The Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation today announced the receipt of a $150,000 gift from the estate of longtime Kingfisher resident Ralph Enix.
The Enix family designated the gift for support of the Oklahoma Science Project at OMRF.
Enix became a member of the OMRF Board of Directors in 1960 and was ultimately named a life director, serving continuously until his death in April. His association with the foundation began in the 1940s when he traveled the state with the founders of OMRF to raise money for the construction of its first building.
The Oklahoma Science Project is designed to provide selected Oklahoma public high school teachers, designated as Foundation Scholars, with laboratory training and experience at OMRF, and ongoing mentoring and encouragement when they return to their classrooms.
Each summer, these teachers have come to OMRF for eight weeks to conduct classic scientific experiments that won Nobel Prizes in the 1950s and 1960s. The classic experiments provided the basis for experiments and research being done today, such as the human genome project, and can be easily and inexpensively replicated in today’s high school laboratories.
Following the summer of laboratory work at OMRF, each teacher is given a laptop computer, through which they can communicate with foundation scientists.
Kingfisher High School Principal Andy Evans was a 1996 graduate of the program when he was a science teacher in Tuttle.
This year, the Oklahoma Science Project will test a pilot program that teams “master” teachers, who are graduates of the Foundation Scholars Program, with new science teachers in Oklahoma’s rural high schools. The high school laboratories will be able to communicate with each other and OMRF over the state’s OneNet Internet connection.
Mark Maehs of Kingfisher High School and Sheryl Johnson of Kingfisher Middle School have been named two of the original science teachers in the program.
“This program will provide a direct link to the world of current science to Kingfisher science teachers and students,” said Dr. Phil Silverman, OMRF Molecular and Cellular Biology Program Head, who assumed leadership of the Oklahoma Science Project in 1992. “Mr. Enix’s gift will ultimately help make this exciting new way to teach and learn science available to high school students not only in Kingfisher, but across Oklahoma.”
The Enix gift will augment gifts from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Williams Companies of Tulsa.