G3 Educator Institute

Girls Inc. of New York City’s (GINYC) Generation Giga Girls (G3) Educator Institute seeks to address the lack of women, especially women of color, in data science jobs. The field of data science is booming: the US Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that by 2026, there will be 11.5 million jobs in data science and analytics. Employment of data scientists is projected to grow 36% from 2021 to 2031, much faster than the average for all occupations. 

Yet, there is a “leaky pipeline” problem: from middle school through graduate school, girls and women “leak” out of computer science, math, and other STEM fields that typically lead to careers in data science. Women hold just 18% of data science jobs in the United States, and 11% of data teams do not have any women on them at all. Women of color hold only 3% of data science jobs. In addition to increasing the risk of bias, gender imbalances in STEM and data science training prevent women from succeeding in high-paying professions linked to the digital economy, widening the gender pay gap.

Research shows that social and environmental factors contribute to this underrepresentation. Learning environments affect girls’ interest and achievement in STEM fields. When girls are told by teachers or parents that their intelligence can expand with experience and learning, they do better in math and science. This is true of all students, but especially for girls, for whom negative stereotypes persist.

In partnering with over 150 schools across NYC, we have seen firsthand that teachers in public and charter schools alike are not equipped to teach data science. A lack of funding, time, and professional development all create barriers for educators to successfully teach STEM curricula. In order to prepare young women to navigate a data-driven world, it is critical that we raise awareness on the value of offering this content at the high school level and prepare educators to teach it to this population.

Further, teaching data science to girls in high school is about much more than preparing girls for highly paid careers. It is a powerful and much needed tool to equip girls and young women to understand systemic inequality in STEM and beyond. For young women, there is a strong need for more project-based instruction that allows students to address problems that they see as relevant. In a 2008 study from the National Academy of Engineering that asked people if they wanted to be engineers, girls were twice as likely as boys to say no. But when asked if they would like to design a safe water system, save the rainforest, or use DNA to solve crimes, girls answered yes. Our goals are to broaden participation in data science by students from historically marginalized groups and to build students’ understanding of U.S. social and economic conditions using real, large-scale, social science data. 

GINYC's solution lies in the expansion of our Generation Giga Girls (G3) Data Analytics program across New York City and nationally. The first of its kind, this interactive, online curriculum, designed for high school girls from low-income and underserved communities, is already having a substantial impact. Since the program’s inception nearly eight years ago, 1/3 of GINYC’s high school graduates on average apply to college declaring a STEM major annually.

The G3 Data Analytics Program is an award-winning program that uses animated multicultural avatars in vignettes that explore social justice themes and real-life situations. In this project-based curriculum, girls learn tangible skills in statistics, math, and data analysis, and are introduced to career opportunities in the realm of big data through workplace visits and mentoring from data science professionals. The digital curriculum, successfully delivered over the past 5 years to over 1,000 girls in public high schools in NYC, is on the cusp of major expansion to educators across New York City and the national Girls Inc. network. 

In order to respond to a growing demand and scale the program beyond the purview of GINYC’s educators, we have established the G3 Educator Institute, a six-month program that provides New York City teachers with skills in statistics and data analytics in the context of social justice themes that directly affect students’ lives. The program includes trainings that demonstrate the impact of using data analytics to drive social change. A key element to the Institute’s success is that it teaches educators and afterschool providers who may not have STEM training to use basic statistical tools, including an introduction to the data investigation cycle, sample to sample variation, and the differences between two measures of center: mean and median.  Additionally, participants are introduced to data platforms that prepare them to visually display data, such as Poll Everywhere, Google Trends, and Opportunity Atlas.

The overall aim of the G3 Educator Institute is to ensure that teachers have the knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to implement the G3 Data Analytics program at their school or program. The Institute objectives for its participants are as follows:

—Demonstrate mastery of the G3 curriculum content.

