The Newton Schools Foundation‘s Year-End Annual Appeal seeks funds to support innovative programs in Newton Public Schools. Last year, NSF raised $191,000 and funded 52 projects, including these STEM-related ones:

• Math Challenge Boards for all Elementary Schools: Our goal is 50% of the K-5 student body at each school submitting Challenge Math work. Teachers and staff will be involved by encouraging students to pick math challenge work when they have opportunities for academic choice. The math coach and interventionist at each school will also be involved for students to ask for help/clarification as well as recognizing the students who have completed the challenge work. We have found many positive connections are made through the Math Challenge program–students are excited for the challenges and enjoy interacting with math staff around the work. This is incredibly helpful when providing intervention–math staff are known grown ups with a positive association. Principals will be involved by being in the beginning of each school’s videos and helping to build enthusiasm with the students and families throughout the year.
• Math Fact Automaticity: Hands-on educational games for students to practice math fact automaticity and mental math.
• Representation in Mathematics: We will provide exemplar STEAM biographical and mathematic lessons for teachers K-5, that are inclusive of diverse cultural identities. For the summer we will be doing research into people and their life work and crafting lessons. We will also be gathering and developing mathematical activities which connect to the person’s work, in which students will engage during the lessons. We will also be embedding professional development opportunities for teachers. In the fall, we hope to bring to life and model the lessons in various grade levels, piloting them at our home schools.
• STEAM in the Classroom: Introduce art curriculum into the 6,7 and 8th grades as part of their overall STEM education.
• The Modern Classrooms Project: Summer Institute is a four week  professional development workshop which contains expert-led presentations, connections with experts and peers and close work with an expert mentor to build instructional videos, mastery checks and other content materials for 8th grade science classrooms.
• The Calculus Project: Research indicates that success in higher-level high school mathematics is strongly associated with college enrollment and is one of the most reliable predictors of college completion. The Calculus Project aims to narrow the achievement gap in mathematics by increasing the number of African American, Hispanic and low-income students who enroll in and successfully complete calculus in high school.