Now that students have returned to daily in-person instruction, the 2020-21 winners of 4C Fund grants can begin their projects in earnest. A total of $48,677 was awarded to winning projects from six schools:

• Athens Drive Magnet High
• Apex High
• East Wake High
• Hodge Road Magnet Elementary
• Middle Creek High
• Salem Elementary

The awards were delayed to December 2020 in light of COVID-19, and there were some modifications to the grant plans. Full implementation of the projects, especially activities with students, may continue until December 2021.

Project summaries and updates for the 2020-21 winners are below.

World Health Organization Mock Summit 

Athens Drive Magnet High School
Elizabeth Luna and the CTE Department 
Amount: $10,000 

Project Description: Students will explore how global choices have a local impact. The CTE department will team together, alongside community partners, as students move through the engineering-design process to understand the World Health Organization’s goals and address their indicators. Final products include comprehensive teacher-developed lessons, student final projects, and a mock summit. 
Update: All CTE teachers have completed a training on World Health Summit topics for 2021. Those include: 

• Vaccines: Moving Towards Health as a Global Public Good;
• WHO Council on the Economics of Health for All;
• The Intersection of COVID-19 and Mental Health;
• Artificial Intelligence in Global Health(care); and
• Pandemic Preparedness: Lessons from COVID-19. 

After completing the training and learning best practices for connecting curriculum to current trends and needs, teachers have set off to begin planning for projects that will be implemented in the fall of 2021. Right now, teachers are in the early stages of figuring out what cross-curricular teams can be made while considering what projects and active work students can be involved in. Once this stage is finalized, teachers will work with a variety of support personnel to connect with community members and create final, robust PBL’s with final implementation planned and presented in the Fall. 

Farm-to-Table Lab Experience  

Apex High School
Erica Hoskins, John Clark, Rebecca O’Brien  
Amount: $9,964 

Project Description: Students in horticulture, culinary, and food science will collaborate while using sustainable technology to explore food systems. Students will understand how food is grown, processed, and preserved. Through collaboration students will research trends and issues related to food insecurity, utilize biotechnology skills, and explore careers in the farm-to-table continuum. 
Update: Students have maintained a garden, produce from which culinary students will use in class. They also learned about molecular gastronomy by making a basil foam and balsamic vinegar spheres in the lab.

Riley Hill School Historical Project 

East Wake High School
Christopher Howell, Frances Price, Maurice Carter, Travis Cooper, Julie Scalzo, Emily Steele, Lori Anderson 
Amount: $6,650 

Project Description: The Riley Hill School Historical Project goes back before the 1970s and takes a look at the impact this school had on the community. This project will give our students at East Wake High School a description of what it was like attending a segregated African American school. 
Update: The Respecting Our History, Building Our Future project was launched in 2019 to document the history of segregated black schools in Wake County. East Wake High has been assigned Riley Hill School, a Rosenwald School built in 1928 in Wendell. Thousands of Rosenwald Schools were built in the early 20th century in the segregated South for the education of Black children. The Riley Hill school project will tell the story of the experience students had at Riley Hill School before 1960. Students will conduct research from state and local libraries, and interview former Riley Hill students. They will create a website presenting the information they gather. A room at East Wake will be painted in Riley Hill school colors and house artifacts and pictures. Already, senior Ashley Smith has worked closely with librarian Christopher Howell and art teacher Maurice Carter to create a painting depicting the historic Riley Hill School (pictured). Ashley’s work is currently displayed in the school library but will later be hung in the Riley Hill room.

Cutting EDGEucation 

Hodge Road Magnet Elementary School
Allyn Arrowood 
Amount: $4,882 

Project Description: Third-grade students at Hodge Road will embark on a yearlong project to understand many third grade math concepts by designing their own one-bedroom apartment and then using a laser cutter to construct a real-life 3D model of their design. 
Update: Third-grade students have received lessons in building design and began designing apartments prior to Spring Break. They are finalizing their designs. Then Ms. Arrowood will use the laser cutter (students aren’t allowed to use it for safety reasons) to produce models for an Apartment Expo in June. 

Making Every Day Earth Day Through Reducing Global Impacts 

Middle Creek High School
Carrie Jones
Amount: $10,000 

Project Description: Students will analyze their global footprint, work in teams to create a digital sketch, solicit peer review, and create a 3D invention/prototype to reduce their footprint. 
Update: Students are using the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) Exploravision Framework to design a STEM project. For baseline data and discussion, students individually examined their own global footprint. Next, diverse groups of students worked in teams to develop their ideas on how to reduce their footprint and impacts on the planet. Final products will include a paper, website and model that will be presented next month.  

Wonderful World of Water 

Salem Elementary School
Wynne Adcock, Adra Hetes, Emma Fox, Paige Laug 
Amount: $7,181 

Project Description: The Wonderful World of Water project is an interdisciplinary unit which involves four dynamic learning experiences: using litmus to test water samples, creation of classroom gardens and rain barrels, design of water filters, and use of game designing software (Bloxels EDU) to bring water related interactive stories to life. 
Update: The gardens were just planted last week, and students have begun the STEM and Bloxels activities. They will be working on these activities throughout the entire 4th quarter. Teachers will film student presentations to create PSAs about what is learned about water. Students and teachers will document their progress along the way and will share all the information on a website that is currently under construction.