NW10-026

August 29, 2010

To: NW Council Members

From: STEM Grant Committee

Subject: Pre-Submitted New Business: Distribution and Disbursement of STEM Funds

Background

The NW council commissioned the STEM grant review committee to review applications and suggest distribution of the budgeted STEM funds. The 2010-2011 budgeted STEM amount is $10,000. SPEEA has received requests for over $92,500 for STEM related activities during the application period. The committee has reviewed the applications, met, discussed the applications and summarized our discussion and reasoning in the following table:

School	Team Size	Request Amount	Reasoning
Hesston (Kansas) Middle School	6	None Specified	Does not meet criteria - Application sponsor/contact does not appear to be a SPEEA NW Region member.
Fernwood Kid Inventors	3	None Specified	Suggest not funding - Application does not provide a budget or specific request. Also mentions using budget to "develop course materials"; unclear whether this means purchasing supplies, compensation for time, etc. Also, the 3 team members appear to be adults rather than students. SPEEA advertizing capability is unclear.
Washington Aerospace Scholars	N/A	$48,000	Suggest not funding - Request was almost 5 times our total budget and their total budget is $500K. Also, request was to fund an event rather than a student group. Any contribution we could make would likely have less impact than if it was given directly to a student group. SPEEA advertizing capability is unclear.
Washington Science Olympiad	N/A	$5,000	Suggest not funding - They are a 501(c)(3) corporation requesting operating funds to subsidize registration fees. We feel our money would have the most impact if given directly to student groups. SPEEA advertizing capability is unclear.
School	Team Size	Request Amount	Reasoning
Puyallup High School Horns of Havoc	8	$1,000	Suggest funding at $500. We don't have enough money to fully fund all requests. This team is one of the two smallest teams, so we decided to grant half of the requested amount.
Ballard High School Viking Robotics	12	$1,000	Suggest funding at $500. We don't have enough money to fully fund all requests. This team is one of the two smallest teams, so we decided to grant half of the requested amount.
Aviation High School Skunkworks	45	$5,000	Suggest funding at $1000
Tahoma Senior High School Bear Metal First	41	$2,500	Suggest funding at $1000
Jackson High School Jack in the Bot	25	$4,000	Suggest funding at $1000
Lewis and Clark High School Team 2994	30	$5,000	Suggest funding at $1000
Lynnwood High School First 2522	20	$4,000	Suggest funding at $1000
Mountlake Terrace High School First 1778	25	$4,000	Suggest funding at $1000
Newport High School Newport Robotics Group	45	$5,000	Suggest funding at $1000
Franklin High School Team Xbot	35	$7,000	Suggest funding at $1000
UW Design, Build, Fly	35	$1,000	Suggest funding at $1000. A good project with potential exposure for SPEEA, and opportunity to reach undergraduate engineering students who may soon be SPEEA members.

Motion

It is moved that the NW Council distribute the budgeted STEM funds in the following manner:

School/Team	Amount
Puyallup High School Horns of Havoc	$500
Ballard High School Viking Robotics	$500
Aviation High School Skunkworks	$1,000
Tahoma Senior High School Bear Metal First	$1,000
School/Team	Amount
Jackson High School Jack in the Bot	$1,000
Lewis and Clark High School Team 2994	$1,000
Lynnwood High School First 2522	$1,000
Mountlake Terrace High School First 1778	$1,000
Newport High School Newport Robotics Group	$1,000
Franklin High School Team Xbot	$1,000
UW Design, Build, Fly	$1,000
Total	$10,000