It has been a productive second term for the Graduate Student Advisory Committee.   Following my appointment as the first Graduate Student board member, I began to work on the following items of interest.

The first action item was to design our Graduate Student committee. Using the following criteria, we developed the first ever NARST Graduate Student Committee tasked with supporting and facilitating Graduate Student contributions to NARST. For committee consideration, I provided the following criteria for selection:

• Eligibility. Any Graduate Student who is an active member of NARST. Preference given to Graduate Student Members who serve(ed) on other committees.
• Term of office. The Graduate Student Member (GSM) will serve a two-year term beginning in September.
• Time requirements. The estimated time required for the GSM will be at least four hours every month plus one week annually to prepare for and attend regular GSM conference calls, media and email correspondence meetings, which may include consultation with board staff for background information related to agenda issues; additional time for handling other Board-related business; time to attend selected advisory group meetings; and the NARST annual conference.
• Conference requirements. The GSM will attend the annual NARST conference meeting and will attend the GS committee meeting, forum and social events sponsored by the GS advisory committee.

Graduate Student & Early Scholars mixer

The GSAC (Graduate Student Advisory Committee) mixer was held at Braddock’s Pittsburgh Brasserie after the original location, Perle’, had a fire which forced them to close. The mixer was well attended, despite the venue change and well received.

Alternative Transportation

The Graduate Student Committee will be making arrangements for all NARST conference members to get a group discount off of standard hybrid bike rentals at a local bike shop in Chicago for the NARST 2015.

Book Study

Lynn Bryan invited Graduate Students to attend a book study and receive 25 free books. The event was hosted by one of this year’s plenary speakers, H. Richard Milner IV, who is the Dr. Helen Faison Chair in Urban Education in the Center for Urban Education at the University of Pittsburgh. The book, “Start Where You Are But Don’t Stay There: Understanding Diversity, Opportunity Gaps, and Teaching in Today’s Classrooms (Harvard Education Press, 2010) was well received by the Graduate students. A big thank you to Dr. Bryan.

Graduate student forum

The Graduate Student forum was very well received and attended. We will have a special session for the 2015 conference which will allow Graduate Students to have interest group breakout sessions with other Graduate Students and senior NARST members.

Partnerships

The Physics Education Research Consortium of Graduate Students (PERCoGS) reached out to ask for a potential partnership:

“I’m writing on behalf of the Physics Education Research Consortium of Graduate Students (PERCoGS). PERCoGS formed less than a year ago, and we’ve been trying to figure out the best ways to reach out to graduate students in PER. We’ve heard NARST has many great resources for graduate students and we would love to hear from you about how you communicate with and support NARST graduate students. Would you and/or other members of the grad student group be interested in having a Google+ meeting with PERCoGS to talk about strategies for improving graduate student leadership?”

I will be corresponding with them in terms of a relationship and graduate student opportunities.

All the best,

Jodi Devonshire