High schoolers don’t often get to see what real science is being done every day by researchers. Worst case scenario is that they are dealing with abstract numbers that don’t have any real-world parallels.

But with the help of Dr. Thomas Luhring, assistant professor of biological sciences at Wichita State University, students will not only get to work with active data acquired by a real scientist, but the data also will have implications in their neighborhoods.

The opportunity comes through Galactic Polymath — a platform developed by Dr. Matt Wilkins in 2021 to help bridge the gap between scientists with classrooms — and Luhring’s NSF CAREER grant. The platform is now home to a module, free for all teachers to use in their curriculum, on data literacy, which allows students to explore and analyze real datasets to practice their skills.

“One of the big goals of this is that it’s accessible,” Luhring said. “It’s something that, by taking part in these activities, they can start to envision themselves as being a researcher, as being a scientist. It’s not some far off thing that’s unachievable.”

As part of the module, Luhring and the team developed a tool to guide data exploration: The PPSTT Framework. PPSTT is an acronym students can utilize to think about data like a scientist does: Patterns, Prompts, Strange, Takeaway, Trust.

The module is broken up into two lessons that ground students in data literacy and the bigger picture of how stream flows vary seasonally across different regions:

• Lesson one focuses on practicing the PPSTT by exploring a database of how the frequency of words in books has changed over time.
• Lesson two enables students to use what they’ve learned about data literacy and analyze river flow data across the United States.

A third lesson is in development for 2026 that will allow students to use what they’ve learned about data literacy and apply it to data collected in the field. The data collected will be part of a field ecology course that is being jointly developed by USD 259 and Luhring and will be offered at WSU for concurrent enrollment.

Ethan Oltean, a biology teacher at Wichita Public Schools, who previously held a Watkin’s Fellowship with Luhring, is already using the module in his courses.

“Just the overall presentation and quality of it is next level in my opinion,” Oltean said. “It looks like something that's been professionally choreographed to my taste. The first data graph analysis allows them to create their own graphs based on their own words that they're searching for, so it really drew them into the intrinsic value of looking for answers.”

As part of the funds for his NSF CAREER grant, Luhring was looking to create material for teachers to use, and Galactic Polymath was the perfect fit for his goals.

“When I was putting this grant proposal together, I didn't want to just create something for local high schools that reflected what I thought they wanted,” Luhring said. “I wanted to find out what they actually needed. How could I leverage this grant to be useful for them and their biggest needs?”

Finding what teachers needed aligned with Wilkins’s recognition that a disconnect existed between the work scientists were doing and what students were working on in classrooms. Motivated to make a difference, he started Galactic Polymath.

“We’re trying to make it so it’s not so hard for scientists to connect with students,” Wilkins said. “The status quo is a disservice to the scientist who is discovering new things and the students who want to know what the NSF is funding.”

It was thanks to that initiative and partnership that teachers now have access to this module, which is now available for free on Galactic Polymath.

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Wichita State University is Kansas' only urban public research university, enrolling more than 23,000 students between its main campus and the WSU Campus of Applied Sciences and Technology (WSU Tech), including students from every state in the U.S. and more than 100 countries. Wichita State and WSU Tech are recognized for being student-centered and innovation-driven.

Located in the largest city in the state with one of the highest concentrations in the United States of jobs involving science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), Wichita State University provides uniquely distinctive and innovative pathways of applied learning, applied research and career opportunities for all of our students. The National Science Foundation ranked WSU No. 1 in the nation for aerospace engineering R&D, No. 2 for industry-funded engineering R&D and No. 8 overall for engineering R&D.

The Innovation Campus, which is a physical extension of the Wichita State University main campus, is one of the nation’s largest and fastest-growing research/innovation parks, encompassing over 120 acres and is home to a number of global companies and organizations.

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