Customized Science Support for Schools and Districts

"I felt like today gave me a real sense for how to apply the different parts of the standards to my teaching. Working with the grade level teams created strong questions and answers." -Kindergarten Teacher, Mill Valley School District
"I appreciated that your instruction modeled the inquiry instruction that we were being taught." -Teacher, Jefferson Elementary School District
"I value the different approach and you making me think in a different way." -Teacher, Marin Primary and Middle School
"I valued the time to delve deeply into specific lessons with colleagues." -Teacher, Marin Primary and Middle School
"I valued the hands-on opportunity. It shows us, not tells us, what to do with our kids." -Teacher, Jefferson Elementary School District
"I love how we decorated and USED our own Science Notebook. I LOVED using the materials to design our own investigation." -Teacher, Marjorie H. Tobias Elementary
"I valued the opportunity to explore, engage, and have a lot of fun learning with my colleagues!" -Teacher, Marin Primary and Middle School

Start a conversation with the Academy's Teacher Professional Development team to explore science support options for your school, district, or organization next school year. Our calendar is currently full for the 2019-20 school year, but we are always open to starting a conversation about potential future partnerships or in case space in our calendar becomes available.

Submit a request

Is your school or district seeking professional development in science instruction for a group of educators?

Read on, then complete the request form to start a conversation with the Academy's Teacher Professional Development team. We would love to work with you to determine whether we can support your team of educators.

How do we support teachers?

Our team can customize a professional learning sequence based on the goals of your school or district. We can host teachers here in our world-class museum, or travel to nearby school sites. We are open to partnerships that include:

Delivering PD experiences for half-day, one-day, or multi-day sessions
Building the capacity of teacher leaders within and across school sites
Coaching teachers one-on-one in the classroom
Coaching groups of teachers at school sites
Facilitating planning days for groups of teachers

We can deliver one-day sessions or multi-day series focused on any of the following themes:

NGSS: Introductory Workshop
NGSS: Intermediate Workshops
Making the Most of Science Notebooks
Levels of Inquiry/Student Investigations
Hands On, Minds On: Activity Before Content
Exploring Phenomena: Using Science to Figure Things Out
Science Discourse for the NGSS classroom
...and more!

More information about some ways we support Bay Area teachers can be found in our workshop catalog.

What is the process for requesting PD from the Academy?

The first step is to submit a request through our Custom Request form!

We are available to provide custom professional development from August through April. We have limited capacity and can't accept all requests. After each deadline, below, we will review and select if necessary.

January 13, 2019: Deadline for requesting back-to-school PD (August through September, 2019) - CLOSED
April 28, 2019: Priority deadline for the remainder of the 2019-20 school year - CLOSED
After April 28th: Pending availability, we will continue accepting requests for the 19-20 school year.

Submit a request

What happens after a request is submitted?

Within two weeks of submission, our team will reach out to you to schedule a short phone conversation. This call will allow the Academy team to learn more about your request, provide time for you to ask any questions of us, and let us determine our next steps together.

Our hope is to finalize partners and dates for Fall 2019 by the end of April, 2019.

How much does this cost?

Previous partnerships with schools, districts, universities, and county offices have ranged in cost from approximately $1K (e.g. delivering a 1.5-hour conference-style session) to $70K (e.g. year-long, multi-modal support for an entire district around implementing new NGSS-aligned curriculum).

The cost of the Academy's custom PD depends on the length of the partnership, scope of work, and how much customization is requested or required.

The Academy's Teacher Professional Development team looks forward to learning more about your request in order to craft meaningful science support to fit your goals and budget.