— Demonstrate an understanding of the mission of Girls Inc. of NYC and the importance of gender equity and mitigating gender bias.

 —Demonstrate an understanding of, and ability to relate to, the demographic/culture of the girls they are teaching. 

GINYC respectfully requests funding to further scale our G3 Educator Institute across New York City and a nationally representative group of Girls Inc. affiliates. With increased teacher training offerings, we aim to increase our G3 program reach to a total of 4,000 girls and young women: 2,000 in New York City and a national rollout to 2,000 girls at Girls Inc. sites in major cities including Philadelphia, San Antonio, Los Angeles, Birmingham, Newark, Chicago, Boston, and St. Louis. In order to do so, we will train 50 teachers in NYC and 50 affiliate program leaders and specialists in the Girls Inc. national network.

Our solution serves girls of color from under-resourced communities throughout New York City and nationally by training educators to deliver our digitized, interactive, and multicultural G3 Data Analytics program. Educators are a vital connector in that they have direct access to hundreds of students who are potentially passionate about advocacy and STEM. In training educators, we are ensuring that they are better equipped to support the next generation of changemakers. Many educators have gravitated toward the G3 program because of the unique use of social justice to get young people interested in data analytics; as a result, students are more comfortable analyzing data, talking about the significance of trends, and pinpointing the impact of social issues surrounding them in their communities.

Annually, GINYC serves up to 10,000 girls from low-income and under-resourced neighborhoods in every borough of New York City. More than half of the girls in our programs speak a language other than English at home. Approximately 40% of our participants are Black, 40% are Latina/x, 10% are bi/multiracial, 7% are Asian, and 3% are White.  We also have a growing population of girls who self-identify as belonging to the LGBTQ community. Girls hail from neighborhoods such as Astoria, East Harlem, South Bronx, and Downtown Brooklyn. 

Our participants face significant obstacles on a daily basis that include parental drug use, a lack of role models, and inadequate places for study and play/leisure. As they transition into high school, many face obligations that their male peers may not, such as caring for their siblings or other family members and contributing to the family income. Due to these many obstacles, our target population is more likely to drop out of high school. In order to prevent dropouts and help girls cope, our programming emphasizes counseling and coaching which has been proven by numerous research studies to improve low-income student’s high school retention and graduation rate.

The G3 Educator Institute is designed to build a foundation of data literacy by teaching the hard skills necessary to prepare educators to implement a high school program in data analytics. More importantly, we are training educators to build a data literate population, capable of understanding, generating, and using data. This includes everything from being able to sort through the results of a survey to comprehending the meaning of a complicated graph or chart. It also includes the ability to critically evaluate data and visualizations.

In addition to their hands-on work in the G3 Educator Institute, trainees engage in a 101 course on data analytics and statistics designed to inform and enrich the G3 experience. Educators learn the basics of data science topics, such as machine learning, inferential statistics, and data storytelling by working on lifelike projects. Through experiential learning, the hallmark of Girls Inc. of NYC curricula, the Institute experience lays a strong foundation for teaching the G3 curriculum, helping educators draw meaningful connections between their classroom work and the latest developments in the use of big data in their lives.

Girls Inc. of New York City has been serving girls in under-resourced communities in New York City for 25 years. We pride ourselves on hiring teachers and staff from the communities we serve, so we have a deep and abiding understanding of their needs. 80% of our staff identify as BIPOC, including our Team Lead for this grant proposal, Chief Development Officer April Caldwell, and G3 Program Manager Marguerite Copeland. For minority and underrepresented groups especially, identifying relatable STEM role models is essential to breaking down harmful stereotypes regarding who can pursue and succeed in a STEM career.

