Summary
Girlstart’s mission is to increase girls’ interest and engagement in STEM through innovative, nationally-recognized informal STEM education programs. Girlstart examines in this report how STEM education directed toward elementary school girls influences long-term readiness and participation to math and science learning. This report compares Girlstart After School participants’ academic performance to nonparticipant performance. Specifically, it examines how Girlstart After School influences science STAAR performance and course enrollment in subsequent elementary and early middle
The Boston Schools Environmental Initiative (BSEI) program worked with several Boston Public schools to foster “hands-on, minds-on” science and environmental awareness. The overall finding from this evaluation, conducted over four academic years, was that the longer a school participated in the BSEI program, the more the culture and operations of the school changed in the direction of the intended BSEI outcomes. BSEI is a program of Mass Audubon’s Boston Nature Center (BNC), which places a teacher naturalist part time in each school, and provides ongoing professional development and project