We are thrilled to announce that SERC Assistant Professor Ilyse Resnick has received a Discovery Early Career Research Award (DECRA) grant from the Australian Research Council (ARC).
Ilyse won this prestigious grant for her project proposal titled ‘Building STEM capacity through literacy engagement in spatial reasoning’.
Receiving this highly competitive DECRA award is a testament to Ilyse’s outstanding track record as an emerging researcher and her vision for fostering spatial reasoning to engage young children in STEM.
As one of only three research projects awarded in the field of Education, and one of two UC recipients of a 2021 DECRA, this award highlights Ilyse’s unique and profound contribution to Education research in Australia. Her three-year project will complement the SERC goal of increasing access to STEM for all children.
Ilyse’s application summary
“This project aims to improve boys and girls’ spatial reasoning in preschool (when gender differences emerge) by utilising an activity that both genders equally access: book reading. Spatial reasoning is critical to achievement in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). This project will address disproportionate outcomes in spatial reasoning and STEM achievement, particularly among females, by identifying effective kinds of spatial learning opportunities for the preschool context. Expected outcomes include an innovative approach to improving spatial reasoning through literacy engagement. This provides significant benefits by creating pathways into STEM and informing targeted interventions.”
Assistant Professor Ilyse Resnick, 2020
Ilyse Resnick: then and now
Ilyse completed her Ph.D. in 2013 at Temple University (Philadelphia, United States) within the Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center (SILC). She was then selected for a highly competitive Institute of Education Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at the University of Delaware.
Prior to coming to the University of Canberra, Ilyse was an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Pennsylvania State University (Lehigh Valley). Her interdisciplinary program of research identifies and characterises the fundamental cognitive processes required in complex spatial and numerical reasoning. By characterising spatial reasoning skills, how they develop, and what specific STEM tasks they support, Ilyse is able to advance targeted, timely, and empirically driven STEM interventions.
Since arriving at SERC, Ilyse has established a customised laboratory space to conduct interdisciplinary research in STEM education and cognitive science. She has also been involved in several collaborations with the SERC team, including the Early Learning STEM Australia (ELSA) program, submission of an ARC Discovery Grant (as a co-PI), and part of the editorial team (as lead associate editor) of an invited special issue of the Mathematics Education Research Journal on how spatial reasoning supports mathematics achievement.
From all of us in the SERC team, we congratulate Ilyse on her achievement and look forward to seeing the outcomes of her research. The future is certainly bright for Ilyse.