Professional staff members and leaders participate in an ongoing system of STEM-specific professional learning.

NAU 

ISTE Philly

In the summer of 2020, ISTE was to hold their annual conference in Anaheim, CA. Several teachers from our school had signed up and were eagerly awaiting attending our first experience at this renowned tech education conference. Unfortunately for us, COVID hit and that dream was shelved for a few years. This past summer that dream once again came to life and a couple of us were able to attend ISTE's conference in Philadelphia, PA. The conference was packed with TONS of gold nuggets of innovative teaching tools, STEM lessons, and amazing pedagogy to bring back to our campus to share with our peers.

STEM PLC 

District Wide PLC mODEL

Our entire district has implemented a Professional Learning Community where teachers have the opportunity to work with teachers on campus using the vertical articulation model as well as work with educators throughout the district teaching the same grade band. This model has allowed teachers to create curriculum, share best practices and support one another throughout the school year. 

ASTA

Several teachers on campus are members of ASTA (Arizona of Science Teachers Association). This past November they held their annual conference where they offered classes on the integration of coding, 3D printing, diminutional science instruction, and teaching with wonder at the forefront of our lessons. This conference 

Arizona STEM Acceleration Project 

For the past two years Mr. Lane our STEM/Computer Science teacher has been a member of the Year 1 and Year 2 Arizona STEM Acceleration Project (ASAP) cohort. ASAP aims to reimagine Arizona's STEM ecosystem and prepare teachers to deliver high-quality, hands on STEM activities. Funded by a $10 million dollar grant through the Arizona Department of Education, ASAP provides fellowships to teachers looking to bring more STEM experiences into their classrooms, schools, and communities.  Working with STEM educators all over the state Mr. Lane has created hands on STEM lessons tied to a content area. This is a link to all of the STEM lessons created by ASAP STEM fellows. This is one of the largest STEM fellowship consortiums the world has ever seen in terms lesson plan development, professional development hours and money pumped into classrooms all over the state of Arizona. The world has been taking notice of what these STEM Fellows have been doing to redifine what STEM education looks like in our state.. 

CS 100 School

We are happy to inform you that as a CS100 Award Winning School your commitment towards expanding access to all K-5 students have been accepted as a CSforALL Commitment and will be published at the 2023 CSforALL Summit. Thank you for your commitment to teach 100% of your students at least 10 hours of computer science throughout the 2023-2024 school year.

We are excited to have you as our partner in the CSforALL movement and thank you for making the commitment towards advancing Computer Science education for all K-12 students in the US!

Sierra Verde Steam Academy commits to providing 115 hours of CS instruction across all grades using a variety of coding and robotics platforms to 899 students in Glendale, Arizona by Summer 2024.

Your CS100 Award puts you in good company, among the top elementary computer science schools in the country. Congratulations again!