This study was conducted during spring 2007 by staff at the the Center for Research, Evaluation, and Assessment at the Lawrence Hall of Science at the University of California, Berkeley and at WestEd.

Data collection focused on districts, teachers, and data in the nine Bay Area counties (Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, Sonoma). Data collection activities included:

• County Office of Education interviews (7 out of 9)
• Bay Area school district survey (almost 60% of Bay Area school districts responded, representing approximately 70% of the Bay Area elementary schools and students
• Bay Area school district interviews (14)
• Bay Area teacher survey (923 exclusively elementary teacher respondents)
• Other Bay Area science support program interviews (4)
• Student demographic and achievement data (from CDE data sets)
• Science-rich education institutions (science centers, universities, etc.) surveys (17)

Based on these data, we anticipate the depiction presented herein represents a more favorable picture of the status of science education in the Bay Area than what actually exists. We expect that those district personnel and teachers who took the time to respond to the survey were more likely to be more engaged in science education than those who did not.

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