In collaboration with Liberty Science Center (LSC), the Urban Teacher Education Program (UTEP) at Rutgers University-Newark was awarded a grant by the U.S. Department of Education in 2014, launching “Excite and Ignite: Building the Next Generation of Teachers” (NextGen), with Jersey City Public Schools as a third partner. This grant-funded partnership focuses on pre-service teacher development in order to build stronger teachers, especially in STEM.