Photo by Erin Nelson Sweeney
A student at Vestavia Hills Elementary Liberty Park works on a project as part of a pilot STEM program in 2021. That STEM program is being expanded across the district this year.
The Vestavia Hills school system is rolling out a new science, technology, engineering and math initiative to all of its elementary schools for the 2024-25 school year.
The STEM program will be offered to all students in kindergarten through 5th grade and will be a weekly hands-on, experiential specialty class alongside art, music and library classes, said Brooke Wedgworth, the school system’s curriculum and instruction director.
The program will emphasize construction, building and engineering processes, robotics and coding and will be thoughtfully tailored for each grade level, Wedgworth said.
“I think for a lot of kids it’s just a great outlet for them and a great opportunity, even if they never choose to go into anything STEM-related,” she said.
The STEM program will be led by teachers tapped from within each school: Katie McDaniel at Dolly Ridge, Heidi Burgess at Cahaba Heights, Billie Jean Price at East, Martha Martin at Liberty Park and Noelle Bradshaw at West. Wedgworth said the group began planning for the 2024-25 school year in May and has spent many hours during the summer developing the STEM program’s curriculum.
The team didn’t have a template to follow, Wedgworth said. The teachers visited Madison City Schools to learn how its STEM program is structured but otherwise developed the Vestavia City Schools program from scratch.
“What we’ve been working on is planning what the whole school year will look like, month by month for each grade,” Wedgworth said. “All the kids will get different experiences in all those areas throughout the school year.”
The program’s launch follows a two-year pilot taught by Martin at Vestavia Hills Elementary Liberty Park from 2021 through 2023. While data is still being collected on the pilot’s academic impact, Wedgworth said the program was successful in helping students develop soft skills and spurring interest in core STEM areas.
“We just wanted to see what the experience was like for the kids. Was it engaging? Was it positive?” Wedgworth said. “Ultimately we would like to see that it carries over to their academic classes as well as supports them in maybe finding a career or a hobby that is STEM-related.
“Obviously we want them to enjoy it and have fun, but we also want to see them develop skills like problem-solving and communication,” Wedgworth said. “So all of those skills were things that we were able to see happening in the pilot. Even if you take the science and technology out of it, they’re developing these important social skills.”
The school system originally planned to implement the STEM program during the 2023-24 school year, and it was to be funded by the 1Rebel 1Future tax increase plan. However, implementation was put on hold after the tax initiative was defeated in a special election in May 2023.
Funding from several alternative sources ensured the STEM program’s launch this year. The school system received $230,000 from state Senators Jabo Waggoner and Dan Roberts and Representatives Mike Shaw and Jim Carns, $150,000 from the Vestavia Hills City Schools Foundation, $10,000 from the elementary school PTOs and $20,000 each from SHIPT, Lathan and Associates and Schneider Electric.
Wedgworth credits Vestavia Hills schools Superintendent Todd Freeman for his tireless efforts to secure additional funding sources for the program.
“Some people were disappointed that it, obviously, didn’t happen last year, but I think they’re excited knowing that it’s going to happen, and I think kids are excited,” she said.
