SEFI_Advancing Indiana's Science Education to Empower Future Scientists with CN ePortfolio

About SEFI

Founded in 1965, the Science Education Foundation of Indiana (SEFI) is dedicated to advancing science education in the state. Over the past 30 years, SEFI has supported over 1,000 Indiana students, providing financial assistance for their participation in the International Science Fair. As a non-profit, its purpose is to encourage and assist young people to become scientists and engineers and to practice their professions in Indiana.

SEFI (Science Fair Education Initiative) is dedicated to providing platforms for students to exhibit their scientific projects and compete in science fairs. With a focus on showcasing students' competencies, learning evidence, achievements, and work samples, SEFI is committed to fostering a culture of scientific inquiry and innovation among young minds.

Use CN ePortfolio to Sustain and Grow the Science Fair

SEFI found CN when COVID-19 hit the world hard in 2020 and lockdowns made their in-person science fair that spring impossible. They were looking for a platform to move the event online -students could exhibit their research projects to the judges asynchronously. They found CN ePortfolio met their needs in the following ways:

1. Through the Showcase feature, every science fair participant can easily upload and present their research artifacts, which include an elevator speech video, a PowerPoint or Google Slides presentation, and a Quad Chart summarizing their research project.
2. The judges can view each student’s artifacts without creating a CN account.
3. SEFI staff have access to various administration controls, from account management and showcase customization, to data analytics.

After receiving tailored training, SEFI was able to quickly populate student accounts and guide students in creating their science fair presentation Showcases. The program then distributed the URLs of these Showcases to the judges to review before the final presentation via Zoom.

From the second year on, SEFI continued using CN ePortfolio for students to share their science research projects, transforming their science fair into a hybrid event. The CN team made multiple refinements to the Institution Showcase feature to fully support SEFI’s needs. A specific example was to support the SEFI admin to hide previous years’ Showcases to avoid the judges mistakenly reviewing old content on returning participants' ePortfolios.

Over the years, SEFI and the CN team have seamlessly collaborated through CN R&D and technology implementation. SEFI’s feedback on user account management, posting function customization, and video embedding has led to remarkable enhancements benefiting other users of the platform. While rating the CN customer service a solid Five Stars, Glen Cook, SEFI’s Executive Director, commented, “Support is great any time I have an issue.”

Outcomes

The first virtual science fair achieved great success. As an enabler of the virtual event during the pandemic, CN ePortfolio contributed to the program in several ways: First, it gave students an online tool to document and reflect on their research projects; Second, it allowed the judges additional time to review each project anywhere; Third, the academic social nature of the CN platform enabled students to look at each other’s work and network before and after the science fair; Lastly, SEFI was able to administer the platform and keep records of all the student artifacts.

Because of the values CN ePortfolio has brought to the program, SEFI continues to use the platform even after restoring the in-person science fair. Since 2020, over a thousand students have created their science research presentations on CN. Here at CN, we are proud to assist SEFI in achieving its goal of advancing science education in Indiana. Nothing is more exciting than preparing young people to become scientists and engineers of tomorrow.