In 1996 the Puyallup Valley Branch of AAUW began offering Innovative Teaching Grants to teachers in grades kindergarten through twelve in our four area school districts.  We continue to offer grants and have included a fifth district in our area.  The Grants are intended to extend classroom enrichment and instruction, provide opportunities that are not available with regular district funds and will benefit a maximum number of students.  Proposals are also evaluated on equity issues and assisting girls in developing increased interest and skills in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.    Grants are awarded each fall to maximize learning for the current year.  Our award recipient presents and explains his/her project at the April Branch meeting.

From 1996 to 2022, the Branch has awarded over $21,000 in Grants to a total of 55 teachers from Puyallup, Sumner/Bonney Lake, Orting, Fife and Chief Leschi School Districts.  IF each Grant ONLY impacted 30 students, that would amount to well over 1600 students who have benefited from the Grants. Many of the items purchased with the Grant are used in multiple classrooms over multiple years, leading to an uncounted number of students who have had access to these innovative projects.

2013 Innovative Teaching Grant

The 2013 Innovative Teaching Grant has been awarded to the Sumner School District to be used to purchase three digital microscopes for the seventh grade life sciences classrooms in the district’s three middle schools. The microscopes will be used to introduce all seventh grade students to the use of the digital microscopes during units on cells, molds and yeasts. Because the microscope image can be projected, it will allow all 600 science students to view the specimens, thus allowing more access to the microscope images than with a conventional microscope.