Transcript Slide 1

Catalyzing partnerships for
developing STEM outreach programs
Lynford Goddard
NSF Noyce Conference
May 25, 2012
How did you develop a love for STEM?
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
2/21
Outline
• ChicTech
– Saturday program for high school girls
• Girls Learning Electrical Engineering (GLEE)
– 1 week summer camp for high school girls
• Brain Fitness Fridays (BFFs)
– 4 Friday program for K-8 students
• Illinois Summer Academy
– 3 day program for high school students
• Principles of Experimental Research
– Class for senior undergrads and new grad students
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
3/21
Chic Tech
• CS and ECE students and faculty organized a Saturday
workshop for local high school girls in fall 2009
– Modeled after the very successful UIUC Saturday Physics for
Everyone (SPE) program
– Put together a good list of presenters and activities
– Sent program flyers to local teachers and counselors
• No high school students showed up!
• Lessons learned:
– Not all outreach projects will be successful
– New programs must have a strong partnership with the schools
for recruiting
– Participants should register in advance
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
4/21
GLEE Camp
Girls Learning Electrical Engineering
Among all engineering fields, EE has one of the largest
gender gaps (ASEE reports only 11.5% of EE degrees
nationwide were awarded to women in 2009)
Partnered with the existing and highly successful Girls’
Adventures in Math, Engineering, and Science (GAMES)
program for 6th - 9th grade girls to develop a new EE program
in 2010 for girls entering 10th - 11th grade
Explores several fields in EE: electronics, circuits, power and
energy, signal processing, electromagnetics, and
nanotechnology by studying how a cell phones works
Program seeks to address both recruitment and retention
[email protected]
G.A.M.E.S.
Original 4 camps (2009)
Civil Engineering (6th-7th)
BioImaging (8th-9th)
[email protected]
CS (7th-8th)
BioEng/ChemEng (9th-10th)
G.A.M.E.S.
GLEE Camp
Program consists of:
1. morning classes that include hands-on labs
to provide exposure to 10 sub-fields of EE,
2. team projects in the afternoons to allow the
girls to do “engineering!”
3. hands on demos in research labs at Illinois
4. social activities after dinner, and
5. connecting campers to faculty mentors and
female students in EE at Illinois and to
Motorola volunteers
[email protected]
G.A.M.E.S.
Encouraging Innovation
Main project: build an FM phone (FM transmitter)
out of discrete components – the girls apply what
they’ve learned about EE and cell phones. Each
team synthesizes their ideas and designs/lays out
their circuit on a prototyping board. They perform
experiments on their prototypes. Finally, campers
solder together their own FM phone that they get
to play with in the dorms and to take home.
[email protected]
G.A.M.E.S.
GLEE 2010
[email protected]
G.A.M.E.S.
Hands on activities
Each team has a bag with a battery clip, batteries,
an LED, and a resistor
Carry out a 2-factor experiment to determine
under which conditions the LED will light up
No talking with other teams (we want independent
results)
Factors
x1=Red wire to shorter (-1) or longer (+1) LED leg
x2=Resistor and LED in series (-1) or parallel (+1)
[email protected]
G.A.M.E.S.
LED experiment
• Factors
– x1=Red wire to shorter (-1) or longer (+1) LED leg
– x2=Resistor and LED in series (-1) or parallel (+1)
Parallel
Series
Battery
LED
Resistor
RESULTS
Battery
Short leg (x1=-1)
LED
Resistor
Long leg (x1=+1)
Parallel (x2=+1)
Series (x2=-1)
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
11/21
Curiosity based learning
• Not given all the details. Some groups find only 1
connection works whereas some other groups find
their device always fails. They have to figure out why.
Opens a curiosity gap.
