NC teacher Brent Osborn receives national award
The Pinecroft Natural Area Preserve in Spokane Valley is not well known to many.
But science students at North Central High School are intimately familiar with the 104-acre sanctuary of undeveloped land.
As so is their teacher, Brent Osborn.
This year Osborn is a recipient of the National Vernier Technology Award for his work with students at the preserve. The award, sponsored by Vernier Software and Technology and the National Science Teachers Association, recognizes the innovative use of data-collection technology in the classroom, such as a computer or graphic calculator.
In 2006 Osborn had two groups of students use the software and hardware as a data collecting tool for their research at Pinecroft, a nature preserve nestled near the Spokane Valley YMCA and managed by the Department of Natural Resources.
For the past three years Osborn has secured grant funding to help students publish the North Central Journal of Science using the preserve as their lab.
Students spend many hours collect samples and data, ask questions, and eventually publish their answers in the journal.
Osborn will receive $1,000, and an additional $1,000 in Vernier products. He also will receive $1,000 toward travel to the 2007 NSTA National Conference on Science Education in St. Louis, March 29 to April 1. Award winners will be honored at the conference.
Parent-teacher conferences start soon
Parent-teacher conferences for most elementary students in the Spokane area will begin Monday and continue through the week.
Students in Spokane Public Schools will be released early all week long as the conferences continue through Friday.
Other North Side districts holding conferences next week include the Mead, Deer Park , Nine Mile Falls and Riverside school districts.
College conference for disabled students
About 100 Spokane-area high school juniors and seniors with disabilities are signed up to visit Spokane Community College Tuesday, and there is still room for more.
The seventh-annual Student Transition Conference is scheduled from 9 a.m. to 1:15 p.m., in the SCC Lair-Student Center, Building 6, 1810 N. Greene St.
The event will feature a visit to the career center and four break-out sessions to give students a feel for college life at SCC, and options available through other community organizations.
Sessions include “Higher Education and You,” presented by Dennis Johnson, the manager of Disability and Support Services at SCC, “Balancing Work, Money and Education,” and “How to Get and Keep a Job.”
The keynote speaker for the event will be Logan Olsen, founder and creative director of Logan Magazine, a locally produced publication for youth with disabilities.
The conference is $3, and includes lunch. For details contact the SCC Center for Students with Disabilities, 533-7169.