Commerce Bank Center for Science Education

Completed in 2003, the Commerce Bank Center for Science Education (CBEC) forms the axis of the Missouri Botanical Garden's expanding education programming. An integral feature of the Garden's main campus, the Center is located at the corner of Shaw Avenue and Kingshighway, and joins the Monsanto Center (the Garden's research facility) on the campus' western border. As the Garden's Education Division headquarters, the Commerce Bank Center unites and connects, through technology, the Garden's several education entities including the Litzsinger Road Ecology Center in Ladue and the Shaw Nature Reserve in Gray Summit, Mo.

The physical facility, housing 24,000 square feet of instructional and support space, offers state-of-the-art instructional resources designed to provide new dimensions to science and mathematics experiential learning for school children, and professional development for teachers. With the built-in flexibility of modular classrooms, the facility is equipped throughout with the newest communication technologies, including online and teleconferencing capabilities. Emerging research technology and the latest upgrades for classrooms and laboratories are key elements of the facility's ongoing operation. 

Instructional program components to maximize learning are based on the documented evidence that experience teaches students for a lifetime. In hands-on, inquiry-based experiments, children in grades preK-12 have the opportunity to, among other things, study plant and animal life cycles, explore habitat preference, test proofs of force and motion, and analyze DNA. While learning science and math, students learn something just as important and perhaps more profound for the future – that they are able to solve problems, find answers and create solutions.

In the resource rooms, classrooms and laboratories of the CBEC, teachers and educators in general are able to develop their professional skills through direct experiences with Garden scientists and educators. The latest scientific principles and facts are made available through the vast resource materials, electronic communication and staff presentations. Teachers take advantage of the many opportunities to develop and expand their interactive coaching skills for work with their students.

Educational use of the CBEC is open to the broad St. Louis community, including St. Louis city and county, and the surrounding counties of both Missouri and Illinois. Higher education is also served by access to the latest resources and enhanced offerings for teachers in training.

Just as the CBEC serves as the resource and instructional nexus for the multiple educational sites of the Education Division of the Garden, so too does it serve the region as a focal point, to complement, and to afford collaborative and synergistic linkages to programs and activities of various institutions providing educational programs in science and mathematics.

Main Entrance Lobby – Room #101
A gathering place, the reception area is used for displays, artwork and donor recognition.

Computer Laboratory – Room #119
Devoted to GIS and other learning technologies, the computer laboratory serves as the core technology resource and anchor for instructional connectivity between the Garden's education sites, preK-12 schools, and other institutions and science and mathematics instruction sites.  This laboratory is equipped with 30 computers, two data connectors and a projection screen.

Stupp Teacher and Instructional Resource Center – Room #102
Dedicated to the provision of standards-based, inquiry-centered teacher resources and instructional materials, the available packages and supplies include diagnostic curriculum and assessment tools. With dedicated computers and on-line capabilities, the room also houses a small library.

Material Resource Room – Room #103
The Material Resource Room operates as the research and development unit to the Stupp Teacher Center, allowing for production and testing of resource and instructional materials. The second floor houses an inventory of instructional materials.

Conference Room #105
Equipped with the latest information and communication resources, including teleconferencing capacity, this area serves as the Education Division's primary conference room designed to accommodate up to 16.

Classrooms #126 and #127
These classrooms function either as four partitioned classrooms or as combined instructional spaces with modular student seating designed to meet the requirements of user groups. Each room is equipped with 18 data connectors, and sink stations allowing for flexible student work areas.

Classrooms #129 and #130
With the addition of video conferencing capabilities in room #129, these classrooms are similar in design and function to classrooms #126 and #127. Partitioning allows for two smaller classrooms.

Science Laboratories #125 and #131
The laboratories are used for intensive exploration of molecular, cellular, organismic, and system components of plants and other living systems. Instruction, organized as classroom projects, focuses on the principle elements of scientific inquiry and involves the convergence of science knowledge and mathematics skills including substantive data interpretation and analyses. The multiple experiment tables are equipped with electric and gas. The two laboratories are of comparable size and differ only in that #131 contains a biohazard hood for use in DNA extraction, separation and analyses.

The Missouri Botanical Garden's mission is "to discover and share knowledge about plants and their environment in order to preserve and enrich life." Today, 151 years after opening, the Missouri Botanical Garden is a National Historic Landmark; a center for research, education and horticultural display.

3/2010