ELEMENTARY INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE
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Mission Statement
Inspiring a love of science and creating opportunity for diverse children and youth is the mission of the Elementary Institute of Science (EIS). We collaborate with schools, parents, and community partners to impact students from early childhood through high school. Our after-school, weekend, and school partnership programs broaden access to quality STEM experiences, foster critical thinking, expand technical skills, and encourage students to pursue STEM careers. EIS has been providing hands-on science experiences at our location in southeastern San Diego for five decades. Thousands of EIS alumni have gone on to medicine, engineering, computer science, and technology careers
About This Cause
MISSION & HISTORY Founded during the Civil Rights Movement, the mission of the Elementary Institute of Science (EIS) is to nurture the intellectual curiosity of San Diego's young people by providing hands-on learning experiences to further their understanding of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). For over 50 years EIS has opened its doors to children and youth of all racial, economic, and cultural backgrounds to inspire curiosity about, and develop proficiency in, STEM subjects. Located in heart Southeast San Diego, EIS believes that all students, regardless of zip code, household income, gender, race, or ethnicity should have the opportunity to participate in quality STEM enrichment experiences to develop confidence and critical skills needed to succeed. Through after-school programs, camps, school partnership projects, and teen leadership initiatives, EIS participants engage in STEM learning and become inspired future STEM leaders. EIS has numerous grade school, middle school, and high school programs, outlined below. This year EIS will serve at least 2,400 students; each student enrolled in one of our programs participates in an average of 25 to 30 hours of quality STEM activities designed to instill a positive science identity. EIS is particularly committed to serving students in the elementary and middle schools who make up the Lincoln High School cluster. CURRENT PROGRAMS Elementary School Age Programs Science is Elementary provides engaging after-school and Saturday science enrichment that motivates and ignites students’ interest in STEM. High caliber instruction is guaranteed through a 12:1 student to instructor ratio and fun, hands-on learning experiences taught by instructors who are enthusiastic experts in a STEM field. Each session (fall, winter, and spring) runs for ten weeks, during the school year. Students are exposed to four different STEM content areas throughout the 10-week session. EIS Camps offer week-long STEM experiences that take place during winter, spring, and summer. Campers participate in engaging labs, applied lessons, and educational activities. Each week of camp includes a specially selected theme, a related educational field trip, and visiting presenters. Steps-2-STEM is our signature initiative. Currently, Steps-2-STEM serves nine southeast San Diego elementary schools within the Lincoln Cluster, the schools that feed into Lincoln High School. EIS has provided after-school programs for over 50 years, but issues of cost and transportation posed significant barriers for many neighborhood families. Steps-2-STEM removes those barriers that keep students from our programs. Step-2-STEM takes place on the weekly half day, early release schedule of our partnering southeast San Diego elementary schools. Instead of going home early or remaining for child care on school grounds, we transport students to the EIS Learning Center. Each week, for five weeks, students receive five hours of hands-on, high-quality STEM education, for a total of 25 hours of science each session. Every five weeks a new group of students is enrolled to provide opportunities for all fourth and fifth graders at each school. We currently provide Steps-2-STEM in seven schools and will add two more schools in Fall, 2018. Steps-2-STEM adds a minimum of 25 hours of focused, hands-on STEM instruction to the school year during non-classroom hours at no-cost to schools or parents. Steps-2-STEM was developed to assist our community’s schools to provide more opportunities for STEM learning and experiences that will kindle an interest in STEM subjects. Middle & High School Programs In 2015, EIS established Future Innovators in Robotics and Engineering (FIRE), an initiative created to build greater awareness of the opportunities for females in engineering and computer science fields and to support girls’ interests in STEM. FIRE is not a single program, but a collection of girl-focused engineering and robotic programs at EIS. Underrepresentation of women in STEM fields is a significant issue and through FIRE we strive to develop strategies that address the specific needs of girls in the southeast San Diego community. All FIRE programs incorporate best practices for STEM programs for girls including relevant, exciting curriculum that dispel notions that a science career means sitting in front of a computer all day. We provide career exploration opportunities that are led by diverse women from the STEM professions who share their personal stories as mentors and role models. FIRE programs are grant funded; we currently providing two FIRE programs: EIS Girls Middle School Robotics Team (EIS Botball) and Girls Take Flight. In EIS Botball, middle school girls learn to design, code, and build robots in teams led by relatable female coaches. Now in its third year, EIS Botball, provides an intensive robotics learning and mentoring experience. Girls participate in Botball for approximately 50 hours per year, which is a deep level of participation at the middle school level. Through fun team activities, Botball builds technical skills, confidence, and teamwork. In 2018, EIS launched a second FIRE program, Girls Take Flight. Girls Take Flight is the first drone program intended for female high school students in the San Diego region. Girls Take Flight provides 32 weeks of training and experience for students to become FAA-certified drone pilots in the high-growth sector of Unmanned Arial Systems. Girls Take Flight builds skills for demand occupations, engages girls in STEM, fosters opportunities and supports post-secondary education attainment. Teen Science Cafe Network, is a national STEM education and leadership program for youth. In EIS’s Teen Cafe, local high school students team together to learn about cutting-edge ideas in science and technology. With the help of an EIS mentor, teens meet weekly to discuss STEM advances that affect their lives. The teens invite guest speakers and plan special events to inform their community about the topics they have chosen to explore. RECENT ACCOMPLISHMENTS Increased enrollment: For the third consecutive year, EIS increased the number of enrolled students, from 770 in FY13/14 to 2,400 in FY17/18. By offering innovative new programs and partnerships there are now more students at EIS than at any other time in our history making full use of our 15,000 sq. foot building, science labs, and equipment during times when there were often no children at the EIS Learning Center. By the end of the current school year, EIS will have provided a total of approximately 60,000 instructional hours (an average of 25 hours/student). Teacher Professional Development: EIS created a professional learning academy at the start of 2017 as part of our strategic initiative to support San Diego's classroom teachers and informal STEM educators. During the first year of its operation, EIS Academy accomplishments include supporting 30 teachers from all over San Diego County with ongoing professional development for Computer Science Education in partnership with Code.org. These 30 teachers will teach Computer Science to over 1,530 students throughout San Diego County. Charter School Partnership: EIS works with community charter schools to provide solutions that improve and support STEM learning. Over the past five years, we have developed custom STEM programs designed to meet schools educational and programmatic needs. In some schools, EIS's hands-on approach becomes a part of the curriculum for a semester or school year. This model benefits students while also strengthening the science instruction skills of the classroom teachers. In other instances, schools have enrolled and transported their students to EIS’s after-school programs to provide science instruction as they did not have in-house STEM expertise and equipment and EIS could provide quality science instruction at an affordable cost. EIS accomplishes this by using proven best practices for out-of-school STEM programs. Working in small groups with a low student to instructor ratio (12:1), students engage in hands-on science activities such as: extracting DNA from a strawberry, engineering and building a bridge, or programming a robot. These experiences are designed to show how math, science, and other STEM concepts are related to each other in everyday life and learning. When students view STEM experiences in positive ways and see themselves as capable STEM learners, they bring their excitement back to school. Education researchers call this crucial learning confidence STEM-identity. Fostering positive STEM-identity can make the ongoing educational work of schools more successful, help close the STEM skills gap, and fire the imaginations of these students—our future STEM leaders.