GINYC created the G3 program nearly eight years ago and it has been remarkably successful in terms of its outcomes and the level of participant engagement. GINYC conducted student focus groups when creating G3’s animated vignettes; as a result, the program provides a context for students to discuss the social justice issues of most concern to them. Girls love the animation and interaction, and they identify with the multicultural avatars and social justice themes. Vignettes include topics such as “School disciplinary and behavioral practices amongst black girls,” “Is GPA fair?,” and “What is the relationship between human rights and reproductive rights?” As we continue to update the curriculum, we have used themes from student’s capstone presentations to ensure that the social justice topics remain reflective of their interests. As a result, new topics include racial injustice, immigration, food insecurity, voting rights, homelessness and mental health.

To our knowledge, G3 is the only digitized program teaching data analytics to girls of color from underserved communities. Since the program’s start, approximately 1/3 of our high school graduates apply to college with a STEM major. In recognition of its success, G3 won the Mayor’s Distinguished Service Award in 2020 for its dynamic, multicultural, highly interactive, and engaging format. We have proud to have delivered the program to more than 1,000 girls and 50 teachers to date in NYC. As the flagship and “incubator” for national Girls Inc., we are well positioned to scale up the G3 program as we have with other digitized programs including Mind Body Matters, our mental health program, and Her Future, our financial literacy program.

Since G3 Data Analytics' inception, we have successfully partnered with 20 high schools, reaching more than 2,000 student participants across New York City. To further scale our reach, we piloted the G3 Educator Institute in the fall of 2022, successfully training 25 educators, reaching 20 new schools, and serving 750 new students in New York City.   

During the COVID pandemic, while unable to conduct the teacher trainings as originally planned, GINYC successfully expanded the G3 digital platform to reach 150 more high school juniors and seniors with G3 programming. Additionally, we scaled the program to offer a weekly, virtual, abbreviated course to high school girls across NYC. Trained GINYC staff facilitated an abbreviated version of our G3 curriculum with a focus on racial justice and health disparities.

Our goal for this year’s program is to expand the reach of our G3 Educator Institute and, thereby, G3’s student reach. With support from MIT Solve, we will train 50 teachers to reach 2,000 students in NYC, and train 50 affiliate program leaders and specialists to reach an additional 2,000 girls throughout the Girls Inc. national network.  

We will recruit teachers from each of the five boroughs, and with intentional expansion in places like Staten Island, where there is an incredible dearth of STEM programming. A Staten Island community needs assessment released in 2018 by Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York (CCC) highlighted the growing inequality on the North Shore of Staten Island, where many residents are not benefiting from the strengthened economy and citywide efforts to improve conditions for children and families. This translates into wide disparities in student educational outcomes. Recently, we were contacted by the Staten Island Borough President’s Office, which expressed interest in bringing G3 to several high schools in the borough. The unequal distribution of resources across schools on Staten Island and other areas has left many schools with minimal STEM programming, especially for girls of color. By implementing our training program, we will be able to address that void and introduce data science to more students who have been historically marginalized.

As data analytics becomes increasingly important in all fields, many schools want to offer an introductory course to their students, but do not have the teacher capacity to do so. Further, it is difficult to hire experienced teachers who have a background in data science. The content of the G3 Educator Institute training sessions is critical to ensure the success of STEM programming facilitated by educators lacking science expertise. Partnering with MIT Solve will offer a much needed opportunity for us to build a community of practice among educators, bringing in leading experts and providing dedicated convening spaces for participants to build their confidence and skill set. Additionally, educators will have access to innovative technology and resources needed to deliver high quality STEM programming.  

In 2020, Education Northwest and the Overdeck Family Foundation released a report titled, “A NATIONAL SCAN: Scaling Out-of-School Time STEM Programming” and found that a key component to successfully scaling STEM programming is to train educators—both program-specific training and training in general STEM skills, including how to build relationships with youth. The G3 Educator Institute provides a space for educators to develop deep knowledge and skills related to facilitating STEM learning, thus transforming their overall practice in a meaningful way.  MIT Solve will allow us to expand our network of practitioners and resources, better informing facilitation practices and enhancing the overall experience of students.  We also hope to receive MIT’s assistance in building an ed tech platform to enhance our educator training. The vision is to provide a learning management space where educators have ongoing access to content.

