Redcat Remix, in its inaugural year, is a group of Fowler High School students that DJ at school dances. The students collaborated to choose a playlist, designed and constructed a DJ booth, and designed a custom light show. The goal of Redcat Remix is to become a fully functioning professional quality production team. Students are scheduled to DJ the Sadie Hawkins dance, but with improvements to the equipment they could DJ other events including, winter formal, prom, and award ceremonies. The expansion of the events would also boost student involvement.

This Innovation Grant allowed Kepler School to expand the Guitar Building Woodshop. By doing so, more students had an opportunity to build a Cuban drum known as a cajon, or a cigar box electric or bass guitar. Working alongside a professional guitar building craftsmen, students learned how to compose and perform music on these instruments for monthly Kepler Art Hop events. Students learned familiarity with hand tools and wood working while building their own instrument entirely from scratch using raw materials.

Students in the ROP Criminal Justice Class participated in running all the Red Ribbon Week events at Firebaugh-Las Deltas Unified School District. Students from Firebaugh High School gave lectures on drug free awareness at all the elementary and intermediate schools. They played games, and gave away T-shirts and fingerprint kits. They we able to collaborate and communicate with their much younger peers, most of all, the younger students were inspired to make healthy life choices.

The Rafer Johnson Junior High School Leadership and Media classes created a healthier social climate on campus through Project PRIDE. The acronym PRIDE stands for Patience, Respect, Integrity, Determination and Excellence, which encompasses the expectations for all students on campus. To promote awareness, the Leadership and Media classes teamed up to create a student website and videos promoting Project PRIDE.

Stars & Stripes is an Adaptive Physical Education (PE) and PE Mentor program at Roosevelt High School. The Adaptive PE classes used students from the mainstream to be PE mentors. The adaptive students were called Stars and the PE mentors, usually juniors and seniors, were called Stripes. The program allowed functionally skilled students to interact with mainstream students and learn about Special Olympic and physical education activities. Grant funds were used to purchase bocci ball sets, portable volleyball net, and stop watches.

At Caruthers Elementary School, the Making it Real-Videography Access project introduced videography and video editing technology to middle school students in Creative Dramatics, Journalism, Yearbook, and Computer Literacy classes. This project provided opportunities not previously afforded to students in the school district. Many students come from families with low socioeconomic status (90.4% free/reduced lunch), are migrant students, or are English Learners. Special day class students with disabilities enrolled in non-core classes also benefited.

Dawson and Sunset Elementary schools hosted monthly events to bridge the gap between parents, educators, and pupils; hence the name, PEP Talks. Research shows that parent involvement has a positive effect on student achievement. In order to form meaningful partnerships between all stakeholders, PEP Talks were informal gatherings in which topics of interest were discussed with parents over refreshments, in a comfortable and safe setting. Parents and educators came together to learn about student needs and collaborate to address those needs effectively.

Clovis High School students studied moisture catcher technology as a supplemental water supply for the school's green house and garden. Through the Catching Water from the Sky project, students created, built, and implemented two or more moisture collectors to harvest water from the atmosphere. Students monitored, measured, and collected captured moisture into channel reservoirs on a daily basis. Additionally, they analyzed and drew conclusions regarding the viability of moisture collection from the sky.

Research has proven that students who are engaged in the arts are more attuned to core academic study areas than those students who are not. Over the past three years, Big Creek Elementary District, through the support of The Foundation @ FCOE, has added arts back into the classroom through technology, instrumental music and now ceramics. Recently, the district purchased a new kiln to revive the ceramics program, and 2014 Innovation Grant was used to purchase much needed supplies.

The KEYS to Success project at Clay Elementary School was a project aimed to strategically teach keyboarding to students at their developmental level. This project employed the use of Chromebooks and the developmentally appropriate ‘Keyboarding Without Tears’ program for kindergarten through fifth grade students, and free online keyboarding lessons and practice for sixth through eighth grade students. The goal of this project was to expose students to pre-keyboarding and keyboarding, increase their speed and accuracy, and to develop proficiency in computer-based assessment navigation.

Students at Central High School gathered around an oversized set of photo prints documenting different moments of historical eras. These carefully selected sets correlate with the social studies history curriculum as students examine the various historical images and take notes on their observations. They formulated questions about the photos and then conducted research. The young budding researchers took what they learned and composed a story reflecting the image itself during that historical time.

Teachers at Alvina Elementary love to see children excited about learning and as the world becomes complex with technology, students are encouraged to find an interest in science, technology, and engineering. With this grant, Alvina Elementary launched a Lego Learners program where children have access to working hands-on with wheels, gears, axles, motors and building blocks. They combined the parts with technology to create simple robotics. The goal was to create an interest in basic physical science concepts through observation, reasoning, prediction, and critical thinking.

West Fresno Elementary strongly believes that it is never too early to start learning about college and career exploration. The College and Career Center allows students to have a designated area to research college and university requirements. It also encourages students to explore career options and offer parents college and career planning resources for their children. The center serves as a meeting area for invited college representatives and professionals to come and share their experiences.

The new and improved library media project at West Park Elementary provided supplemental enhancements to school learning through supported library services. Students now have access to media hardware for whole class presentations. Programs such as TED TALKS, Educational You Tube, Discovery Channel, History Documentaries, and contemporary news resources are now accessible to supplement and enhance learning services. All students will benefit from this implementation and it is aligned with the school-wide objectives. This project will make learning more engaging and interactive.

Students in the ROP Stagecraft program at Kingsburg High School were given an opportunity to create stage props using a vacuforming machine. A vacuforming machine is an essential piece of equipment in theater scene shops that allows for the creation of props, costume pieces and other set decorations. It works by placing objects on a table that is then covered in heated plastic. Holes in the table surface remove the air from the area and the heated plastic conforms to the shape of the object beneath it.

ROP students at Laton High School constructed a portable oxy-acetylene plumbed table that will be utilized to teach students in the Introduction to Agricultural Mechanics class about oxy-acetylene safety and methodology through hands-on application. The portable oxy-acetylene apparatus is a table made up of eight stations with each station offering the capability to cut or weld. Students will learn fabrication methodology including designing, measuring, cutting, welding, fastening, gas pipeline plumbing, assembly and fit-up.

Third grad students at Pacific Union Elementary participated in the the Get Fit project to improve their physical fitness by teaching them the correlation between eating healthy foods, exercise, and establishing healthy habits. Students carried a Fitbit throughout the day to monitor their activities and they tracked all the food calories they consumed in a daily log. They logged the number of calories they burned, steps taken, and the number of miles walked or run during recess and PE activities.

Students and their families in the community of Westside Elementary now have access to a special library. Storyland Library is a special library geared towards children of this rural farming community. It offers a large variety of books including multicultural, learning and picture books, and resource books for parents. These books are available for check-out to read at home, or they can read with their children in the comfortable cozy reading space. The library is open daily during school hours for parents to use and once a month it would be open in the evening for parents who work late.