STEM Teaching & Learning

What is STEM?

STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. STEM instructors specialize in integrating these subject areas through project and problem-based learning. This encourages students to investigate and engineer solutions by providing evidence-based explanations.

Is a Certificate in STEM Education Right for Me?

Educators interested in becoming leaders in preparing their learners to take on questions and issues that reside at the intersections of traditional disciplinary curriculum. Participants in this certificate should be interested in understanding global concerns and their local manifestation, and how to apply disciplinary content to create community based solutions.  The graduate certificate is appropriate for classroom teachers, informal educations, administrators,  along with corporate and industry individuals with educational outreach position descriptions.

University of Cincinnati’s STEM Teaching & Learning Certificate Program

UC’s online graduate certificate in STEM education is designed for current educators who hold a teaching license or informal educators seeking professional development in STEM areas to more effectively teach STEM disciplines.

What will I learn?

With a 90% graduation rate, students who earn their STEM certificate for teachers online can expect to meet below goals:

Program Goal 1 

Improve educators’ proficiency of core content and cross-disciplinary knowledge in STEM and sustainability with competencies rooted in systems thinking and 21st century skills of problem-solving, critical thinking, digital literacy, and innovation.

Program Goal 2 

Strengthen educators’ cultural competence of the moral and ethical considerations of STEM education by cultivating social-emotional awareness and engaging community assets to build equitable educational environments for diverse student populations.

Learning Objectives 

1. Promote resilient and adaptable skill development for students and educators to better navigate increasingly uncertain instructional and career settings.
2. Strengthen core subject knowledge to construct lessons that contextualize content with cross-disciplinary knowledge, sustainability, and local to global problem solving.
3. Gain foundational skills in systems thinking, project-based applications, and digital literacy for safe and effective use across educational environments.
4. Become proficient in evidence-based practices and skills in monitoring student development to enhance learning and make curriculum adjustments when necessary.
5. Continuously deploy Universal Design for Learning and 21st Century Skills to maximize accessibility and relevancy for all learners that is developmentally appropriate.
6. Adopt community assets and place-based curricular and instructional approaches that respect and incorporate diverse student backgrounds.
7. Apply a social justice, equity-oriented pedagogy to the development of lessons and materials that encourage and embrace student and classroom diversity.
8. Critically reflect on assumptions and seek transformative change in STEM by challenging dominant narratives that perpetuate systemic oppression in teaching and learning.

Program Overview and Outcomes

After completing the program, STEM Graduate Certificate students can expect to be able to do the following:

• Create or adapt specific curricula or learning activity into an integrated STEM and/or Sustainability activity.
• Implement, monitor, and assess student or participant learning during a STEM and/or Sustainability activity.
• Design program curricula with respect to the intersections of STEM education and sustainability.
• Choose from electives to produce a project-based learning activity, inquiry-based learning activity, modeling design project, or mathematical problem-solving research project.

Program Offerings

• 100% online
• Only 15 credit hours
• Easy to transfer credits
• Enroll in the spring, summer, or fall semesters
• Instruction from award-winning faculty
• Part-time flexibility
• Option to apply course credits toward the Master of Education in Curriculum and Instruction, which is also 100% online.

Accreditations and Rankings

• The University of Cincinnati and all of its regional campuses are accredited by the Higher Learning Commission.
• The University of Cincinnati is fully accredited by the Council of the Accreditation of the Educator Preparation (CAEP).
• Top tier of America’s Best Colleges by U.S. News & World Report.
• University of Cincinnati Online ranked “Best Online” Public University on College Consensus in 2022.