Energy Engineer Andy Shapiro took time to say a few words on Fran and her impact on VEEP:
“I first met Fran in 1994 when the Tour de Sol – a New England solar car rally – came through Montpelier, VT. I had called the organizers of the rally to see if they had plans to get kids there to see this new phenomenon of a solar powered car. They said to call Fran, who, it turned out, was bringing teachers to a workshop to prepare them to bring their students to the rally.
She welcomed me to come, and when I showed up she had already set up stations around the room. One had a light bulb a wire and a D-cell battery and challenged you to make the bulb light up in 4 different configurations. Another had a small PV cell and a motor; another had a battery and a motor, one had a little car that you could put a battery in – or attach a PV panel if there was sun – for it to run.
She walked the group of teachers through the instructions for each station, and then turned them loose to experiment and work with all the stations. Each teacher left with a kit of materials enough of each type of kit so that all students in the classroom would to be able to work on one of the stations at the same time. When the kids showed up at the rally, they understood more than most adults there about how these cars worked!
Fran had a knack for de-mystifying teaching of science for elementary teachers in particular – she was an accomplished science methods instructor and was always kind and understanding with teachers. She helped many science-phobic teachers over the hump, understanding science was as simple as observation, data gathering and interpretation, and upped the skill levels of many more.
Fran taught me about “constructivist” education: present a student with a phenomenon and then try first to understand each student’s mental construct of why it worked like it did. When I was in the 6th grade classroom helping students design their own solar concentrating collectors (that they built and then tested) Fran would be going around the room quietly asking individual students what they understood about what they were doing. One student had a black object that she was holding near the window but not in the direct sun that was coming in. Of course, it did not warm up with no direct sun on it and it turned out the student thought that black attracted sun the way a magnet attracts paper clips and the black color would bend the sun around to it. Fran would then have the student experience some event that was discrepant with the student’s theory. You could hear the mental gears turning as the mental model shifted.
With my background in energy and engineering and my love of explaining complex phenomena in simple ways and Fran’s exemplary pedagogy, we formed a good team, bolstered by our caring and respect for each other. Fran had significant dyslexia, but she wrote books, created VEEP and nurtured and led the organization for many years. She accepted her limitations, working through and around them, not letting them stop her, even if they slowed her down. Fran passed away in early 2023 and her significant legacy lives on through VEEP and now NHEEP.”
– Andy Shapiro, VEEP Energy Engineer