2012 Grants

Horizons at Harley in Rochester, New York

Horizons at Harley is a program at The Harley School in Rochester, New York, for the most-challenged students and families within the Rochester City School District. Every summer for the past 18 years, Horizons has provided a six-week program that combines academic, social, cultural, wellness and recreational activities to young people. The program uses small classes and experienced teachers, and is committed to infusing STEM curriculum across all grades. (Their website is www. horizonsatharley.org.)

This past summer, Horizons at Harley offered a fun STEM project: build a go-kart! In 16 sessions, two teams of young women -- one of 5th and 6th graders, the other of 7th and 8th graders -- designed, built and drove go-karts. The classes taught STEM skills such as measuring, drawing, planning and organization, budgeting and finance, teamwork and delegation of tasks, and of course math. The scale of this engineering project was itself an asset: as Luis Perez, Executive Director of Horizons noted, "Many participants have not had the opportunity to start and complete a project of this magnitude." There was also an entrepreneurial element: when the go-karts were finished, the instructors discussed how they might make money from the product they had built. By the end, the young women had a tangible, fun example of how teamwork and math can be made useful and interesting.

The Foundation funded $3,000 of the total budget of $7,500.

Liberty Science Center in Jersey City, New Jersey

The Liberty Science Center (www.lsc.org) is a big, beautiful, state-of-the-art museum and science education center in Liberty State Park. If you've approached New York City from the south along the New Jersey Turnpike, you've seen LSC's distinctive dome and tower off to the right, against the backdrop of the Statue of Liberty and lower Manhattan. The Center's mission is to educate and inspire interest in the sciences and to encourage students to consider careers in science fields. They host approximately 600,000 guests each year, including 210,000 students and teachers (40% of which are low-income youths, their families and teachers). LSC has a Women's Leadership Council, which is an initiative led by women volunteers who are committed to STEM education for students of all ages.

This year, the Foundation is sponsoring a pilot mentoring program. Thirteen young women in 11th and 12th grade who participated this past summer in a LSC program called Partners in Science have been paired with members of the Women's Leadership Council who are female STEM professionals. The mentors include engineers and scientists (including a senior scientist at a major biotech firm), as well as businesswomen from both big and small STEM companies (including the CEO of a major New Jersey hospital). Foundation funds will pay to enroll these young women in the Women's Leadership Council, which includes membership fees, participation in events, and travel to events (primarily held at the LSC), as well as materials and supplies. The program mentors will serve as role models, coaches and advisors to the young women, and join them at the WLC events, which include speakers, luncheons, and exhibits. It's a great way to support and encourage these young women as they consider how to continue their involvement with science.

The grant is for $3,000 and will support all 13 girls in the mentor program.

The Girls' Middle School in Palo Alto, California

We have supported programs at The Girls' Middle School for several years now. Last year, we funded three programs; this year we will fund one of those same programs again and we will also fund two new programs.

"Indoor skydiving" physics field trip

Last year we funded a field trip for the entire 8th grade at GMS to visit a nearby "indoor skydiving" facility. The girls:

* Conducted experiments within the flight chamber to determine the terminal velocity of various sports balls
* Examined the flight patterns of non-uniform items
* Listened to a lecture on physics topics relevant to the wind tunnel and flight
* Toured the facility
* Got to "fly" in the wind tunnel!

GMS reported that "The students who went on this trip last year were unanimous in describing how much the experience helped make sense out of the ideas being discussed." It's a great way to make physics understandable, and we're delighted to be funding this trip again, for the entire 8th grade. The grant is $1,666.

Exploratorium field trip

The Exploratorium (www.exploratorium.edu) is a science museum in San Francisco that emphasizes interactive, hands-on exhibits and workshops. This year the Foundation will fund a field trip for the entire 8th grade at GMS (68 students) to go to the Exploratorium for a day. The GMS science teacher then uses the exhibits the young women saw on the field trip to reinforce ideas and examples in class, and to introduce new ideas that will be studied later in the year. The students are also asked to do independent science projects, and are given the option of deconstructing and explaining one of the exhibits they saw at the Exploratorium.

