Texas Administrative Code › Title 19 - EDUCATION › Part 2 - TEXAS EDUCATION AGENCY › Chapter 127 - TEXAS ESSENTIAL KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS FOR CAREER DEVELOPMENT AND CAREER AND TECHNICAL EDUCATION › Subchapter O - SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, ENGINEERING, AND MATHEMATICS › Section 127.758 - Scientific Research and Design (One Credit), Adopted 2015

Current through Reg. 49, No. 28; July 12, 2024
(a) General requirements. This course is
				  recommended for students in Grades 11 and 12. Prerequisite: Biology, Chemistry,
				  Integrated Physics and Chemistry (IPC), or Physics. Students must meet the 40%
				  laboratory and fieldwork requirement. This course satisfies a high school
				  science graduation requirement. Students shall be awarded one credit for
				  successful completion of this course. Students may take this course with
				  different course content for a maximum of three credits.
(b) Introduction.
(1) Career and technical education
				  instruction provides content aligned with challenging academic standards and
				  relevant technical knowledge and skills for students to further their education
				  and succeed in current or emerging professions.
(2) The Science, Technology, Engineering, and
				  Mathematics (STEM) Career Cluster focuses on planning, managing, and providing
				  scientific research and professional and technical services, including
				  laboratory and testing services, and research and development
				  services.
(3) Scientific Research
				  and Design is a broad-based course designed to allow districts and schools
				  considerable flexibility to develop local curriculum to supplement any program
				  of study or coherent sequence. The course has the components of any rigorous
				  scientific or engineering program of study from the problem identification,
				  investigation design, data collection, data analysis, formulation, and
				  presentation of the conclusions. All of these components are integrated with
				  the career and technical education emphasis of helping students gain
				  entry-level employment in high-skill, high-wage jobs and/or continue their
				  education.
(4) Science, as defined
				  by the National Academy of Sciences, is the "use of evidence to construct
				  testable explanations and predictions of natural phenomena, as well as the
				  knowledge generated through this process." This vast body of changing and
				  increasing knowledge is described by physical, mathematical, and conceptual
				  models. Students should know that some questions are outside the realm of
				  science because they deal with phenomena that are not scientifically
				  testable.
(5) Scientific inquiry is
				  the planned and deliberate investigation of the natural world. Scientific
				  methods of investigation are experimental, descriptive, or comparative. The
				  method chosen should be appropriate to the question being asked.
(6) Scientific decision making is a way of
				  answering questions about the natural world. Students should be able to
				  distinguish between scientific decision-making methods (scientific methods) and
				  ethical and social decisions that involve science (the application of
				  scientific information).
(7) A
				  system is a collection of cycles, structures, and processes that interact. All
				  systems have basic properties that can be described in space, time, energy, and
				  matter. Change and constancy occur in systems as patterns and can be observed,
				  measured, and modeled. These patterns help to make predictions that can be
				  scientifically tested. Students should analyze a system in terms of its
				  components and how these components relate to each other, to the whole, and to
				  the external environment.
(8)
				  Students are encouraged to participate in extended learning experiences such as
				  career and technical student organizations and other leadership or
				  extracurricular organizations.
(9)
				  Statements that contain the word "including" reference content that must be
				  mastered, while those containing the phrase "such as" are intended as possible
				  illustrative examples.