STEM

Roller coasters are fun, but for safety’s sake, they must be designed, built and maintained by mechanical engineers. It’s a STEM career path that Adrianna Koty has enjoyed discussing recently with the fifth graders in her class at Thorpe Gordon STEM Academy in Jefferson City, Missouri. “Giving students real-world problems to solve and think about […]

V. Barbara Pener has been selected to serve as program director for STEM Teacher Quality (TQ), an immersive year-long STEM professional learning experience that has equipped 1,071+ and impacted 35,000+ students throughout the Greater St. Louis region since 2011. Read more about Pener’s leadership of STEM TQ’s eleventh cohort.

Deb Holmes has led STEMpact’s STEM Teacher Quality program since its inception, encouraging over 1,070 local educators to see STEM in a whole new light.

Photo: Co-authors Briana Trager, a former STEM coordinator from the Mehlville School District (left) and ISP Associate Director Rachel Ruggirello An ISP-led collaboration with three St. Louis area school districts aimed at improving math outcomes for all students is featured in Success Stories from Catalyzing Change, a new book published by the National Council of […]

Science teacher Jaime Schneider has earned a reputation for herself. Students come to her class expecting something phenomenal, and she’s happy to deliver. Where else in the building can a seventh grader get a chance to set methane bubbles on fire or generate mystic-looking fog with dry ice and a bucket? “I always start with […]

Mistakes are easy to make, and often hard to accept, but sixth grader Valeria Rodriguez is getting more comfortable knowing she’s not always going to have the right answer. “When I was younger, making mistakes made me a little anxious because I thought I did something wrong,” says Valeria. “But now I know that if […]

PHOTO: Victoria May, executive director of the Institute for School Partnership, is a 2022 recipient of the Virgil Ethic of Service Award. May leads Institute for School Partnership, leader in STEM education and teacher development You may not know her name, but the superintendent of your child’s school district certainly does.  For decades, Victoria May, […]

Rachel Ruggirello, associate director of the Institute for School Partnership at Washington University in St. Louis, is the 2022 recipient of the Outstanding Administrative Support Award by the National Science Education Leadership Association (NSELA). The award is given annually to honor one educator who is working outside the classroom at school, district and city/county levels […]

Last summer, four organizations came together to launch a new program in 17 St. Louis Public elementary schools. The Institute for School Partnership (ISP), The Little Bit Foundation (TLBF), and St. Louis Public Schools (SLPS), with funding from the Bayer Fund, developed a pilot program to increase capacity for STEM teaching and learning in SLPS. […]

PHOTO: Students from Barbara C. Jordan Elementary School in University City, including Ania Hargrove and Tyler Smith, participated in an Hour of Code activity in 2017 that was led by the Institute for School Partnership. (Photo: Myra Lopez/ISP) The Institute for School Partnership (ISP) at Washington University in St. Louis is developing a new strategic […]