This week, we’re helping a Texas preschool class get some tools for their unit about the Earth and space, and we’re still working toward a skeleton model for a Mississippi high school. We hope that readers who support quality public school education will help by sharing or supporting our featured projects.
The Inoculation Project is an ongoing, volunteer effort to crowdfund science and math projects for red-state public schools in low-income neighborhoods. As always, our conduit is DonorsChoose, a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation that facilitates tax-deductible donations to specific, vetted projects in public schools.
Tyler is an East Texas city about midway between Dallas and Shreveport, LA. It’s the center of American rose cultivation and home to a 14-acre public rose garden. Less charmingly, it was a Confederate stronghold in the Civil War, with a large ordinance factory, and has an ugly history of lynching. And here, to make their way in this place, comes Ms. Tiemblo’s preschool class, needing some items for a unit to help them understand Earth and space.
PROJECT #1
Resources: Help me give my students materials to learn about space during our “Earth and space” unit.
Economic need: An Equity Focus School; nearly all students from low‑income households.
Location: Douglas Elementary School, Tyler, Texas
Total: $467.80
Still Needed: $217.80 Completed — thank you! Please consider project #2.
Teacher’s Comments from Ms. Tiemblo:
My Students: Most of my students are first-generation Americans and while each one of them is different they all have something in common: they all are passionate about learning. They love coming to school and are always eager to learn new concepts and experiment with things first-hand.
They deserve meaningful, engaging, and fun learning activities and experiences that will keep them wanting to learn.
My Project: My students absolutely LOVE learning new things. They are eager learners and are always excited when we start a new theme. But learning abstract concepts is difficult, especially when you are 4 years old. And talking about space and our planet is one of the most abstract themes in our Pre-K curriculum.
However, manipulatives can help with these difficult concepts, relieve student boredom, spark imaginations, and promote cooperative learning.
Things always get exciting when the props come out in a classroom. Manipulatives help bring conceptual ideas alive for students.
Thank you for helping my students!
Donations of ANY size can make a BIG difference!
This is our fourth week on this big project, and we are close to 60% funded. Mind you, no one but our readers has come on board so far! Oh, they will, when it gets to the double digits and hits the “urgent” list, but you glorious folks have done the heavy lifting to this point. And we have all of January and February to complete it, so we’re in a good place.
This town on the Mississippi (and thus the border with Arkansas) was a cotton-plantation area before the Civil War. After Reconstruction, it was difficult for freed people to do better than sharecropping, and many migrated north in the early 20th century. What remains is a rural town, heavily Black and half with sub-poverty incomes. For the record, this is the Rosedale to which bluesman Robert Johnson was going with his rider by his side in the iconic Traveling Riverside Blues.
PROJECT #2
Resources: Help me give my students hands-on opportunities to learn about the human body by providing them with a life size human skeleton model and a lungs model.
Economic need: An Equity Focus School; nearly all students from low‑income households.
Location: West Bolivar Middle/High School, Rosedale, Mississippi
Total: $833.39
Still Needed: $343.39 $133.39
Teacher’s Comments from Mrs. Bolden:
My Students: My students are bright, creative, and love the opportunity to explore the world around them with hands-on activities. They love to be able to solve issues to real-world problems during lab activities.
My science students come to class each day with a positive attitude and a fresh perspective for creative thought and scientific exploration.
These students are an inspiration to my life's purpose as an educator.
Our school is a Title I school in the heart of the MS delta. Poverty is the main challenge to every student within our school and also presents major issues to educators because there is a serious lack of available resources. The families that I work with within the community are suffering from the effects of poverty.
My Project: By using a real-life 3D model of a life-size human skeleton, I could give the students the opportunity to visualize, investigate, explore, and understand their own bodies and how they work. This makes the subject come to life and gives the students a reference point to relate to concepts pertaining to their bodies.
When the students can see the life-size human skeleton model and put their hands on it, it makes concrete connections with the material that allows for true learning to take place.
When I teach them about various body systems and am able to use a model to show them what we're talking about, it makes it clear and engages them in the material.
Pedagogy tells us that the best practice for learning is to engage in hands-on activities that help students make real-world connections. This skeleton model and lung model will help my students achieve just that. The skeleton model and lung model will help me, as a teacher, to close gaps and help students truly learn the material and fall in love with science.
Donations of ANY size can make a BIG difference!
Our main project from last week was completed, and we played a big part in that, too.
Project #1, Diverse Books for Diverse Students: Mr. Williams teaches fifth grade in Memphis, and he needs books that speak to his students, so they will want to read.
He writes [my bold]: I am honored to have had my project featured in the Daily Kos publication, and it was something I did not expect. What I did expect was your remarkable generosity, because time and again, you have proven that your philanthropy and dedication to public education has no bounds. Even though everything around us seems to be changing, kind-heartedness will never change.
I have something to add, because I happened across more from Jason Reynolds, one of the authors of Mr. Williams’ class’s new books. Here, he talks about why it’s so important to provide kids with books that “meet them where they are.” [2:25]
DonorsChoose has developed a new designation for schools that submit projects. Equity Focus Schools meet two criteria: at least 50% of students are Black, Latinx, Native American, Pacific Islander, or multiracial, and at least 50% of students qualify for free or reduced price lunch, the standard measure for school economic need. You can read more at the link about their efforts to address the longstanding inequity in education. |
Founded in 2009, The Inoculation Project combats the anti-science push in conservative America by funding science and math projects in red-state classrooms and libraries. Our conduit is DonorsChoose, a crowdfunding charity founded in 2000 and highly rated by both Charity Navigator and the Better Business Bureau.
Every Sunday, we focus on helping to fund science or math projects, preferably in neighborhood public schools where the overwhelming majority of students come from low-income households. We welcome everyone who supports public school education — no money is required!
Finally, here’s our list of successfully funded projects — our series total is 949! The success-list diary also contains links and additional information about DonorsChoose.