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Diane DeBaise

Diane DeBaise is a secondary school Earth Science teacher at Commonwealth Connections Academy (CCA). She started her teaching career in 2004 and has been teaching with CCA since 2008. Ms. DeBaise holds a Master of Science degree in Biology from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania. She holds teaching certificates in both Biology and Secondary Science from Albright College.

She says, "teaching is my second career, which I began in 2004. Prior to that, I was a registered dietitian specializing in treating adolescent eating disorders for 20 years. I also taught biology at several colleges. I became a high school science teacher because I found, through my previous work, that teenagers appeal to my sense of humor, which makes coming to work everyday great fun. I feel a strong commitment to preparing future generations to assume their role as guardians of our planet.

This is the last job I will ever have, because I love working at Connections Academy. We work in a very happy, energetic environment. Teachers here are encouraged and recognized for being creative and innovative in our teaching approaches. Our interactions with our students and their families are very positive and rewarding. With the launch of the mobile classroom, CCA has become a science teacher's dream job. We are now able to reach out and further prepare our students with the hands-on skills needed to integrate science concepts into their daily lives."

Teaching at Sea

Ms. DeBaise was recently honored by being selected to join JOIDES Resolution scientific ocean drilling vessel with a team of scientists and educators headed to the Cascadia Margin off the coast of British Columbia. Teachers are selected through a competitive application and interview process. Ms. DeBaise was selected from thousands of applicants who sought  the opportunity to learn shipboard science alongside the expedition’s science party. She says, "Thank you so much for allowing me this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Just one more of a mountain of reasons why I love working at CCA!"

Ms. DeBaise will be sailing during the fall of 2010. During the expedition her team will be conducting scientific investigations in the various high-tech labs to uncover the geology of the region using deep sea cores and logging data. They will also observe the assembly and installation of a CORK that will take various measurements deep in the ocean floor.

She was thrilled to have been selected for the expedition and says, "I'm excited about the work we will be doing on this expedition. A team of ten educators (not all science teachers!) will be collaborating to produce curriculum materials, lessons and activities that teachers across the US can use to teach Earth Science concepts in a more entertaining and engaging way.

Plate tectonics, for example, is an important, but very abstract concept for students to understand. The JOIDES Resolution actually studies the movement and activity of the tectonic plates. I'm hoping to be able to provide my students with materials that will help understand the concept AND make them see that it is a real phenomenon, not just something that I sit around and think about. (The movement of the tectonic plates affects many aspects of our daily lives: weather, earthquakes, the formation and destruction of mountain ranges, the spreading of the ocean floor to replace old crust with new, and on and on.) 

Also, I will be learning new techniques for showing and teaching science information. For example, we will be creating a graphic novel about the expedition in PDF format that teachers can give to students (much more entertaining than reading a textbook!). I'm planning to teach my students how to create a graphic novel from the field studies we'll be doing with them using the mobile classroom.

I will learn how to make slide samples of the materials collected from the earth's mantle for my students to examine in live lessons under our videomicroscope. I don't think I could even get these slides unless I went on the expedition and made them myself.

Overall, I am hoping to come back with some fun Earth science learning activities for my students. I'm also excited about being able to expose them to the expedition live in real time instead of just on a video. They will be able to talk to real people who have careers in the field of Earth science."