The American Meteorological Society (AMS) has been actively engaged in teacher enhancement programs since 1991. It's first program, Project ATMOSPHERE, created a national network of Atmospheric Education Resource Agents (AERAs), teachers who are instrumental in training their peers with AMS-developed resource materials on selected topics in weather and climate. In addition, AERAs became leaders in their respective states in promoting the study of the atmospheric environment across the K-12 curriculum. They also serve as agents of change in curriculum and assessment within their state educational systems.
In 1994, the Maury Project was began. Modeled after Project ATMOSPHERE, the Maury Project provides a similar teacher enhancement program on the physical foundations of oceanography. An outgrowth of Project ATMOSPHERE is the DataStreme Project which utilizes near-real-time observational data to enhance the study of weather topics using the Internet as a delivery system. A common thread that runs through all of these teacher enhancement programs is the cultivation of a cadre of teachers with both the necessary scientific background and the leadership skills to serve as educational resource agents in their respective schools and states. These teachers serve an invaluable role of transferring their knowledge acquired through AMS summer workshops to their peers in their home states. Such a network of resource agents working within their own educational systems have made it possible for the AMS educational programs to achieve a level of effectiveness and accomplishment that otherwise would have been impossible. A key component in the development of resource agents is the evolution of the unique AMS model of leadership training for teachers. This paper will examine this leadership model and how it serves the respective AMS educational programs