By Debra Cleveland In Glen Lusebrink's Willet Elementary School classroom, students cluster around several pie pans containing a gooey mixture of cornstarch and water. If the students scoop up the stuff and roll it around in their hands, it forms a solid ball. As soon as they stop applying pressure, the "oobleck," as science teacher Lusebrink calls it, drips from their fingers. The oobleck is a non-Newtonian fluid: it looks like a fluid but doesn't behave according to Newton's definition. The students immersing their fingers in the oobleck aren't the fifth- and sixth-graders Lusebrink usually instructs. They're UC Davis undergraduates enrolled in the inaugural quarter of a science teaching internship, a program funded by a grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The class meets weekly in Lusebrink's classroom to learn how to teach science to second-grade through high-school students. Then, at schools throughout the Sacramento region, the students put the teaching lessons into action during the quarter as interns in classrooms. Tom Rost, associate dean and professor of plant biology, is coordinating the internship program to promote teaching as a valued and respected career choice. "Few science majors at UC Davis choose K-12 teaching as a career while in college," he says. "Whenever I get together with a group of division undergraduates, I ask what they plan to do after graduation. Most often they mention medical school or a graduate program. Very rarely do they want to be a teacher." Rost likes to point out to these students that while a doctor or surgeon may save lives, the number of people he or she affects is relatively low compared with a teacher. Rost and internship co-coordinator Rich Nuccitelli, professor of molecular and cellular biology, were surprised to receive 55 applications for 15 spaces in the new teaching internship. In response, they increased the class size to 25. All of the applicants had strong academic records and a serious interest in teaching. Rost says 17 students in this quarter's class would like to enroll for a second quarter. However, at present the students can't participate for a second quarter because the class is intended to allow as many students as possible to get teaching experience, and funding isn't available for a group of repeating students. Senior biochemistry major Barry Miller is having a "great time" teaching science to fifth-graders at a Davis elementary school. Before he enrolled in the internship, Miller was considering becoming a teacher and wanted to know what it was really like. Now he says he definitely wants to be a teacher. Heather Foley and Mike Anand travel to Suisun High School in Suisun City to teach. They tackle teaching first-graders about DNA and genetics. "The most difficult part is that you want to tell the kids everything you know because it's so exciting. Obviously they can't take all of that in, so we've had to learn how to create presentations appropriate for their level," Foley says. When students like these have teaching experiences as undergraduates, they will be more likely to stay in the profession, points out Merna Villarejo, director of the Division of Biological Sciences Educational Enrichment and Outreach Programs. "The dropout rate of first-year teachers is astronomical," she says. "This program is meant to give students realistic expectations about teaching as a career." Debra Cleveland is an assistant editor for the Division of Biological Sciences.