Equity & Inclusion

STEM K12 1: School/program provides equitable opportunities for students to engage in high-quality STEM learning.

Impact Narrative:

We are not a melting pot but a salad bowl. Equity and Social-Emotional Learning are the cornerstone for teaching and learning in the district and Frank Lebby Stanton Elementary School.  Ensuring highly qualified teachers teach scholars at every grade level via current best-instructional practices, quality, engaging, and culturally relevant resources is an intricate component of our philosophy, core approaches, and practices to ensure equity and access. 

Our philosophy purports equity, inclusion, and diversity inclusive of APS 5: Whole child Development, Personalized Learning, Data, Curriculum and Instruction, and STEM Cross Curriculum Learning opportunities. Again, the STEM Program includes Monthly STEM Challenges, which offer scholars practice opportunities to design projects aligned to the Engineering Design Process.

Though often challenging for students and teachers, the impetus from STEM Monthly sessions garnered stakeholders’ interest in STEM-related fields. In fact, throughout the years, scholars consistently demonstrated confidence in their ability to utilize the Engineering Design Process to address everyday problems. 

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Challenges

Based on the i3 Rubric Self-Assessment, data suggests improvement is needed in sustainability. The following areas are to increase content growth in Science and Mathematics, as evident in the Georgia Milestones Assessment System. A second opportunity is to systematically integrate the Engineering Design Process Model across content and grade levels while providing targeted instructional support to meet the needs of learners at their level of readiness. 

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Additional activities will include an on-campus, interest-based science club to assist with supporting students’ College and Career Awareness in their chosen field of engineering, inclusive of a weekly Hands-on Lab.  

Equity, diversity, and inclusion will be the hallmark and criteria for forming a Gender Neutral Science Club.  The “Gender Neutral” Science Club will include cross-ability students, including those with disabilities. Students will be assertively recruited and partners whose organizational framework includes diverse personnel reflecting demographically similar backgrounds of students at Frank Lebby Stanton Elementary School.

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Inclusivity

Frank Lebby Stanton’s Population includes three main groups: African Americans (99%), Economically Disadvantaged (100%), and Students with Disabilities (SWD) (24%).  There are three sub-groups within the Economically Disadvantaged group: Other/Non-Hispanic (1%), Girls (48%), and Boys (52%).

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Female and Male Students

Based on students’ voice and performance, specifically on standardized 2021-2022 MAP Reading and Math Assessments (Fall, Winter, and Spring), girls scored higher than boys in the Reading/English Language Arts; however, boys scored higher in Math than girls. Therefore, data suggests the need for targeted instructional support for girls in Numbers and Operations in Math; for boys in Foundational Skills in Reading/English Arts.  

The foundational skills in reading and math are essential to students performing well as we Build Engineers for the Future. 

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Therefore, interest-based literacy book clubs supported by local male students majoring in STEM-related fields from the HBCU Morehouse College and Georgia Institute of Technology (GA Tech) University will be recruited to serve as “Book Buddy Mentors” to our male students while encouraging them to read text related to their field of career and interest in STEM. Conversely, the STEM Committee has worked tirelessly to recruit female-rich organizations to support girls over the upcoming years. Sisters of the Skies (SOS) includes members such as skilled pilots, designers, engineers, meteorologists, and more, all of whom are female and African Americans who will mentor our female students exclusively. 

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Students with Disabilities

Students with Disabilities and those with 504 Plans are included in all STEM and regular educational lessons and activities. Their involvement in STEM specifically includes modifications and accommodations as required in the Individual Education Plan (IEP) or 504 Plans.  Instructors and instructional support staff skillfully provide instruction based on students' individual learning styles/needs. Accommodations and modifications include a Social Emotional Learning component that supports teachers’ ability to use their professional discretion and consider learner differences when assigning modified individual and Cooperative Learning Group tasks. Including all students in quality learner experiences with minimal learning, disruption is essential to fostering an atmosphere of full-student-body engagement.

All Students

Many STEM-based activities have been offered to students across grade levels and content to include mixed gender and ability groups. For example, two new “Communication Clubs” will be offered in August 2022 by one of the first African American Males to integrate Georgia Institute of Technology (GA Tech) University, Mr. Lawrence Michael Willams, to improve students’ listening, speaking, and presenting skills via the Short Wave Listening (SWL) and an Amateur Radio Club. Students will spend time during these extracurricular clubs learning the International Phonetic Alphabets, Time Zones, and World Languages germaine to the station's origin assigned within and outside of the United States of America.

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Economically Disadvantage Students

Food Apartheid, Book Depravity, and myriad societal ills plague the FLS Community and surrounding neighborhoods. FLS and its partners defray the cost and thus offer all of the resources needed to conduct research project builds, field experiences, and visits from experts in the field. Therefore, parents who often need additional financial cushioning by stretching paychecks from pay-period to pay period to meet the demands of their household are relieved of any costs associated with their scholar acquiring access to quality curricula and a robust STEM Signature Program because WE Pay it Forward!

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Attracting, Recruiting, and Retaining Tiger Scholars

Frank Lebby Stanton Elementary School is a “trusted: neighborhood school.  Though many students have attended the school over multiple generations, we have begun to attract, recruit, and retain new students due to gentrification in the community.

Recently, we have hosted PreK and Kindergarten Round-up Activities to interface with potential parents of school-aged students. The program includes a STEM Pathway of Study that delineates the course of study or problem-based project “engineer” categories that will be explored by grade level and grade band.

Frank Lebby Stanton Elementary School is within 2-5 miles, i.e., mid-center of  “7 neighborhood charter schools who aggressively compete for our Cognitive Capital students. These schools offer 21st-Century “Ready to Learn” classes with selection criteria that boast rigorous learning opportunities, small class sizes, teacher quality,  “required” parental engagement, and a positive/minimal behavioral concerns environment.

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Like other schools with similar enrollment trends of less than capacity, Frank Lebby Stanton Elementary School is required to publish an enrollment allotment opening for parents outside of the school’s zone to apply for student entrance through “administrative “ transfer permission. This population of students, like the PreK and Kinder students, is recruited using the Program of Study specific to their grade level and band. 

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Finally, once recruited, intentional two-way communication is used to retain students/parents. The website and each teacher or instructional support updates their Class Dojo and send information flyers home regularly.  The Academic Parent-Teacher Teams (APTT) and GO Team Meetings virtually and in person are also used to keep parents and community partners informed of the school’s overall progress to include STEM, which in turn leads to parents electing to continue their scholar’s enrollment at FLS and to recommend the school to parents new to the community which helps with attracting, recruiting, and retention efforts.

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Initiatives/Actions:

• Developed a schoolwide STEM Mission and Vision Statement 

• Implemented Monthly STEM Challenges   

• Implemented the STEMScopes curriculum, which served as a supplement resource to engage students at high levels, which in turn assisted with GMAS Science data increasing over three years