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PHILIPPI -- A Philip Barbour High School teacher is participating in an innovative mathematics teaching improvement effort.
For the past year, Sissy Collins, a math teacher at PBHS, has taken part in the statewide Mountaineer Mathematics Master Teachers (M3T) improvement network, after being named a member of the third cohort of M3T Fellows last spring.
The M3T project network began in 2020, thanks to a six-year, $3 million grant to West Virginia University from the National Science Foundation's Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program, supported by additional grants from the West Virginia Department of Education.
The M3T project builds on previous efforts to support secondary mathematics teacher leadership and instructional improvement across West Virginia, which started in Pocahontas County more than a decade ago.
"I am constantly looking for ways to improve my teaching and that can be challenging for the smaller counties in West Virginia. The opportunities for collaboration are limited and often come with a price tag that is unrealistic," said Collins, who is one of 43 M3T Fellows supported by the project, representing 29 counties across West Virginia.
"The privilege of being selected for this project will benefit, not only my students, but all the students of Barbour County and for that I am extremely grateful."
As part of the project, M3T Fellows must continue to serve in their role as a middle or high school mathematics teacher and work as a network to identify and solve specific problems in their own classrooms and share that learning.
Beginning next year, Collins and other Cohort 3 Fellows will lead "local improvement teams" with colleagues in their school or district to further grow the M3T network. By the end of the project, Fellows will be supported to mentor other emerging teacher leaders across the state.
"The students of Barbour County Schools are lucky to have such a dedicated professional leading our math department," said Jeff Woofter, Superintendent of Barbour County Schools. "Her willingness to collaborate with fellow educators throughout the state benefits our students and the students of the other educators."
Collins has shared her ideas with other mathematics educators across the state, both on M3T network calls as well as through a poster presentation at the annual conference of the West Virginia Council of Teachers of Mathematics, held in March.
In addition to her classroom improvement work, Collins and other M3T Fellows are currently working to develop deeper understandings of topics related to data and statistics, as relatively new -- though vital -- content expectations in middle and high school mathematics classrooms.
Fellows will share these and other takeaways from the year at the M3T Summer Institute, being held in June in Morgantown. The network will be sharing reports on progress made with educators across the state starting in the fall.