The Learning Edge: Advanced Technological Education Programs at Community Colleges.

This book is one of several supported by a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to the American Association of Community Colleges. It reviews the first seven years of the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) program by showcasing activities, partners, and achievements at 13 colleges. When Congress enacted legislation in 1993 establishing the ATE program, America's community colleges became the focus of a NSF effort to improve the nation's technological workforce. NSF's Division of Undergraduate Education and Division of Elementary, Secondary, and Informal Education jointly manage the ATE program. The aims of the ATE program are to improve advanced technology education, create models for other institutions, ensure that students gain strong backgrounds in mathematics and science, and generate educational products that can be applied nationwide. From its inception through the end of fiscal year 1999, the ATE program supported more than 250 individual projects and 12 national centers of excellence. The centers focus on specific technologies and serve as national resources that provide wide-ranging support to all institutions that are concerned about improvement in those specific technologies. Some of the programs described in this report achieved the following outcomes: new courses in telecommunications; new associate of arts and sciences degree and certificate program in environmental technology; and faculty development in geographical information systems, image processing, and remote sensing. Appendices contain ATE Centers of Excellence, ATE Funded Institutions, and Advisory Committee. (Contains 35 references.) (JA)