Author Archives: Lisa Donohoe

How to Conduct the CIF Project

Conducting the CIF Project

Interested teachers may begin the program in either semester, depending on the schedule of their school.

The CNS Education Group and experienced CIF teachers will be available to assist new participants. We will attempt to pair new teachers with experienced teachers. These people will help guide you through the following suggestions to implement the CIF program.

Every teacher has a particular style of instructing students. In keeping with the CIF curricular model, the coordinators and experienced CIF teachers suggest a constructivist approach. In this way students soon establish a baseline of what they already know. They also begin to understand what they do not know. Finally, they establish what they want to learn and where they must do research to learn these things.

The CIF staff suggests you and your students begin the course by brainstorming both the Benchmark statements and the objectives. In these sessions you might want to create concept maps to visually display connections and links between and among topics. In this way you and your students will develop the meaning of the issues.

Following this, you may want to divide the work among your students. Maybe you would like to create teams that will investigate different geographical regions. Perhaps certain activities would appeal more to some students than to others. Are there some who would like to do the scientific as opposed to the historical research? Are there students who have a knack for writing essays or reports? Do you have web whizzes who will assemble the Benchmark and final products?

Next, define vocabulary and terms. Try to identify terms that will most likely be seen as acronyms. If you find undefined acronyms, there are acronym dictionaries. Make lists of vocabulary and special terms. Perhaps you will want to create a glossary, maybe even one with illustrative pictures or graphics.

Define the areas where you need to do research and the kinds of research tools that you need to use. For example, you might need almanacs for economic statistics on particular countries. You might need atlases to investigate specific regions. The Web might be a good source for pictures and other graphics to illustrate your product. Some of the activities will require interviews with people in the community. You might even want to check out the local video rental. The school or local library could give you social and cultural background information. Your options are many and varied.

The CIF coordinators strongly recommend that you not get all of your data from the Internet. It has been said, “not everything on the Web is good, and not everything that is good is on the Web.”

Synthesize and analyze your data. One of the requirements for your Benchmark and final products is that you have internal source citations and a reference list or bibliography at the end.

For each Benchmark, the coordinators expect to receive results that demonstrate the students’ knowledge of the vocabulary, concepts, and issues covered by each Benchmark. Decide how you want to present your results. These results could be essays, reports, the script for a TV newscast, a newspaper article, a press release, an op-ed piece, or other written material. You might want to create a multimedia product, maybe in HyperStudio or some other software product. You might want to develop a series of Web pages. Again, your options are many and varied.

Throughout this process also think about the kind of presentation you would like to make at the student conference. In a conference situation your students will have the opportunity to interact with students from other states and other countries. Consider that this venue is quite different from that in which the Benchmark results are displayed. At the student conference there will be much more oral and visual interaction.

We welcome you to CIF and look forward to the work that your students produce. Please take advantage of this website, the threaded discussion on Yahoo, and the CIF staff and teachers.

Videos of Student Presentations 2011

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CIF 2011 spring conference report: “American, Chinese, and Russian High School Students Discuss Solutions to Nuclear Challenges in the Middle East“

The semester-long CIF program concluded with a successful students conference on April 28-29 in Monterey where students from three countries presented their findings on nuclear issues in the Middle East.

View the videos to see the great work that CIF students do!

Nuclear Safety & Security: Why a Critical Issue?

2011-2012 Critical Issues Forum

Nuclear Safety and Security Student Benchmarks

Introduction

The issues concerning nuclear safety and nuclear security are not new.

Opinion polls, backed by concerns about global warming and energy security, had been showing increased support for nuclear energy. Support remained even after 9/11 raised concerns about terrorists acquiring nuclear materials. While public trust in nuclear power was growing, there were still memories of Three-Mile Island and Chernobyl. Then, in 2011, there was the Fukushima incident in Japan. After Fukushima public trust in nuclear power dropped, in Japan and around the world. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called the accident a wake-up call for the world to enhance nuclear safety and security.

After Fukushima, some countries started reviewing the safety of their nuclear power plants. For example, Germany and Switzerland decided to phase out nuclear power.  Most countries, including Japan, have become more cautious about the rapid growth of nuclear energy. However, neither Fukushima nor concerns about nuclear security will put an end to nuclear power. The IAEA shows that use of nuclear power will continue to grow, but slower than in previous projections. The long-term impact of the Fukushima accident remains to be seen, but one thing is certain. It is necessary to address the serious issues of nuclear power safety and security.

Some countries are interested in constructing new nuclear plants along with existing plants, so nuclear safety and security are important issues. There are also countries starting nuclear power programs for the first time. For example, countries in Asia and the Middle East are planning to begin nuclear power programs. Both nuclear safety and nuclear security have one goal—the protection of people, society and the environment. Although they are different in some respects, they do complement each other. Improvement in one area can also benefit the other area.

Progress on nuclear safety and security is needed if nuclear energy is to have a role in the future. If a “Nuclear Renaissance” is to happen, leaders will have to control technologies that can provide nuclear material for power plants but also for weapons. Leaders in the United States and other nuclear-weapons states will also have to figure out appropriate rules for these technologies.

The Critical Issues Forum topic for 2011-2012 is “Nuclear Safety and Security.” Students will investigate the current status of, challenges to, and future prospects of nuclear safety and security. They will research and respond to two Benchmark Activities on these issues.

In their research about nuclear power in the world today, students will learn basic facts about forms of radiation, the nuclear fuel cycle, construction of various nuclear facilities, and both military and civilian uses of nuclear facilities and materials.

Using this basic knowledge, students will be able to understand the definitions of nuclear safety and nuclear security, as well as the importance of these issues. They will be able to understand the difference between safety and security, and the connection between the two.

During their research, students will see how the four CIF content domains – scientific/environmental, political/geopolitical, economic, and social/cultural – have an impact on all of these issues.

CIF Teachers Learning about Nuclear Fission

Today at the teacher’s workshop, Ferenc Dalnoki-Veress, scientist-in-residence at CNS, discussed nuclear fission and the related nuclear safety issues. We learned that even when a reactor is shut down, which Fukushima power plant operators did when the tsunami hit Japan, fuel remains hot and radioactive for a long period of time.

Ferenc discussed the difference between “criticality incidents” and “non-criticality incidents” at nuclear reactors and examined three case studies: Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima.

Questions for teachers to think about in guiding student projects include:

  1. What are the similarities in response between the accidents?
  2. Given that the political systems were so different, why were there still serious problems in response?
  3. How do we improve risk communication during an accident?
  4. How do we prevent this from happening again?
  5. What is the role of industry? Regulators? Civil society? How do we build trust?