Our History
CityScience was founded in 2010 to carry forward the Center for the Urban Environment’s (CUE) portfolio of place-based STEM lessons developed over thirty years of work with urban youth.
With the goal of addressing the shortage of K-8 science teachers, CityScience shifted CUE’s model to emphasize capacity building. Our model not only provides hands-on curricula and field trips, it increases access to materials and trains after school and classroom teachers to lead fun STEM programs and transformative projects that improve the environment.
We’ve found that tapping into NYC’s STEM workforce (the largest in the U.S.) creates engaging urban STEM curricula, connects students to career prospects, and helps drive a self-supporting STEM education system. Since our founding, we’ve worked with government departments, community-based organizations, environmental groups, parks, and museums to build bridges between public schools and citywide STEM resources.
At our heart, CityScience is a learning organization. By learning together with our partners, our collaborative approach results in STEM projects and curriculum tailored to the communities we work in.
In the past seven years, we’ve proudly served over 90 Amazing Clients.
For more about our work, check out our Programs.
Our Timeline
Check out our history timeline! Hover over the photos for more information.
2010: CityScience developed curriculum and co-led the Great Falls Youth Corps in Paterson NJ’s new national park. Youth produced GPS data and wrote the park’s first brochure.
2011: CityScience built a learning garden, launched an annual science fair, and became a development model for NDMS’s network peers with school leaders in West Harlem’s New Design Middle School.
2012: CityScience provided hands-on explorations and delivered agency-wide workshops that helped CAMBA exceed the NYC Department of Youth & Community Development’s STEM expectations measured by hours, curriculum, and site visits.
2013: CityScience joined the Hall of Science, TASC, Cornell, and FHI 360 in the Partnership for After School Education’s Strengthening STEM initiative that trained 100 Master trainers at 30 organizations serving 4,500 students.
2014: The National Urban League (NUL) selected CityScience as their National STEM Coach reporting to the senior education team. CityScience developed practical tools and trainings that 98 NUL affiliates currently use to build STEM programs.
2015: CityScience developed, piloted, and enhanced nine activities for the Lowline Lab, connecting STEM learning to the Lab’s technology and design.
2016: NYC Department of Youth & Community Development chose CityScience to pilot a new summer camp program, Food in the Big Apple, that integrates cooking, nutrition, culture, and social justice through 10 tasty meals.
2017: CityScience continued innovating as the STEM enrichment provider for two of NYC’s first after school programs for youth living in transitional housing for the homeless.
Current and Former Clients
Additional Clients
Community Association of Progressive Dominicans, Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy, CAMBA, The Child Center of New York, Cypress Hills Local Development Corporation, Directions for Our Youth, ExpandEd, Girls for Gender Equity, Jacob Riis Settlement House, Lowline Development Corporation, Midwood Development Corporation, National Urban League, NYC Department of Education, NYC Department of Youth and Community Development, NYC Department of Parks and Recreation, Partnership for After School Education, Queens Community House, South Asian Youth Action, and Women in Need.