Save Science in Motion

Summary

Alabama Science in Motion (ASIM) has been an essential core component of Alabama's public schools for more than 23 years. We implore our legislators to represent the interest of students, teachers, and concerned community members by immediately putting ASIM back in as a line item in our Education budget. Furthermore, we ask that the funding for this critical program is increased to cover its actual operating costs to $3.5 million and that these funds be dedicated solely to Alabama Science in Motion.

What is ASIM?

ASIM provides teachers and high school students with expert guidance, professional development, curricula, and laboratory equipment that, in many cases, would be unavailable due to prohibitive costs. There are 33 ASIM specialists who travel around the state in multiple regions to share resources both in and out of classrooms. In 2016, ASIM specialists delivered $82,000 of supplies and $430,000 of equipment to 136,684 students in 352 schools, serving 132 of 137 school systems. The ASIM program is offered to ALL school systems in the state.

What are the benefits of ASIM?

For Students:

ASIM works precisely because of the focus on student-centered classroom labs. A model program, ASIM efficiently shares high tech equipment among thousands of Alabama students. In having access to ASIM’s mentorship and laboratory equipment, much of which would otherwise be unavailable, students develop a genuine interest in science and are more prepared for higher education and the workforce. Having equitable access is critical for educational opportunities for children in poverty. In Alabama, these students are most often children of color and/or children from rural areas. Through ASIM experiences, many first-generation college students are more prepared to navigate university-level laboratory-based science courses.

For Teachers:

In having access to ASIM’s science education training and support, teachers gain specialized knowledge and invaluable tools. Teachers bring the continuing professional education they receive immediately into their science classrooms. ASIM specialists ensure that teachers are provided with updated equipment and that experiments are correlated to the latest science standards. Given the trend of increasingly high teacher turnover, ASIM guidance is particularly important for new classroom teachers in our school system. Specialists offer teachers collaboration, expertise, and encouragement in a challenging profession.

Why did the Alabama legislature originally plan, create, and fund ASIM?

Our representatives had a vision to get science into Alabama classrooms based on the pressing need to offer students a pathway to excel in the industries of science and technology. In a global economy, increasingly driven by digital technology, robotics, and information, this vision is more crucial than ever.

What are the costs and budget for ASIM?

ASIM has received its own line item allocation of around $1.6 million annually in the state budget for the past few years. It was funded at twice that amount before proration slashed the budget. AMSTI (Alabama Math, Science, and Technology Initiative), a similar program for primary and middle school students, has allocated $1.5 million of its own operating budget for the past few years to keep ASIM operating at its current levels. That alone is strong evidence that science professionals highly value what ASIM is doing to prepare students to be scientifically literate.

As of March 2017, the ASIM program has been completely taken out as a dedicated line item in the Alabama State Education budget. Governor Bentley’s administration has moved it under the "Other Current Expense" category of the Education Trust Fund in the state budget proposal for next year.

Grouping ASIM into this discretionary fund ensures that the program is no longer earmarked as a priority. It will have to compete for funding with an array of unrelated budget items.

Further, Governor Bentley’s administration has recommended that ASIM receives no discretionary funding at all from the “Other Current Expense” budget. This recommendation sends a clear message that the current governor and education superintendent want ASIM to be dismantled.

What is the vision for Alabama public high school science?

Alabama State Education Superintendent Sentance has argued that ASIM is not achieving his desired results for student performance and intends to work with Governor Bentley to phase out the program. Yet he and the governor have not presented a clear, detailed, and proven proposal for a comprehensive replacement for ASIM. Nor have they offered any data that something else will work better than this model program, which other states look to as a blueprint for cooperative science and technology.

Few if any state delegates have been sent out to observe ASIM in action. Nor has any official data been collected from students, graduates, parents, teachers, scientists, or others who have firsthand experience with ASIM.

Finally, Superintendent Sentance has unveiled a long-term plan to completely defund AMSTI as well. Since ASIM and AMSTI are the only two programs in the history of Alabama public schools that offer equitable access to high-tech, hands-on, student-centered, college-prep science education for all students, it is unclear what vision for education our current state administration holds.

What are the long-term costs to Alabama students if ASIM is destroyed?

Diminishing or obliterating the ASIM program strips Alabama public schools of essential components of our science education curricula. Our students rely on these components to have the mastery of science necessary to forge ahead as competent leaders and citizens.

As a state, we continue to complain about a broken education system while citing standardized test numbers that imply only 24% of Alabama high school students are prepared for college science. Therefore we cannot risk losing ASIM, which ...