STEMing the spread of a school network

In the 2018-2019 school year, the STEM Network launched with the selection of three schools: Holy Spirit STEM Academy (Mid-Wilshire), Divine Saviour School (Cypress Park), and St. Turibius School (DTLA).

This past week, the STEM Network announced their second cohort of schools to join the first three: San Gabriel Mission Elementary School and Immaculate Conception School in Monrovia. They will begin implementation of the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) program model in August of 2020. 

This initiative allows the Department of Catholic Schools to formalize and implement STEM education in elementary schools throughout the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

The schools follow a program model focused on STEM, with key features like specialized math and science teachers, starting from kindergarten. By implementing a system of block scheduling, the schools allow an authentic, real-world learning system. In the first roll out of the program, each school has one grade band following the STEM path. After three years, each school expects to be fully STEM-integrated. 

The STEM Network is an all-encompassing learning ecosystem involving the network schools, community partnerships, and intentional parent engagement. By empowering principals, teachers, parents, students and communities, their goal is to address some of the startling statistics related to STEM majors, especially in underrepresented groups.