Students in William Magnusson’s ROP Construction Technology class at Firebaugh High School were able to design and construct a school barbeque. The project incorporated many units including, excavation and layout, form building, reinforcing of concrete and concrete pouring, stamping, screeding, edging, rough, and final floating. This project helped students develop the foundation and concrete unit skills portion of the construction curriculum and was an excellent experience for students to build teamwork

Hank Guiterrez, Principal of Fowler High School was honored to receive the Innovation Grant to fund the Redcat Men’s Alliance. More than 20 teenagers were given an opportunity to take part in this class for at-risk boys to help build leadership skills and ways to give back to the community. Students received extra mentoring from teachers to help them succeed in school and life. This past Christmas, they carried packages from room to room in the children's oncology unit at Children's Hospital Central California.

Kingsburg Elementary School District purchased a rolling wall that could be used to display student art work and to establish a National Junior Art Honor Society. The portable art wall created a fabulous buzz on campus, and teachers were eager to have the art society display their students’ content-based art on the art wall. Innovative arts education at its best!

Washington Colony Elementary was able to give kindergarten students early access to technology by using it on a daily basis at center time. They practiced the fundamentals of reading and mathematics. The iPad Minis promote visual, tactile and auditory experiences, which are also integral to young children's learning styles.

Students at Alvina Elementary Charter Schools explored music fundamentals through class instruction, solo, and group performance on piano keyboards. Keyboarding will serve to introduce young students to music basics and prepare them to transition into other types of instrumental and vocal ensembles in 5th through 8th grades. Students who attended learned basic keyboarding concepts including note names, finger numbers, five-finger positions and pitch notation for piano.

Project First Hand was an enrichment program implemented at Indianola Elementary in Selma Unified to connect students to community members who are willing to share their life stories. Students strengthened their understanding of historical events by interviewing people who have lived during the time period. The Innovation Grant made it possible for the school to acqire the necessary tools to videotape the historical experiences of community members to create a DVD library of interviews for the district.

Preschool Nights provided activities and materials to parents of children who were not participating in a preschool program to help prepare them for kindergarten. The activities included CDs and concept cards for children to practice identifying colors, shapes, numbers, and letters. They also received playdough, portable white boards and dry erase markers to practice letters, shapes, numbers and writing their name, which all help improve fine motor skills.

Rafer Johnson Junior High launched its first Media Production and students in Ms. Perkins classroom were given an opportunity for hands-on learning experiences with media production equipment. The Innovation Grant made it possible for the school to purchase digital video cameras, microphones, and staging equipment for the classroom to produce episodes of "News to You". The students enjoyed taking control of projects and joined together to create some powerful documentaries and drafting individual autobiographies that were produced and given to students on DVD's.

Students in Mrs. Yates' class at Kerman Middle School participated in Project TI Nspire Science, a science and technology project. This project gave students hands-on experience with Veneer Probes. They graphed results of temperature change, pH neutralization, heart rates when exercising, and conductivity in the science classroom. In the science club, after school students applied these concepts to better understand the dynamics of the local ponding basin.

The library at Clay Elementary School underwent a transformation bringing it in to the 21st century and making it a more inviting place for students. The school increased the library's hours of operation to include time before school and during lunch. Students can also visit the library to read or to use the computer lab for Accelerated Reader quizzes before school. New non-fiction titles that support the Common Core curriculum were purchased and “The Daily Special” board was implemented to encourage students to read outside of normal genre choices.

By increasing the selection of high interest books at Centerville Elementary in Sanger Unified, students in Tier II and III were motivated to participate in the elective Accelerated Reading Program. The new books, made possible through the Innovation Grant, offer low level reading text to improve fluency and comprehension. These books will remain an important part of the Tier II and III intervention for the 2013-14 school year. Students will continue to be encouraged to use these books to help them meet grade level reading goals and improve comprehension and fluency.

Rural living is desirable for its small community appeal, but one of the undesirable characteristics of rural communities is limited access to technology and limited access to the Internet. Through the Innovation Grant, students at Laton High School were given an opportunity to experience 21st Century learning that connected students to the community and technology. Grant funds were used to purchase an iPad 2, an iPad Mini and accessories, which connected students to multi-media applications and web-based tools.

Building upon the project that was funded through the Innovation Grants the previous year, the APPS project at Burrel Union Elementary was phenomenal in assisting students with increasing their reading proficiency and their math knowledge. With funds from the Innovation Grant, ALL students were given access to grade level applications to help them with their weaknesses in each subject area. The teachers were deeply appreciative of the funds because it gave them additional resources to ensure that students are reading at grade level.

The NED Show comes to West Park Elementary! The Show, based on the acronym NED - Never give up; Encourage others; Do your best, is an elementary school assembly program promoting positive attitudes and behavior, and academic achievement in school. The Show’s character, named NED, had students amazed with his yo-yo tricks, laughing at his jokes and motivated by his message of always doing your personal best. The presentation was hilarious, inspiring and engaging, and teachers found a common language to encourage students in every class to never give up, encourage others, and do their best.

High school students in the Navy Junior Reserve Officers Training Corp (NJROTC) at Parlier High were introduced to the SeaPerch program. They learned the concept of buoyancy and were engaged in many areas of STEM through the hands-on experience of building their own Remote Underwater Vehicle (ROV). Students received in-depth training on the use of various hand tools, to include soldering irons, ohm meters, and electric drills.

Cooking was the highlight of the week in Paula Larson’s kindergarten class at Monroe Elementary. The Innovation Grant was used to purchase a kitchen cart, small kitchen appliances and tools, as well as some food items. This cooking project helped to reinforce measurement, fractions and other math standards. The children enjoyed reading recipes and following the sequential steps to make food items. Each week's lesson made nutrition and health a topic of discussion and reinforced learning of previous science units.

Eleventh grade science students at Firebaugh High School learned to use their curiosity and creativity to become innovators while participating in their first science fair. The students were given guidelines, examples, and a grading rubric, and they were required to develop their own topics and investigations for their projects. They worked hard since CSTs, conducting research and developing new ideas or new twists on projects that have been done in the past. Student projects were judged and prizes were awarded for exemplary projects.

At Orange Center, 7th and 8th grade students learned a new approach to writing. Picturing Writing: Fostering Literacy Through Art, is an art-and-literature-based approach to writing that integrates visual modes of thinking at every stage of the writing process. Picturing Writing utilizes simple crayon resist art techniques and quality literature in a progression of mini-lessons that teach essential literacy skills to students with diverse learning styles. With this approach, students draft their ideas in images first.