The grant is $1,140, which will cover all 68 students.

Geology field trip to the Marin Headlands

In our biggest grant yet, we will fund a field trip for all 68 students in GMS's 6th grade to spend three days and two nights at Marin Headlands in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. They will be introduced to the geology of California and the theory of plate tectonics, on one of the world's most famous plate boundaries: the San Andreas Fault. The girls will learn:

* The three types of rock.
* The three types of plate boundaries.
* That they are walking on ancient seafloor, and consider how it ended up atop the Headlands.
* How field science is conducted. They will spend their days outside collecting and analyzing data.
* That microorganisms are indicators of water quality. The girls collect water samples and use microscopes to examine microorganisms. * That field journals are an important tool for documenting observations. The girls use field journals to identify and draw scientific diagrams of plants, animals and their adaptations, and the landscape.
* That science doesn't end at sunset. Night hikes introduce the girls to animals of the ecosystem and bioluminescent microorganisms on the beach. Bioluminescence is explored as a complex adaptation that may allow the organisms to avoid their predators by attracting even bigger predators to eat its enemies.

Upon return to GMS, the girls will incorporate their learning in the following ways:

* Map reading skills: the girls conclude the watershed unit by reading and gathering information from a variety of maps that depict the San Francisquito watershed.
* Modeling Earth's interior: Earth's layers are compared to a hard-boiled egg using real eggs, diagrams and journals.
* Volcano Field Exploration: Using Google Earth, the girls collect field data at three different volcanoes. Their field data is used to make complex inferences about how the plates move, how magma moves, and what types of eruptions and volcanic flows can occur.
* Construction and eruption of film canister volcanoes. Using real earthquake data they determine the type of plate boundary between the Nazca and South American plates. Our new knowledge and understanding of plate tectonics then informs our study of ocean currents and seafloor volcanoes and seafloor vent ecosystems.

The trip is a great way for these young women to see the theories of geology at work in the real world. It also shows them science "in action," outside a classroom. We very excited about the trip and are proud to be sponsoring it. The grant, which covers all 68 students for three days and two nights, is $18,450.

The Young Women's Leadership School in New York City

For the past three years, we have given grants to The Young Women's Leadership School, which has several schools in New York City (www.tywls.org). For the past two years, we supported a three-day environmental science workshop and academic field experience for the entire 7th grade of the Astoria, Queens school (75 students), at an 85-acre nature preserve. The program was such a success, we've decided to fund it again this year, and to double the number of young women: this time, we will fund the trip for not only the 7th grade of the Astoria school but also the Brooklyn school. All together, 135 girls will participate in the field trips.

The program is conducted with Christodora, a non-profit environmental science organization. Before the field trip, a Christodora environmental educator and a TYWLS science teacher team-teach the young women at TYWLS. The students work through a lesson plan that covers the basic concepts of watersheds, bio-diversity and human impact on the natural environment, and additional topics. Once the girls have this foundation, they go on a three-day overnight retreat at Christodora's Manice Education Center in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts. It's an 85-acre preserve of natural woodlands, where environmental educators will teach the girls in small groups. This will be the first wilderness experience for many of these girls. They will study diverse ecosystems (woodlands, waterfall and bog) and they'll gather water samples and measure weather conditions. The academic lessons include:

* Forest Ecology
* Geology
* Wildlife Search
* Wetlands Exploration
* Organic Gardening
* and others

After last year's trip, TYWLS reported, "Each year we find that TYWLS students leave this program with a greater understanding of the processes involved in an ecosystem and enhanced knowledge of how to use a systematic approach to analyze environmental issues. The classroom 'comes alive' through these outdoor field experiences. For our urban student population, this retreat is academically and personally life-changing." TYWLS also said that "Teachers noticed a difference in their students after returning from the Manice Center, observing that their students participate more in science class and are more excited about learning in school." This program is a great match for the Foundation, and we're very pleased to expand our support for it this year.

The grant is $16,000, and will pay for the entire 6th grades from the Astoria and Brooklyn schools (approximately 135 students) to attend.