STEM Learners 1.1​​
 The STEM school/program supports non-traditional student participation through outreach to groups often underrepresented in STEM program areas.

Girls in STEM at CAE
All girls have the opportunity to engage in STEM in many ways.  It is our goal to  inspire our girls to visualize themselves in STEM careers and empower them to pursue STEM professions. 
Response
CAE ensures that all students participate in STEM activities and a PBL curriculum during the school day. By offering STEM to all of our students, we ensure that our girls are exposed to STEM learning opportunities in a variety of settings.  This includes our students in PreK, EL, and all special education self contained classrooms.  In addition to STEM opportunities during the school day, our girls are exposed to STEM through after school clubs.  We have a number of after school clubs that are facilitated by CAE faculty and parents with the mission of exposing our female students to STEM.  Moreover, we are proud of the fact that we have a healthy representation of girls on our APS Regional Science, Engineering and Technology Competition Teams, the WCAE News Crew, and our Girl Scout Troop. 
Girls Scout Troop 3404 testing the water for the hydroponics garden towers.
In addition to during school and after school opportunities, we deliberately expose all students to STEM experiences in our after school program.  The students in our after school program may or may not have a chance to participate in an after school club due to the work schedule of their parents.  Therefore, we have exposed our after school students to the Big Thinkers Science Club and STEM enrichment classes.  By doing so, we can again ensure that our girls are exposed to STEM after normal school hours. 

Our school wide outreach plan is inclusive of STEM opportunities during the instructional day, in our after school clubs, embedded within the after school extended day program, and through community wide activities that promote STEM. Some of our community events that promote STEM learning include quarterly school tours for the community, Project Based Learning Night,  and the 3rd- 5th grade Science, Engineering and Technology Fairs.  The community is invited to participate in all of the aforementioned events and it allows parents and the community to immerse themselves in the STEM vision for our school.  

Strengths
We are very proud of the fact that we incorporate STEM learning opportunities into every child’s academic experience.  By doing so, we can ensure that girls, our target population, is consistently and frequently exposed to STEM learning opportunities.  To be more specific, we find that our strengths in reaching out to our target population are follows:
  •  Boys and girls are equally represented in our STEM after school clubs. This is something that we are very proud of, as we have worked hard over the past 4 years to ensure that our target population is a viable force within our STEM programs / clubs. 
  • We have a very strong  Girl Scout program.   The Girl Scout organization has a very strong focus on STEM, which further promotes the STEM initiative at our school and our focus on exposing girls to STEM.
  • Our 2nd- 5th grade girls participate in the CAE STEM Gems club once  week which focuses on women in STEM career fields.
  • All teachers, from PreK to 5th grade, regardless of the educational setting, incorporate STEM units in their classroom. Once again, ensuring that we reach all girls in the school. 
  • CAE offers a very successful extended school day program which is filled with over 1/3 of our student population. The extended day program promotes the STEM initiative among all students after school and during the summer by exposing them to the STEM Gems Club, a host of STEAM enrichment courses, a cooking course, Digital Media and Technology course and STEM in the Gym . The extended day program is deliberate in its intent to reach all students, which ultimately provides a our girls with a risk free environment to be exposed to STEM opportunities that are traditionally filled with boys. 
  • We have 2 faculty sponsors leading an active CAE Tech Club.  The team regularly conducts programming and research sessions after school.  The team also participates in district level and state competitions. The faculty sponsors were very intentional in ensuring that girls were a part of the team.  
  • CAE  hosts quarterly STEM PBL Showcase Nights. These evenings are popular and well-attended family events where students are able to showcase and present their learning to their peers, parents and other stakeholders By hosting evening events such as this, not only are we able to reach out to girls, but it gives us a unique opportunity to partner with the parents of female students to encourage their continuation in STEM related activities. 
  • We host an annual Science and Engineering fair where K-5th grade students are given the autonomy to select a topic of their choice for research.  It is a semester long project that ends with the students presenting their findings to their peers, parents, and the community. 
  •  While our teachers incorporate STEM activities in their lesson plans on a regular basis, the STEM Leadership Team has also coordinated school-wide STEM days once a month.  On this day, all classrooms are participating in STEM challenges that encourage girls to take risks and a leadership role in the activity. 

Sustainability
We will sustain our outreach efforts to girls by continuing to offer STEM opportunities to all students through our instructional programs, the extended day program, and our community events.  Further, we will continue to target and recruit girls for participation in our STEM after school clubs.  

Areas of Opportunity
In a school-wide endeavor to strengthen and expand the STEM curriculum, we have put together a list of areas for improvement.  More specifically, we have developed three goals relating to the continued recruitment and retention of girls in STEM. They are as follows: 
  1. By December 2019, we want to recognize a 9% increase in the percentage of girls engaged in STEM after school clubs such as Lego League, Maker Fair, and the Regional Science Fair. To be more specific, we want to move from our current representation of 51% of girls participating in STEM clubs to 60% of girls in STEM clubs by 2018. 
  2. By December 2019, we want to create a partnership with Morehouse School of Medicine to create a  Women in STEM and Women in  Medicine Club to target and work with young girls interested in STEM. 

Steps to Initiate Improvement
We have taken the following steps to initiate improvement: 
1. We have begun discussion with the Morehouse School of Medicine and Georgia Power to plan visits to our                   school to encourage STEM and provide mentorship opportunities. We have also begun talks with Morehouse             School of Medicine and Spelman College about the start up of a Women in STEM outreach group at our                       school. 
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​2. We are in the planning stages of a Girls who Code and TinkerBelles Club for girls in grades K-2 and 3-5.   Girl               Who Code and TinkerBelles will start during the 2019-2020 school year. We have a partner who has been                     tasked with facilitating our Girls Who Code Club and our Gifted Teacher who will facilitate our TinkerBelles                   Club. 

Evidence
5th grade girls in the CAE Tech Club write, film, edit and produce their own mini- movie to be featured on the WCAE News Morning Broadcast.
2nd grade girls present their research and explain their findings at the Science & Engineering Fair.
4th grade girls design cost effective games that could be played at the Fall Carnival as they learn about simple machines and force and motion.
4th grade girls design cars that will move at different rates of spend depending on the amount of force to be applied.
2nd- 5th grade girls are attending their first STEM Gems meeting.
Real Women Read is an annual even sponsored by Atlanta City Council member, Derrick Boazman. Women from different STEAM career fields join our Kdg-5th grade girls for story time, conversation and lunch.
4th and 5th grade girls reverse engineer a computer CPU and learn all of its internal parts in order to build their own Kano computer.
Paige Carnes, 3rd Grade- Wreath using recycled material from an old pair of jeans.
Tytiana Perry, 5th grade-  Used her prior knowledge about force and motion and simple machines to design a toy that you could play alone or with a friend. 
Nola Lawson, 4th Grade- Denim purse from recycled jeans.
Essence Morris, 5th Grade- Designed an interchangeable headband that is cost effective and could match any outfit!
All students are encouraged to think creatively so that they are able to become solvers of problems. Each month a new innovative student is recognized  for their new idea, design or solution and featured on the WCAE News Morning Broadcast.