Providing Elementary Girls with Access to STEM Learning and Mentorship

OUR COMMUNITY PARTNERS

We have learned alongside our Community Partners as they have faced challenges, overcome barriers, and achieved extraordinary successes. Find out more about each project and the outcomes below.

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YEAR

2022

GRANT CATEGORY

Equity

GRANT AMOUNT

$18,800

Organization:

Girlstart

Project Title:

Providing Elementary Girls with Access to STEM Learning and Mentorship

Project Description:

Girlstart was founded in Austin in 1997 and has since served over 220,000 girls, families, and educators across Texas and in Boston, MA, and California’s Bay Area. Girlstart is focused on STEM education to empower and equip girls in grades 4-8 and young women through year-round, informal education and programming. Its nationally-recognized STEM education programs are diverse and women-centered with real-world connections to STEM careers via guest speakers and career-focused curriculum. Girlstart’s goal is to serve 1,250 students in 40 Austin-areal elementary schools, a number comparable to pre-pandemic levels.

The grant is unrestricted and awarded in support of the mission and programs of Girlstart.

Grant Status:

In 2023, Girlstart partnered with 35 schools in 6 districts, reaching 1,352 4th and 5th grade girls in Austin and Central Texas. Partner school districts included Austin, Georgetown, Hays, Leander, Pflugerville, and Round Rock. All of Girlstart’s after-school lessons and activities are designed to bridge learning gaps by increasing girls' learning hours in STEM and preparing girls for advanced math and science in middle school and beyond.

Girlstart shared the following feedback about their 2023 after-school program:

Goal 1: Participants will demonstrate competency in conducting scientific inquiry, investigations, and reasoning and will gain competency in STEM skills.

88% reported a willingness to redesign their activity if it did not work on the first try
89% know that it is ‘okay’ if their activity did not work the first time around
82% agreed with the statement, “I enjoy STEM”

Goal 2: Increase # of girls interested in continued/future STEM study (in high school and college), including interest in STEM electives, additional STEM study, STEM higher education, and STEM majors.

89% agree that, “if I try hard, I can be good at science”
86% understand that doing well in STEM in school means that they are more likely to get into college
83% report that they want to go to college