Are we preparing middle and high school students to tackle water justice issues?
A review of New York City educational standards for water security and data science

Laureline Josset1, Christopher Anderson2, Jermal Day-Collins2, Yurvana Mustafayeva2, Andrew Peterson2, Christopher Slaughter2, Shadrack Sakyi2, Alesha Smith2, Sarah Trexler2, Anne Degnan1  

The NSF big ideas “NSF INCLUDES”, “Harnessing the Data Revolution” and “Growing Convergence Research” brought forward the need to transform education and career pathways to help broaden participation in science and engineering for the development of a 21st-century data-capable workforce with trans-disciplinary aptitudes. This requirement is particularly necessary to address water issues. Not only is water the connector through which natural disasters and climate impacts manifest, access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation remains plagued by environmental and social injustices throughout the US.

Water issues touch upon hydrology, climatology, ecology, sociology, economics and health sciences amongst others. Additionally, the water sector has been undergoing tremendous data challenges (e.g., gaps and inaccuracies) and transformations (e.g., a burst of water data platforms and cyber-infrastructures). Consequently, an inclusive STEM workforce competent across disciplines with strong data literacy is crucial.

Our research examines current standards at the middle and high school levels in NYC. From literature, we establish a list of keywords illustrating the core knowledge, skills, attitudes necessary for water and data sciences. A systematic review of NYC Department of Education’s PK–8 and 6-12 Science Scope & Sequence for these terms is conducted. Gaps and misalignments between needs and reference documents are then derived.

While “water” and “data” are each mentioned between 85 and 355 times in NYC’s scope and sequence, “groundwater” is only mentioned twice despite providing 25% of freshwater used in the US. “Data set”, “database” are only mentioned a couple of times. We observe a need to transform curriculum standards to equip students with the competencies necessary to address water issues. Furthermore, we hypothesize that by exemplifying STEM core competencies around water issues and tackling water injustices head on, the lack of diversity in STEM workforce may be improved. We conclude with an overview of our NSF-funded project, which brings authentic water data platforms into the class units and co-curricular activities, “Engaging Young Black and Latino Students in Data Science Through Water Security”.