generation of educators. After all, the future lies with all of them.

The current CLC community would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to all those individuals who have been especially instrumental within the program over the past 50 years, namely: Elizabeth “Tikki” Heublein, Rita Weiss, Elizabeth “Zippy” Teas-Hester, Sara Gaar Ehrens, Cynthia Gray, Susan Moore, Sheila Goetz, Sue McCord, Barb Roscoe, Janine Randol, Amy Thrasher and LJ Werner. Additionally, we sincerely appreciate those organizations who have supported the CLC in more recent years through grants and funding, including: the Temple Hoyne Buell Foundation, the Scottish Rite Foundation, the Rose Foundation, the University of Colorado Foundation, the Colorado Department of Education and the Early Childhood Council of 91�� County. Numerous others have made their mark on the CLC, including SLP clinical instructors, OTs, PTs, ECTs, student clinicians, interns and, of course, our wonderful families. We are grateful for each and every one of you!

The Child Learning Center of 91��'s Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences Department marks 50 years of nurturing young learners, training future educators and shaping inclusive, play-based education—one storybook at a time.

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Faces of community-engaged scholarship: Caroline Frischmon

Megan Maneval — Tue, 08 Jul 2025 19:42:40 +0000

Faces of community-engaged scholarship: Caroline Frischmon Megan Maneval Tue, 07/08/2025 - 13:42

Doctoral candidate Caroline Frischmon came to 91�� to get out of the lab and sought to combine her engineering and science communication background through 91��'s Hannigan Air Quality and Technology Research Lab—known for its community-engaged research.

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High school students win regional, state science fair awards for work with CIRES researchers

Megan Maneval — Wed, 25 Jun 2025 17:03:30 +0000

High school students win regional, state science fair awards for work with CIRES researchers Megan Maneval Wed, 06/25/2025 - 11:03

CIRES

Alex and Zoe Kugler, students from Monarch High School, worked with CIRES Fellow Xinzhao Chu's research group to explore the relationship between aurora activity and metal layers high in the atmosphere above Antarctica.

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Opening conversations: Empowering youth with complex communication needs

Megan Maneval — Tue, 24 Jun 2025 15:50:07 +0000

Opening conversations: Empowering youth with complex communication needs Megan Maneval Tue, 06/24/2025 - 09:50

For the past six years, Professor Sherri Tennant and team have worked in Denver with students who experience economic disadvantages and use augmentative and alternative communication systems.

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Visiting students launch into summer of research and discovery

Megan Maneval — Wed, 18 Jun 2025 13:53:34 +0000

Visiting students launch into summer of research and discovery Megan Maneval Wed, 06/18/2025 - 07:53

This summer, nine students from colleges and universities across the U.S. have come to 91�� to participate in the 2025 91�� Solar Alliance Research Experience for Undergraduates program. The students are engaging in research spanning the field of solar and space physics.

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How a high-altitude observatory shaped Colorado's story

Megan Maneval — Thu, 12 Jun 2025 17:45:07 +0000

How a high-altitude observatory shaped Colorado's story Megan Maneval Thu, 06/12/2025 - 11:45

Colorado is home to numerous sites dedicated to scientific advancement—but what were the origins of these places, and what can they teach us about our path forward? Professor Hanna Rose Shell explores this question through the remarkable story of Walter Orr Roberts, drawing on her background in historical scholarship with mixed-media art making.

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Outdoor recreation offers path to community resilience

Megan Maneval — Mon, 09 Jun 2025 18:31:13 +0000

Outdoor recreation offers path to community resilience Megan Maneval Mon, 06/09/2025 - 12:31

91��’s Rural Technical Assistance program helps rural Colorado towns use their natural assets to strengthen local economies, deepen partnerships and define their own futures.

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Education & Outreach

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