Grants

ExpandED Schools

To expand K-12 STEM experiences for students from traditionally underserved communities through strengthened partnerships between New York City schools, afterschool organizations, and STEM service providers

  • Amount $325,000
  • City New York, NY
  • Investigator Emma Banay
  • Year 2022
  • Program New York City Program
  • Sub-program

There is significant funding in the NYC STEM K-12 education system for field trips, curricular supplements, and after-school programs, and public schools are empowered to develop their own partnerships with private organizations that provide STEM educational enrichment services. In the absence of a comprehensive list of the available options, however, principals and teachers have to rely on personal relationships or word of mouth to discover opportunities. Moreover, even if schools and providers do connect and are interested in partnering, frictions like procurement processes can present substantial obstacles to building a working relationship that serves educators and students.ExpandED Schools is a NYC-based nonprofit dedicated to ensuring that all young people in New York City have access to enriching afterschool programs that affirm their identities, teach them valuable skills, and spark new possibilities in and out of the school day. ExpandED Schools hosts the NYC STEM Education Network ("the Network"), which brings together over 90 city agencies, schools, after-school programs, youth-serving organizations, science museums, universities, public and private funders, and intermediaries with an interest in STEM education. Many members operate after-school, field-trip, and summer programs. The Network hosts regular community convenings to spark new ideas, deepen partnerships, and collaborate on ways to serve overlapping communities and increase their reach overall.ExpandED Schools and the Network have begun developing ways to broker and support new partnerships, including direct outreach events between schools and after-school STEM providers.       This grant supports efforts by ExpandED Schools to scale up the Network’s efforts to better connect STEM providers with schools in historically underserved communities. The Network will hold several      District-level events      and will increase the likelihood of successful partnerships by building up resources and technical training for STEM providers as well as making "minigrants" of up to several thousand dollars to subsidize their initial engagements with new schools. Sloan funds will build the Network’s staff capacity with an additional full-time hire to manage and coordinate all of this work, under the leadership of the volunteer Steering Committee and working group chairs.

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