STEMscopes surpasses 1 million Texas users

Yajaira Tapia, Francis Martinez and Arely Pena, students in the Pasadena Independent School District, follow instructions on a STEMscopes-inspired science experiment.

Rice University’s STEMscopes program, an online science curriculum, has surpassed a million users among students in Texas, a milestone for the program in its second year. STEMscopes, a division of the Rice Center for Digital Learning and Scholarship (RDLS), has also introduced a comprehensive online curriculum for high school students in three core subjects — biology, chemistry and physics.

Within two months of its availability, the high school component was serving more than 50,000 students in 20 school districts, said Reid Whitaker, RDLS executive director and founding director of STEMscopes. The program covers 100 percent of the Texas Essentials Knowledge and Skills standards, with ample support for teachers to implement scientific investigations and research activities in their classrooms, he said.

STEMscopes was introduced in 2011 as one of a dozen digital curricula selected by the state of Texas to supplement science textbooks for grades 5-8. It quickly became the top choice among Texas teachers.