College of Education researcher awarded STEM fellowship

Jennifer Schellinger, a postdoctoral researcher in FSU’s School of Teacher Education
Jennifer Schellinger, a postdoctoral researcher in FSU’s School of Teacher Education

A Florida State University postdoctoral researcher has been selected for a highly competitive fellowship supported by the National Science Foundation.

Jennifer Schellinger, a postdoctoral researcher in FSU’s School of Teacher Education, has been selected for one of 10 annual one-year fellowships with the Community for Advancing Discovery Research in Education or CADRE. CADRE is a resource network for STEM educators supported by NSF.

“I am so honored to be named as a CADRE fellow,” Schellinger said. “The fellowship has already provided me with multiple opportunities to meet other STEM education researchers who are at similar stages in their careers, to interact with more seasoned professionals who engage in various lines of STEM education research and to hear from National Science Foundation administrators on funding opportunities and strategies to secure funding.”

The CADRE Fellows program, now in its eleventh year, provides capacity-building and networking opportunities for researchers who are in the early stages of their STEM education careers. The new fellows include graduate students, postdoctoral researchers and research associates who have been nominated by awardees from NSF’s Discovery Research in PreK-12 Education (DRK-12) program. The DRK-12 projects research and develop a wide range of STEM education resources, materials, and technologies.

“In the coming year, I am looking forward to building relationships and, possibly, collaborative partnerships with other CADRE fellows, to explore academic and non-academic career options and to develop knowledge about and strategies to pursue NSF funding to support my research interests,” she said.

Schellinger is a postdoctoral researcher for a DRK-12 funded program called Learning Through Collaborative Design – Professional Development at FSU. The focus of this project is to identify the most effective means by which to support teachers to foster productive discourse in science. Schellinger’s research examines how collaborative and inclusive discourse-rich spaces may support students’ disciplinary engagement and understanding across STEM disciplines.

In the coming year, the new CADRE Fellows will explore career pathways, research dissemination and use, community building and collaboration, and research funding. Their experience will culminate in the 2020 DRK-12 PI Meeting in Washington, D.C.

“The CADRE Fellows program offers a unique opportunity for early career researchers to network with and learn from NSF-funded STEM education awardees from across the country,” said the Education Development Council’s Catherine McCulloch, who oversees the program along with Jennifer Stiles. “It’s an honor to coordinate a program that, in part, is focused on broadening participation within the research community.”