Dear Mr. Ptucha, Mr. Grimaldi, Mrs. Acampora, Mrs. DeSabato, Mr. Geringswald, Mr. Kaston, Dr. Peller:
According to Whitehouse.gov, President Obama has specific, innovative guidelines for educating students in grades K-12. The Whitehouse website notes the significant lapse in science and math literacy in recent years. For example, in the 2006 Programme for international student assessment comparison, American students ranked 21st out of 30 in science literacy and 25th out of 30 in math literacy among students from other developed countries.
With these severe educational limitations in topics that have clearly been shown to be imperative in future careers, the STEM program was enforced. STEM- is an extremely important educational program that provides students with science, math and engineering/technology in sequences that build upon each other and can be used with real world applications. STEM education creates critical thinkers, increases science literacy and enables the next generation of innovators (per ISA website, Francis Eberle, PhD, author and executive director for National Science Teachers Association).
That being said, STEM schools and STEM programs are popping up all over the United States. Across Long Island and as nearby as Huntington, STEM schools are developing to give their districts an edge over the rest.
We, in Half Hollow Hills, have been way ahead of the curve with our shuttle room and now newly renovated Discovery Center. The Discovery center provides the thousands of elementary children in our district the opportunities to perform hands on science and engineering experiments in a unique environment, led by unique scientists, Tom Affatigato and Brian Clare.
Listed below is a sampling of this diverse and exciting elementary curriculum performed in the Discovery Center:
-First Grade…studying weather, matter (via slime, etc), scientific method and classifications
-Second Grade…Learning about magnetism, the water cycle, the moon phases/ solar system
-Third Grade…Students explore Mars via robotics in the custom made Mars terrain. They also study matter and weather using hot air balloon races and force and motion roller coasters.
-Fourth Grade…Continue to study Mars with emphasis on velocity, momentum and friction using robotics and simple engineering concepts to “fix” a solar panel on a rover.
*The Discovery Center is essential for helping the fourth grade students prepare for the state science assessments- teaching volume, mass, electricity, magnetism and energy
-Fifth Grade…The students focus on planetary science, again using the Mars rovers in a more advanced science and engineering application. They also identify rocks based on density and buoyancy, and in the earthquake engineer station they construct buildings and predict how they will fare as they are exposed to the HHH earthquake “shake table”
In a time of severe budget cuts, increased workload on our children, lack of field trips and less non-core curriculum study, the Discovery Center provides a welcomed retreat where “out of the box” instruction on science, math and engineering is taught and experienced first hand by caring and interesting professors. The field trips to the Center are, for all intents and purposes, free. The children are able to step away from the tense classroom environments, and the excitement and curiosity for science is unmistakable.
Please do not destroy Half Hollow Hills version of STEM in order to save a mere .03% of the budget! The Discovery Center, so unique in its operation, is what makes our district stand out from the others.
We, as concerned parents and taxpayers in the HHH School District believe passionately in continuing the hands on science experience that the Discovery Center provides.
We respectfully request that you, as our Board of Education, do not destroy this landmark program.
Thank you for your continued support.