MIT Solve’s Support Program will also enable us to conduct a community needs assessment to ensure we are meeting the varied needs of those we serve. The technological and societal landscape has changed dramatically in the years since GINYC created G3. Innovations in technology and data have advanced civic engagement, and it is important that our students have access. Moreover, we must connect with community stakeholders  to ensure that we have a clear understanding of the strengths and needs of the communities, girls, and families we serve, and the social justice issues that are affecting them daily.  We know that data plays a key role in effective community school development, and the development of a community needs assessment in partnership with MIT Solve can ensure sustainability and scalability of the program. 

Last, a partnership with MIT Solve would allow us to develop a network of universities and training organizations, thereby accelerating our impact.  

Our Team Lead is Chief Program Officer, April Caldwell. A graduate of Colgate University, April was born and raised in the Bronx, NY and brings her lived experience as a Black woman to her role at GINYC. Prior to joining us, April served as the VP of Affiliate Advancement and Programs at the National Black Child Development Institute, a trusted partner in delivering culturally relevant resources that respond to the unique strengths and needs of Black children around issues including early childhood education, health, child welfare, literacy, and family engagement. She also spent three years at Harlem Children’s Zone, the groundbreaking nationally recognized New York City program whose holistic cradle-to-career approach to improving student achievement has served as a model for countless communities across the country.April recently served as an Advisor and panelist for the “Advancing the Conversation on Scaling National Informal STEM Programs” conference hosted by National Girls Collaborative Project, National Science Foundation, and the Education Development Center in Washington, DC. 

Our CEO, Dr. Pamela Maraldo, is the Board Chair of CGFNS Commission of Graduates of Foreign Nursing Services, which was a recipient of an MIT Solve grant. 

Existing solutions addressing gender equity in STEM are not culturally relevant or interactive enough to overcome girls’ fear of STEM and, specifically, data analytics. And while there are many STEM-based curricula, G3 is unique in that it uses social justice as the lens through which students explore data analytics. Using culturally diverse avatars that girls identify with and animated vignettes to reflect on social justice themes and real-life situations, G3 enables girls to learn complex subjects with ease. We have used the same formula--combining intersectional representation and cross-curricular themes–to achieve great success with our digitized mental health and financial literacy programs, both of which were created by GINYC and are rolling out nationally.  

Our Educator Institute takes this successful model to the next level, maximizing our impact and ability scale. Our program is completely free to educators and schools and GINYC pays educators to participate in the Institute, thus eliminating financial barriers to access. The G3 Educator Institute equips educators with the skills, pedagogical knowledge, and confidence to go into the classroom prepared to teach data analytics. These teachers are instrumental in bringing new school-based partners and students into the GINYC fold.

Our impact goals for the next year and over the next five years are to expand our reach throughout New York City, build the capacity of educators. and expand access to resources. Additionally, over the next five years, we will roll-out G3 to Girls Inc. affiliates in major cities including San Antonio, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Newark, Birmingham, Chicago, St. Louis, and Boston. We envision that educators who complete the Educator Institute will develop a firm grasp of core data analytics skills and understanding, greater confidence in their ability to facilitate STEM programming, and further stimulate the interest of girls and gender expansive youth to pursue advanced degrees and careers in STEM fields.   

Short-Term Goals

1. To improve math scores and overall academic scores in alignment with Common Core standards.

2. Increase curiosity in STEM, with an emphasis on data analytics.

3. Increase belief in the importance/relevance of data analytics and STEM.

4. Increase sense of self-efficacy in STEM.

5. Develop a positive feedback loop between interest and knowledge/skills.

Long-Term Goals

1. Increase the percentage of students who demonstrate readiness for advanced level study in STEM fields.

2.  Increase the percentage of students who demonstrate readiness for college-level study in STEM fields.

3. Increase the number of students who graduate from a post-secondary institution with a degree in a STEM field.

To achieve these goals, we plan to partner with NYC public schools that focus on CTE (Career and Technical Education) certifications.  Additionally, we will expand our model to support and train out-of-school time service providers who support students in more informal spaces but lack basic STEM skills and facilitation practices.

