IRVING, Texas — Crowded around a workshop table, four girls at Lorenzo de Zavala Middle School puzzled over a Lego machine they built. As they flashed a purple card in front of a light sensor, nothing happened.

The teacher at the Dallas-area school emphasized that there is no such thing as mistakes, only iterations, in the building process. So the girls dug back into the box of blocks and pulled out an orange card. They held it over the sensor and the machine kicked into motion.

"Oh! Oh, it reacts differently to different colors," sixth grader Sofia Cruz said.

In de Zavala's first year as a choice school focused on science, technology, engineering and math, the school recruited a sixth grade class that's half girls. School leaders hope the girls will stick with STEM fields. In de Zavala

See Full Page