• Teams want to solve the mystery
– Allow them to talk with other teams to find out what variables
were overlooked
• Teaches them how to draw conclusions from
observations and that the world is full of non-ideal
problems where a solution may not exist
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
12/21
Feedback from non-STEM staff to
make an age appropriate workbook
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
13/21
Catalyzing Partnerships
Camp planning: Lynford Goddard, Young Mo Kang, Steve McKeown, Minosca Alcantara, Kris Ackerman, Sue
Larson, Kathy Nibeck, Renee Massey, and Heather Thompson
Recruiting: High school teachers and counselors, NSBE, SHPE, family, friends
Assessment: College of Engineering, Women in Engineering
Camp manuals: Lynford Goddard, Young Mo Kang, Steve McKeown, Cori Johnson, Alex Haser, Alandria Lark,
Jacquelyn DiMonte, Gautam Shine, and Amir Arbabi
Curriculum review: Kris Ackerman, Renee Massey, Heather Thompson, Jana Sebestik
Camp Instructors: Professors Lynford Goddard, Tangül Başar, Jennifer Bernhard, Marie-Christine Brunet, Xiuling
Li, Alejandro Dominguez-Garcia, Philip Krein and Students Young Mo Kang and Steve McKeown
Lab Assistants: Rebecca Marcotte, Stephanie Chou, Sai Ma, and Kamaria Massey
Counselors: Alex Haser, Kelli Coleman, and Christina Poon
Tour Leaders: Prof. Stephen Boppart, Stanton Cady, Lydia Majure, Dane Sievers, Young Mo Kang, Steve
McKeown, and Josephine Lu
ECE lab support: Dan Mast and Wally Smith
Guest presentations: Peggy Matson from Motorola
This camp was made possible through generous donations by the Motorola Foundation, donated software from
National Instruments, and technical support from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, the
Women in Engineering program, and the College of Engineering.
[email protected]
G.A.M.E.S.
GAMES 2012
Moved from middle school to high school in 2011
Robotics (9th-10th)
Bioengineering (9th-11th)
Chemical Engineering (9th-11th)
Environmental Engineering (9th-12th)
Aerospace Engineering (9th-12th)
Girls Learning Electrical Engineering (10th-12th)
Girls Learning About Materials (10th-12th)
Needed to form new partnerships, e.g. with high
school teachers/counselors to be able to recruit
G.A.M.E.S.
[email protected]
Outline
• ChicTech
– Saturday program for high school girls
• Girls Learning Electrical Engineering (GLEE)
– 1 week summer camp for high school girls
• Brain Fitness Fridays (BFFs)
– 4 Friday program for K-8 students
• Illinois Summer Academy
– 3 day program for high school students
• Principles of Experimental Research
– Class for senior undergrads and new grad students
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
16/21
Brain Fitness Fridays (BFFs)
• Kinesiology Department runs a popular Summer Sports
Fitness camp for K-8 students (Mon-Thur)
• In 2011, Technology Entrepreneur Center and
Engineering faculty launched BFFs to engage these
students in hands-on STEM activities
– Topics included design, entrepreneurship, nanotechnology,
robotics, the math and science of sports, and Mentos launching
– Parents loved it: educational and cheaper than paying a
babysitter
• Partnership created a unique outreach program
– Reached out to kids who were not pre-disposed to STEM
– 42 kids (19 female) with ages ranging from 5-14 participated in
the BFF program during the four week camp
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
17/21
Brain Fitness Fridays (BFFs)
• Leveraged existing outreach efforts
– NSF Nano-CEMMS center, Micro and Nanotechnology Lab,
Physics Van, FabLab, TEC and the Solar Decathlon project
• Split group as K-4 and 5-8 for age appropriate activities
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
18/21
Illinois Summer Academy
• New outreach program for summer 2012
– 3 day camps in: Aerospace Engineering, Agricultural & Biological
Engineering, Art & Design, Bioengineering, Crop Science,
Electrical & Computer Engineering, Landscape Architecture &
Urban Planning, Leadership, Molecular & Cellular Biology,
Physics, Veterinary Medicine
• Partnership with national 4-H club through the UI chapter
• Plan to leverage existing outreach efforts
– GLEE and Engineering Open House activities
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
19/21
New course: ECE 498LG (446)
Principles of Experimental Research
Education and Outreach
• Develop students into independent researchers
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Design of experiment
Experimental techniques/instruments
Data collection and analysis
Oral/written presentation of research
Scientific computing (LabVIEW, Matlab)
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Goddard
([email protected])
6
20/21
Summary
• Do what you do best – EDUCATE!
• Form partnerships to handle logistics, provide unique
learning or research experiences, or perform
assessment and evaluation
– Let them do what they do best
– Work closely to recruit, retain, and inspire your students
• Leverage your efforts
– If they haven't seen it, it's new to them
– No need to reinvent the wheel
Lynford Goddard ([email protected])
21/21