GINYC will administer pre-and post-surveys to educators evaluating Institute content and training delivery. Desired benchmarks are as follows: 

• 50 teachers will complete the G3 Educator Institute.  

• 90% of teachers will rate the curriculum on its ease of use, quality of the content, and opportunities for interaction as a 4 or higher on a scale of 1-5, with 5 being the highest score. 

• Upon completion of the in-person training, 90% of the trained facilitators will begin implementing G3 programming by February 2024 (submitted Memorandum of Understanding by 9/30/2023).  

• 75% of facilitators trained will rank "meets standard" or "above standard" on their site visit evaluation from a GINYC staff member.  

• 90% of teachers will attend quarterly webinars/conference calls.   

The aim of G3 Educator Institute is to stimulate an interest in Data Analytics and encourage academic achievement. The program is aligned with the relevant Common Core standards. Accordingly, girls in this program perform significantly better than their peers in math. Measures of success for program participants include:  

• 75% of girls' scores on Common Core aligned standards will increase from pre- to post-survey.

• 80% will report an interest in a career involving math or data analytics. 

• 80% will show confidence that they can do well in math. 

• 78% will report the ability to understand articles related to data analytics. 

• 80% will know how to analyze or interpret data. 

• 65% will consider taking math courses in college. 

• 85% will understand that math and data are present in a variety of careers.

Please see the Theory of Change chart image below. 

While G3 is a digitized curriculum, the Educator Institute that will help greatly increase its distribution is not currently tech-based. We are eager to work with MIT to introduce ed tech to the Institute in order to make the offering more turnkey for the GINYC staff who provide resources and the teachers who attend.

Full-time staff: 8

• Chief Program Officer

• Assistant Vice President of Programs

• G3 Program Manager

• Senior Director of Training/Development

• Leadership Specialist

• E-Learning Coordinator

• High School Program Director

• Marketing Director

Part-time staff: 1

• Program Specialist

GINYC launched G3 nearly 8 years ago.

Over the years, we have added to the diversity of our board and staff, although there is still work to be done. Our leadership team is 50% people of color, and over 80% of our staff identify as BIPOC. Recruiting for diverse members of the board is a priority of our board nominating committee. We have a full roster of trainings for staff at all levels so they understand the pathways to advancement in the organization, along with other professional development trainings on topics such as fundraising and finance, communications and public speaking, and more. 

GINYC’s statement on Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) reads:

At GINYC, we are united by our commitment to creating safe and supportive girl-positive spaces. Our programming cultivates environments where all girl-identified young people are seen and heard. Our organization strives to be a model for sustainable change within our society. We recognize that for true diversity to be realized, equity, inclusion and belonging must also be present. To embody these principles, we commit to ongoing work in allyship, inclusivity, transparency, and accountability with staff, funders, and supporters. 

Diversity: We embrace diversity within our organization and in the communities we live and serve in, inclusive of culture, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and gender identity, age, class, religion, and people with disabilities. We aim to lead by example with a workforce that reflects the rich diversity and unique characteristics of our constituents and of New York City. 

Equity: Each employee and every role at GINYC is essential in fulfilling our mission. Through ongoing and intentional professional talent development resources, we aim to provide equitable access to opportunities for advancement within our organization and empower our staff to show up and strive to be stronger, smarter, and bolder each and every day.

Inclusion & Belonging: The culture at GINYC focuses on building empathetic relationships and supportive structures that encourage the free and open expression of ideas, innovation, and creativity. We are advocates for each other and for the youth we serve. We encourage a sense of belonging and authenticity, value collaboration, and intentionally seek to compensate for, and ultimately eliminate, the barriers that prevent equal access to resources, opportunities, and advancement.

