by Christine Knippels, Frans van Dam (PARRISE Coordinators)

The EU-funded PARRISE project (Promoting Attainment of Responsible Research & Innovation in Science Education) aims at introducing the concept of Responsible Research and Innovation in primary and secondary education.  It does so by combining inquiry-based learning and citizenship education with socio-scientific issues in science education. The project also aims to collect and share existing best practices across Europe and develop learning tools, materials and in/pre-service training courses for science teachers.

In PARRISE, 18 partners from 11 EU- and associated countries participate. The four-year project started in January 2014, and is funded by the EC Framework 7 Science in Society Programme. PARRISE is led by the Freudenthal Institute of Science and Mathematics Education, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.

The PARRISE project is now in full swing. Starting this Fall, teachers and teachers educators across Europe will improve and develop teacher professional development modules that position inquiry-based learning in a societal context. The teachers and educators involved work within science, technology, engineering and mathematics from primary to lower and upper secondary schools, as well as in informal learning environments. In January and May the partners gathered in Utrecht and London prepared the work of the years to come.

The PARRISE approach is based on a new pedagogy framework, called SSIBL, Socio-Scientific Inquiry-Based Learning. SSIBL has been developed by the PARRISE consortium in the first half of 2014. This approach will guide teacher professional development: teachers develop their own lessons, school or informal education modules. Subsequently, best practices of teacher professional development will be exchanged across European borders.

Thus, PARRISE will contribute to a curriculum and pedagogy that enhances the capacities of young people within their daily lives. This pedagogy will empower young people in their capacity of citizens who will be able to engage in debate about the social aspects of science and technology.

In the next two years, the partners will invest in testing the SSIBL framework in teacher professional development. After two rounds of testing, the result will be a robust pedagogy framework as well as numerous ready to use modules. We will keep you informed about our results!