The Science and Technology Education and TRAINing (STEDTRAIN) Committee is accepting proposals for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Seed Grants, for the 2025-26 school year. Any teacher in a public or State approved k-12 school within Jackson, Madison, Marshall, Morgan, and Limestone Counties in Alabama and Lincoln County in Tennessee may submit a proposal. Our definition of a teacher is anyone who instructs and educates K-12 children in a state-recognized school system. A teaching certification from their respective state is not necessarily required.

Since the Program began in 1988, it has distributed over $689,302 for 627 individual grants and other worthy educational projects. The grants currently benefit approximately 10,000 students directly and about 20,000 indirectly a year.

Seed Grants are innovative programs that “seed” the student's enthusiasm for STEM education in the several contexts, to include Bloom's taxonomy, enhancing technology awareness and interest, and technical careers. The projects must involve hands-on activities by the students, and can be either in-class or extracurricular.

We offer two types of Seed Grants. Teachers may apply for either a Type I or a Type II grant, but not both. The requirements for these two types of Seed Grants can be found on our website.

Type I Standard Seed Grants range from $200 to $1000, and are awarded for innovative, hands-on projects that will stimulate the student's interest in pursuing a technical career.

Type II Enhanced Seed Grants are a more challenging class of grants that qualify for awards of $1500 to $2500. Additional information is required in the proposal.

The most important element of a successful proposal provides a solid program plan. The plan lays out the learning goals and objectives to be accomplished, including how any new technology or tools will be used, and how the learning objectives are evaluated.

Visit our website (https://stedtrain.org) for details.