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Wow,Peter, that is such a timely topic. I left a high-performing, predominately upper class school after seventeen years to take part in a grant that has been in place for three years now. Our parish wrote a PROGRESS Federal Grant to reach those low performing schools with high-poverty students. There are two branches of the grant. One is utilizing instructional coaches to improve teaching practices, and to coach teachers into using more technology with their classes. The other part of the grant is our STEM Team. We have STEM teachers in elementary, middle, and high school. The largest group of STEM teachers is on the elementary level. We serve 12 elementary schools. We have lost two STEM teachers this past year so now, the remaining three are each assigned four schools. I spend one week each month at each school. Our target was 4th grade, but I mainly work with 3rd through 5th and when teachers from other grade levels ask for my help, I work with every thing else, PreK, Special Education, and every where in between. We promote STEM nights, Science Fairs, field trips, guest scientists, the local engineering department at our university, and traveling exhibits. I have been trained and do have lots of cool STEM stuff such as; Lego EV3 Mindstorm Robots, Spheros, Little Bits, Arduinos, and hydraulic kits. However, many times, I have found that the teachers simply don't even teach the basics. There are many reasons for this. The main reason is that teachers feel intimidated and inadequately trained to teach science. This summer we will be conducting our 2nd STEM Institute for teachers. We piloted a STEM RTI curriculum for 4th grade this past year and are hopefully going to be able to offer it to the entire parish. This summer we are writing a similar curriculum for 3rd grade pending approval. I have seen resistant teachers become very enthusiastic about teaching science and conducting experiments that I would have never imagine possible. I have seen students do their homework so they do not miss out on science labs. (Teachers tend to take away the labs as if that is an enrichment class instead of the basic curriculum.) I have witnessed students who are usually disengaged in class become the most excited participants in science class. We start the year off teaching them how to use science journals and by mid-year, those journal entries are elaborate and detailed compared to entries from the beginning of the year. The middle school STEM teachers have reported to us that the students they are getting from the designated STEM schools know which equipment to use and how to use it, they follow safety procedures, they understand the difference between and experiment and an activity, and they are very engaged with increased scores on tests in science.
Children have to know what their options are in order to make informed decisions. Hopefully, we will make a lasting impact. Even though we are one small area in our state, hopefully, programs like this will continue to grow and reach all students.
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