ODI Staff

Amy Busey leads and contributes to a diverse array of initiatives that support teachers in ensuring students’ STEM proficiency and school, college, and career success. She brings significant experience in quantitative and qualitative research, strategic dissemination, and promotion of knowledge utilization. Her most recent work is deepening understanding of effective strategies to foster students’ data literacy and bridge STEM education research and practice. As a member of EDC’s Oceans of Data Institute (ODI) team, Busey was a primary author of ODI’s Visualizing Oceans of Data report—a groundbreaking effort to provide guidelines to support interface and tool designers in bridging cyberinfrastructure to classrooms, enabling students to work with large, high-quality scientific datasets. She played a key role in ODI’s Ocean Tracks project, which developed and tested powerful Web-based visualization and analysis tools derived from state-of-the-art knowledge about how to support student inquiry with data, and worked collaboratively with the Concord Consortium and the University of Minnesota on the CODAP (Common Online Data Analysis Platform) and with GMRI on the Real World, Real Science project. Busey is currently leading EDC’s team on the Building Insights through Observation project and is a researcher on the Streams of Data project. Busey is the lead author of the article “Harvesting a Sea of Data” published in the Summer 2015 issue of The Science Teacher. Busey holds a BS in Psychology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an EdM in Mind, Brain, and Education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Erin Bardar led the Ocean Tracks College Edition curriculum development team. She was also project director and curriculum team lead for EDC’s part in the NASA-funded Real World Real Science project, and was a key contributor on the Zoom In to Science project. She is currently leading curriculum development on the Streams of Data project. Erin brings 15 years of experience in Earth and space science curriculum development, teacher professional development, and education research to her ODI work. She holds an ScB in Physics from Brown University and a PhD in Astronomy Education Research from Boston University.

Jackie DeLisi brings nearly 20 years of experience in the field of education as both a researcher and a practitioner. Her primary research interests include understanding the intersections between school organizations, pedagogy, and students’ adoption of scientific and engineering practices. Her work also focuses on instrument development, including determining psychometric properties, to measure school, teacher, and student outcomes. DeLisi is a co-author of the report Visualizing Oceans of Data: Educational Interface Design. She also served as a researcher on the Ocean Tracks and Real World, Real Science projects. DeLisi earned a BA in Chemistry from New York University, an MA in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Colorado at Denver, and an EdD in Administration, Training, and Policy Studies from Boston University."

Josephine Louie has extensive experience conducting research in education and social science, with a background in quantitative and qualitative research methods. Louie leads the Strengthening Data Literacy across the Curriculum (SDLC) and WeatherX projects. She is the research lead of the  Innovation Pathways to Data Careers (IPDC) project. She was the co-principal investigator of ODI’s Ocean Tracks. Louie received an AB from Harvard College, a master’s in city planning from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and an EdM and EdD from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Kevin Waterman is a STEM education expert and educational innovator. An experienced project director and instructional designer, he leads education R&D initiatives that broaden participation to underserved or underrepresented student populations and support teachers in improving students’ learning and achievement. Currently, he is designing tools and curricula to help teachers foster students’ data literacy and build their computational thinking across disciplines. Waterman is the co-principal investigator of EDC’s WeatherX project, which is helping rural students gain data literacy skills. He is also co-leading an initiative to integrate computational thinking into EDC’s award-winning Insights elementary science curriculum. Previously, he contributed to the Broadening Participation in Computer Science initiative. Waterman holds a BA in Mathematics from Trinity College and an MAT in Mathematics Education from Boston University.

Lynn Goldsmith brings more than 30 years of research experience to the study of learning and teaching. She has directed research for curriculum development projects, studied professional development for teachers, investigated principals’ instructional leadership for mathematics, examined the role that emotions play in learning, and explored relationships between arts education and mathematical reasoning. Goldsmith has also written about mathematics education for the research community, practitioners, and parents. She currently directs the NSF-funded project,  Integrating Computational Thinking into the Insights Elementary Science Curriculum, which is developing NGSS-aligned science units for grades 1 and 4, with particular attention to use of computational thinking.

She directed the research on EDC’s Young Mathematicians K–5 curriculum, supervised the research component of several professional development projects at EDC, including Turning to the Evidence, Supporting Staff Developers, and Formative Assessment in the Mathematics Classroom: Engaging Teachers and Students (FACETS), all funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). With colleagues from Boston College and Massachusetts College of Art and Design, she investigated the connection between arts and geometric thinking and is currently collaborating on a project with Artists for Humanity, an after-school workforce development program for high school students, to infuse STEM thinking into the design and development of works of art. Goldsmith has also collaborated with colleagues at Mills College, Syracuse University, and WestEd. Goldsmith's recent publications include Mathematics teachers’ learning: a conceptual framework and synthesis of research, A framework for the facilitation of teachers’ analysis of video, and Examining Mathematics Practice Through Classroom Artifacts (co-authored with Nanette Seago). She has authored or coauthored articles for parents and practitioners about math education, The Fostering Algebraic Thinking Toolkit: A Guide for Staff Development, and several guides for selecting rigorous curriculum materials (Choosing a Standards-Based Mathematics Curriculum and the series Guiding Curriculum Decisions for Middle Grades—for language arts, mathematics, and science). She has also written about child prodigies, including coauthoring Nature's Gambit: Child Prodigies and the Development of Human Potential. Before joining EDC, Goldsmith held research positions at Tufts University and TERC and taught at Middlebury College. She received a BA in psychology from Yale University and a PhD from the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota. She did postdoctoral studies at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Pam Buffington, a national expert in rural education and mathematics education, guides policymakers, education leaders, and teachers in improving K–12 student outcomes. She brings extensive experience in rural education, place-based learning, research, and distance learning networks to her leadership of EDC’s Rural and Ready STEM initiative. Buffington specializes in expanding access to high-quality STEM education, closing opportunity gaps in mathematics education, and bridging research and practice. Buffington holds a PhD in Education from the Union Institute, an MA in Curriculum and Instruction from Lesley College, and a BS in Secondary Education and Mathematics with a minor in Physics from the University of Maine at Farmington.