Welcome to The Inoculation Project! This week, we’re helping to buy model rockets for an Arkansas junior high school. As always, our conduit is DonorsChoose.org, an organization founded in 2000 and highly rated by both Charity Navigator and the Better Business Bureau. If you’re short on cash, don’t worry — we’re glad to see you anyway! And your tips, recs, shares, and so on are a good free way to help, by helping us get on the rec list and catch more eyes. Join us below for all the fun!
NEW LONG-TERM PROJECT
Resources: My students need a class set of rockets to explore the forces of flight and laws of motion for a Pre-AP Physical Science class.
School Poverty Level: High
Location: Ramay Junior High School, Fayetteville, Arkansas
Total: $549.64
Still Needed: $549.64 $404.64
Expires: January 8, 2017
Teacher’s Comments from Mr. Mason:
My Students: Our school has many different types of students from diverse backgrounds. We have over 47% free and reduced price lunch and high levels of poverty. Our budgets have also been cut for this year, making many labs financially impossible. Many of these students have not been exposed to the many exciting aspects of science. This type of project can foster an new interest for them in science and may lead to a bright future in this field. They are immediately interested in hands-on activities and glimpses of what science can do on a larger scale. We have talked a lot about space this year, and this product will relate perfectly.
My Project: My students will use these rockets in several ways. The task of protecting an egg in flight will be an excellent challenge in design and a valuable tool for teaching the scientific method and engineering design process. Students will need to demonstrate a deep understanding of the physical forces exerted on the egg during the flight of the rocket. We will also use the flight path and speed of the rockets to conduct inquiry-based investigations on the forces experienced by the rocket in flight and the force of the engine in the rocket. This is a very powerful, exciting, and engaging way to get students excited about science and will create a lasting memory for students concerning the physics of motion.
We currently have a very limited budget in our science department.
This inhibits our ability to conduct some of the more interactive labs that can be very powerful for engaging students in science.
Donations of ANY size can make a BIG difference!
We helped complete our long-term project last week (for a series total of 529!)
Ms. Freeman is the STEM teacher at her Atlanta, Georgia elementary school. With the help of her DonorsChoose project, she’ll have five new project sets, each about a different alternative energy technology, to help her students solve problems and extend their knowledge. See project Making the World a Better Place: Emerging Energy is Elementary! for details.
Our Dollars at Work
At Mr. Crane’s rural Arkansas middle school, his students are learning about alternative energy by building fuel-cell cars powered by salt water, thanks to kits from the project we helped them with, Fossil Fuels for the Future! (More photos at the link.)
Although these solar cell cars are far more simplistic than an actual car, it should help get the idea across. The bonus is that my students will get to explore these concepts and their implications on future development of items that can be run off of renewable resources, in a project-based atmosphere.
Founded in 2009, The Inoculation Project is an effort to combat the anti-science push in conservative America by providing direct funding to science and math projects in traditionally red-state classrooms and libraries. Our conduit is DonorsChoose.org, an organization founded in 2000 and highly rated by both Charity Navigator and the Better Business Bureau. DonorsChoose allows you to contribute to specific, vetted projects in public schools, resulting in tremendous and immediate impacts from small-dollar donations. Here’s an introductory video about DonorsChoose featuring Michelle Obama and Stephen Colbert. Each Sunday morning, we focus on helping to fund one or two science and math projects in traditionally red-state schools, preferably in highest-poverty districts. We welcome everyone who shares our interest — no money is required! Your tip, rec, republish, comment, or share helps bring us more eyes, and besides, we like the company of others who love kids and education. Feel free to post a link or video, or just tell us how your weather is!
See our list of successfully funded projects. The success-list diary now also contains links and additional information about DonorsChoose, formerly found in this space.