Alabama Lends Math, Science Resources

Pelham, Ala.

Along a busy stretch of commercial roadway, an ordinary-looking office building serves as a sort of lending library for math and science education.

This facility, located in a suburb south of Birmingham, is one of 11 service sites for the Alabama Math, Science, and Technology Initiative, one of the largest and most ambitious state-run math and science programs in the country. The ground floor includes a sprawling warehouse, packed with math- and science-classroom equipment—graphing calculators, water-monitoring devices, beakers, flasks, even GPS units—which are shipped out on loan to schools, week after week.

Up a flight of stairs is a team of traveling mathematics and science “specialists,” who lend their expertise to schools, helping teachers with difficult...