Date: April 2, 2010

Explorit Science Center would like to acknowledge and thank their most recent corporate donors.
By Peter Willson

"Intel has always been a big supporter of Explorit." states Lindsay Poss a Development Associate for Explorit. Once again, Intel answered the call for support by donating $10,000. Lou Ziskind Explorit's Executive Director explains, "A big portion of the donation will be used to provide Family Science Nights for schools in the Sacramento Unified School District. A smaller portion of the funds will be used to allow us to develop a Robotics component that we will introduce during our 2010 summer camp program." Over the past 20 years Intel has donated over $180,000 to support Explorit's outreach programs.

Dr. Rick Baker, a Kaiser Permanente pediatrician and Explorit Board President was all smiles this past March 24th when he announced that the Kaiser Permanente Community Benefit Program donated $10,000 to Explorit's health programs. Dr. Baker explains the crucial benefit to our community from this Kaiser Permanente contribution, "This money will allow Explorit to provide it's mobile health education programs to schools which might not otherwise have access to high quality, science-based health education." Explorit plans to visit several Sacramento Valley Title One schools and provide for them the "Journey Through the Human Body" science assembly program. This program is designed to get an entire student body excited about human biology through a dynamic multi-media presentation that includes live experiments conducted by student volunteers in the audience. This donation adds to the long-standing relationship between Kaiser Permanente and Explorit.

"The West Sacramento Foundation strongly supports science education through helping to provide resources that make opportunities available," said Lou Ziskind, Executive Director of Explorit. He adds, "We have long appreciated The West Sacramento Foundation in helping Explorit to advance scientific knowledge to children with fun and stimulating programs." The West Sacramento Foundation generously donated $1,500 to provide funding for bus transportation for schools that will be taking fieldtrips to Explorit.

"Although the financial contributions are a great gift, sometimes what we need are 'things'." Peter Willson the Director of Marketing and Development stated. In this case, the 'things' that he is referring to is a set of after school science kits worth over $1,000 donated by Agilent. The science kits that were donated will allow the Explorit educators to add even more hands on tools to their outreach programs. Willson describes the value of this type of donation, This will be another great way to allow students to really get engaged in science."

Explorit Science Center has received $3,000 from State Farm Insurance, to fund the exhibition "Transportation," set to run September 11, 2010 to January 2, 2011.

Members of The Venture Club of Davis spent all last summer pouring beer at the Farmers Market. Once the last keg was tapped and brew was poured they had raised enough money to support a variety of local charities. Explorit Science Center was one such charity. The Venture Club donated $1,000 to provide an after school science assembly, Health In Your World, to an underserved school in Yolo County this spring.

Over the years Schilling Robotics has been one of, if not the, biggest donors to Explorit. It would appear as if there is a definite community benefit that Explorit provides that Schilling supports. Once again, Schilling has emerged as a driving resource behind the longevity of Explorit's programs.

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Explorit Science Center is open from 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. on Tuesdays, and 11 a.m. - 5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays at 2801 Second St. in Davis. Admission is $4 general, free for ages 3 and under, as well as members and teachers with ID. For more information: http://www.explorit.org or (530) 756-0191.

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