KINGSTON, R.I. – Oct. 20, 2025 – Teachers by nature are used to being on the move. But this fall, the office for one of the state’s premiere teacher professional learning programs has relocated from the University of Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay Campus to its Kingston Campus.

After building a strong foundation at the University’s Bay campus, staff in the URI GEMS-Net program say they are enjoying the increased visibility for their program on the Kingston campus and a chance to share with the URI community what their work is about. A community open house, offering the public a look at the program’s new space and opportunities to learn more about GEMS-Net, will be held on Wednesday, Oct. 29 from 4 to 5:30 p.m. in Pastore Hall, 51 Lower College Road, Room 350.

GEMS-Net (Guiding Education in Math and Science Network) is a sustained research-practice partnership that offers comprehensive support for science education throughout Rhode Island. 

Part of URI’s Feinstein College of Education, the GEMS-Net partnership supports science programming in school districts across Rhode Island. The program started with just a handful of school districts in the 1990s, supported by an Eisenhower grant, and later the National Science Foundation. URI faculty member emerita Betty Young established the program, intent on preparing teachers to enact active hands-on science learning in their classrooms. GEMS-Net is now a national leader in professional learning for science educators, sharing their work and model with organizations and universities across the country.

Today, GEMS-Net has expanded to support 15 school districts across Rhode Island and is currently partnering with Burrillville, Chariho, Cumberland, Exeter-West Greenwich, Foster, Jamestown, Narragansett, New Shoreham, North Kingstown, Paul Cuffee, South Kingstown, Warwick, and Westerly; Central Falls and West Warwick joined this year.

Program staff say it takes more than a 1-2 day workshop to support quality science education. GEMS-Net offers curriculum-based professional learning for all teachers throughout their career. This includes teacher workshops, classroom coaching and support for school and district leaders.

Alison D’Angeli, a GEMS-Net program specialist who spent 10 years in the classroom, says the professional learning offered is immersive and practical.

Now on the Pastore building’s third floor — the former home of URI’s chemistry program — GEMS-Net is staying close to the University’s scientific roots.

GEMS-Net supports science education programming that emphasizes phenomena-based learning — engaging students with a puzzling phenomenon, helping them consider what they know, and more importantly what they don’t know. This establishes an authentic context to pursue robust science learning as students seek to figure out how the phenomenon works and develop explanatory models. The goal of science education is not to mimic the work of scientists, but to engage in the practices of science as those practices are productive for sensemaking.  

“We know a lot about teaching and learning and work collaboratively with teachers to reflect on and continually develop their science teaching practice,” says Caroline Stabile, director of GEMS-Net.

As they tailor programs to help teachers advance their practice, faculty from URI’s Graduate School of Oceanography, College of Engineering and other STEM departments round out the program. When researchers partner with GEMS-Net, it helps teachers make connections between what their students are learning in science and the research going on at the University. It also helps researchers share their work with educators and their students in ways that have a broad reach and lasting impact through the longstanding GEMS-Net partnership.

STEM impact for students

The fall semester found a swirl of activity in GEMS-Net’s new office as a team of veteran teachers on assignment with the program as teachers in residence were preparing to support 766 teachers across the state in districts from Burrillville to Westerly. Through these teachers, the program is supporting 19,739 students in their classrooms this school year.

The program’s teachers in residence say the move had them energized and excited at the start of the new school year. They work directly with teachers in each partner district to help them prepare for and enact high-quality science curriculum.

While the curriculum provides opportunities for students to develop robust science ideas, it also underscores teaching students in a way that invites wonder and enthusiasm as students work together to figure things out. Stabile and D’Angeli say that the intent of GEMS-Net is to help young students become independent thinkers, pose questions and make sense of the world around them.

“We want students to do science,” says Stabile, “not just learn about it.”

This is important not only for school success, but also regional scientific readiness. A collaboration between GEMS-Net and the College of Engineering’s Navy/STEM program is helping to address STEM workforce development needs.

“This kind of partnership between K-12, higher ed, and industry serves an important role,” Stabile says, to help grow the pipeline for future job candidates and thinkers.

“We’re trying to ensure that teachers and students know about the wide variety of career and college pathways in STEM fields, and we know we need to start that work with our youngest grades. Kids need to see how their school learning connects to exciting careers and opportunities in higher education,” she says.

“We’re here to meet the needs of teachers and STEM fields,” says Stabile. “We are proud to partner with school districts and organizations across the state to support URI in its mission as a land-grant institution, serving our communities in ways that make them more just and sustainable.”

Follow GEMS-Net URI on social media or sign up for the GEMS-Net newsletter by emailing alison.dangeli@uri.edu. Learn more at uri.edu/gemsnet.