Deb Wolf’s recent initiative to further science education in the state of South Dakota blends seamlessly with her new position as director of Sanford Lab's Education and Outreach Department at Sanford Underground Research Facility.
Wolf grew up in Sioux Falls and graduated from Augustana University with a degree in biology. Her education philosophy was molded during her first years as an educator teaching in Palm Springs, California, and Las Vegas. In those locations, she worked with many students who lived in poverty and spoke English as a second language. This gave her a passion to help underserved students.
"One of the things that became really important to me was focusing on students who tend to be underserved or marginalized," Wolf said. "That's always been a lens through which I viewed things because of those formative first years as an educator."
Wolf later returned to South Dakota where she taught chemistry for more than 20 years and became an instructional coach for new science teachers. In 2017, she became the Education Innovationist for the South Dakota Department of Education.
“That role was fascinating,” said Wolf. “I was working mostly with administrators on solving big problems in school districts, such as access and opportunity.”
Wolf said the biggest gap the department saw in South Dakota education was science instruction. To help support South Dakota's science teachers, Wolf and her team created the SDMath/SDSci Educator Leadership program. Wolf says the biggest strength of this program is that it harnesses the existing expertise and passion of science instructors across the state.
“We already have incredibly talented teachers who can become leaders in their own communities,” Wolf said. “The purpose of the program is to help teachers recognize those leadership opportunities and develop a common vision of what effective instruction in math and science looks like.”
The program was piloted in the 2017-18 school year. It brought 25 teachers together for four weekend conferences. They shared expertise, learned about effecting change in complex school systems and created keystone projects to tackle complex problems in their own school districts.
“That’s been my focus for the last year, so when this opportunity at Sanford Lab bubbled up, it felt like the right fit,” Wolf said. “This team is super passionate about not only building resource materials, but also the quality instruction that comes with it.”
Wolf has been working with current director June Apaza to learn about the work already being accomplished within the Education and Outreach Department. Apaza, who is also the director of the Center for the Advancement of Math and Science Education at Black Hills State University, will step down in December.
“They’ve done a fabulous job focusing on three specific buckets of work: creating experiences for kids who can visit Sanford Lab, presenting at schools about the work happening here and creating the curriculum units,” Wolf said. “These people have all kinds of expertise. My role moving forward as director is to guide the work that’s already been established.”
She is also excited that kids are exposed to the diversity of people, careers and interests that support a facility like Sanford Lab: “You don’t have to be a physicist to be involved with a cool place like this!”
For more information about the Education and Outreach Department at Sanford Lab, visit their page.