To help hold ourselves accountable to these values, GINYC’s DEIB consultant, Nicole Smart of Smart EDI Solutions, conducts an annual employee survey, the results of which are presented at our annual all-staff retreat. In addition to questions about self-identification, which help us understand staff demographics, employees are also asked to rate the degree to which they agree with statements that reveal the organization's culture, such as “I am made to feel like I’m an important member of the organization” and “Policies and procedures encourage DEIB in the workplace.” The presentation is also a time to reflect on actions taken in response to the prior year’s survey, and to present priority focuses for the year ahead. For example, last year’s survey spurred the expansion of mental health support through the addition of an employee assistance program.

As a 501(c)(3) non-profit, our business model is not driven by making large sums of money in excess of operating costs. That said, we need to fund ourselves adequately to accomplish our long-term mission, and, to do so, employ a hybrid business model that includes government funding; fundraising from foundations, corporations, and donors; as well as a fee-for-service model. 

Our partners include public schools for whom we provide daily comprehensive programming that is largely funded by NYC’s Department of Youth and Community Services. Beyond our comprehensive sites, we also provide select signature programs and teacher training support. Our school-based partners connect us with students and teachers and provide us with infrastructure, facilities, security, and management to deliver our programs. We charge our charter school partners a fee per program that covers the vast majority of our costs, with external funding from corporations, foundations, donors, and fundraising events covering the remainder. We expect our partners outside of the government funded network to pay the fee per program in exchange for the key value we provide: high quality, innovative programming. 

Our customers are public schools, charter school chains, low-cost private school chains, and other nonprofits, including Girls Inc affiliates throughout the country. Our beneficiaries are teen girls of color from under-served communities; the value we provide to them is learning to navigate big data, as well as other 21st century skills.

At scale, our models will be more cost-effective (current average cost per student per year is $500) and will provide greater ROI in learning outcomes than traditional learning methods by leveraging our existing G3 platform and maximizing its utilization. In the future, we will explore a market-based/end-user paying model, where families can opt to pay a nominal amount to access our platform—leveraging our platform and generating revenue by working with low-cost private and public school systems.

GINYC’s revenue streams include funding from corporations, foundations, individuals, government, fundraising events, and earned income. Our highest revenue stream comes from the government, followed by corporations, and then foundations. We have been a financially stable nonprofit organization for 25 years, weathering such major disruptive events including the 9/11 terrorist attack, financial crisis of 2008, and the COVID pandemic. 

GINYC is poised to scale programs like G3 because we know our organization is sustainable for years to come. We have emerged from the pandemic with an organization that is financially secure, and our budget and participant reach is on a growth trajectory. Income has steadily risen from $3 million in FY2020 to over $5 million projected for the current fiscal year, which closes on June 30, 2023.

GINYC and our mission to advance gender equity attract support from a diverse array of companies across sectors. For example, G3 was developed in partnership with and with seed funding from Moodys, who continues to be corporate sponsor of the program at the level of $50,000 annually. 

Organizationally, government funding comes primarily from NYC’s Department of Youth and Community Development. Foundation funding sources include A.C. & E. Foundation, Barker Welfare, Charles Hayden, Equality Can’t Wait, Hyde & Watson, H.W. Wilson, International Youth, Old Oaks, Overbrook, Pinkerton, Sunshine, Rona Jaffe, Washington Square, and Weinberg Foundation. Corporate funding sources include Aerie, AlphaSights, Armadillo, BNY Mellon, Bread Financial, Con Edison, Dior, Elsevier, Google.org ($1M won for their Impact Challenge for Women & Girls), Hedley May, Kate Spade, Konrad Group, State Street, TIAA, Macquarie, Madison Square Garden, Neuberger Berman, Rakuten, Revolve, TD Securities, Katapult, and Merrill Lynch.