A one-day STEM-a-Thon was held on Saturday, November 15, at Centerville Elementary School in Virginia Beach. This fun-filled day was developed and ran by the STEM Education Alliance and coordinated by Operation PRIDE. The STEM-a-Thon hosted 25 military-connected fourth and fifth grade students from Centerville Elementary School.

The day was filled with engaging activities that revolved around electricity. These hands-on, minds-on activities included:

• Discovering, through guided inquiry and exploration, how to make series and parallel circuits using wires, bulbs, and batteries.
• Identifying insulators and conductors.
• Creating an electromagnet from a wire and nail.
• Building a working motor.
• Experimenting with Snap Circuits kits.

At the end of the day, parents were treated to a discussion on various STEM careers, followed by a poster presentation of the day’s activities by their children. Each participating child got to take home a Snap Circuits Jr. kit, and several large Snap Circuits kits were given to Centerville Elementary School for future use by their teachers.

A big thank you goes out to the Norfolk Naval Shipyard for sending two engineers who did a great job of working with the students and sharing their expertise.

The STEM Education Alliance is having an exciting year working with 13 public schools in Virginia Beach. In conjunction with the MCASP and Operation PRIDE teams from Virginia Beach, the College of William and Mary’s STEM Education Alliance is helping teachers find ways to bring STEM instruction into their classrooms. An initial workshop was conducted by the STEM Education Alliance at each of the schools to share the Five Strands of STEM Instruction with the teachers. As the year progresses, the STEM Education Alliance will be implementing professional development plans to meet the individual needs of each of the participating schools.

STEM is typically thought of in terms of content (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), but the STEM Education Alliance hopes to show that good STEM instruction is more than just teaching STEM content. The Five Strands of STEM Instruction, as developed by the STEM Education Alliance, includes strategies that all teachers can benefit from using: cooperative learning, thematic instruction, co-teaching, explicit instruction, and inquiry-based teaching.

The STEM Education Alliance is looking forward to a great year working with many remarkable K-12 teachers in Virginia Beach.

A four-day STEM Summer Academy was held at Brandon Middle School on July 28-31, 2014. This action-packed event was sponsored by the Department of Defense Education Activity and developed by the College of William and Mary’s STEM Education Alliance in conjunction with the Operation PRIDE team. The academy hosted 25 middle school students from both Larkspur Middle School and Brandon Middle School.

The Operation PRIDE STEM Summer Academy was designed to help students develop their problem-solving skills and ability to work in a team while using mathematics and science to solve challenges. Student teams competed in the Tower Build Challenge, the Water Rocket Challenge, the M&M Statistics Challenge, and the Electronics Challenge. Through these hands-on activities, students explored physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, and mathematics in an engaging, high-energy environment. Students also had an opportunity to explore career opportunities in STEM-related fields.

The STEM Education Alliance (@stemeducation) enjoys sharing relevant information and spreading the word about STEM Education.  Recently, we were listed as one of the top 25 STEM experts worth following on Twitter.  There is so much information out there, especially on Twitter.  Multiple times a week, we sift through many articles to find the best, then we tweet our findings to our followers.

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A one-week STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) summer academy was held on base at Quantico Middle/High School, June 16-20, 2014. The Fourth Annual STEM Summer Academy, which supports the DoDEA curriculum standards, was a huge success. Forty students teamed up with 15 teachers, 4 Engineering Interns and 12 scientists and engineers.   This year's activities were slightly different from the past three years to give the students that have previously attended the Academy more variety.  The activities included LEGO's Green City Challenge, where the students completed multiple robotic challenges involving energy.  The students also participated in an infectious disease transmission lab, a bridge building activity, card tower activity and a buoyancy activity. Through hands-on challenges, students explored physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, robotics, and mathematics  in an engaging, high energy environment.

Learn more about Summer Academies.

The year is underway for the Virginia K12 STEM Outreach program. The team of teachers, scientists and engineers (S&Es), and William and Mary's STEM Education Alliance will have a busy year with more than 17 schools participating in various activities. The Virginia Demonstration Project (VDP) originated in 2005 and has reached over 38,000 students through in-class programs and summer academies.

The school year, in-class program consists of collaborative teacher and S&E teaching teams who deliver integrated science and mathematics lessons wrapped around a real world problem. The STEM Education Alliance has created an integrated science and mathematics lesson plans, R2: Relevant Robotics, which are linked to both the Virginia SOLs and Common Core Standards.  In addition to robotics, this is the second year of evaluating the SeaPerch program being implemented in five different Virginia school divisions.  SeaPerch is a hands-on STEM activity that allows students to create an underwater robot while learning to use tools and problem solving skills.

In response to budgetary and man power issues, The STEM Education Alliance has developed a Blended Virtual Mentoring protocol. This was piloted at Post Oak Middle School in Spotsylvania public schools last school year.  An S&E participates in both in-class and virtual demonstrations and question and answer sessions with students. A virtual presence in the classroom reduces travel time and increases the S&Es availability for increased student engagement.

Due to the program's eight year span of service within the schools, the STEM Education Alliance has developed a longitudinal focus. High school students who participated in the VDP in-class program during seventh or eighth grade are interviewed during the last several months of their senior year.  Based on two years of data, with more than 2800 students participating in the surveys, students report that they were more likely to pursue a career in technology, mathematics, or engineering than students who did not participate in the VDP in-class program.   Given the four to five year span between program participation and follow up evaluation, the results are quite significant for long-term impact of the in-class program.

In addition to in-class programs, the Virginia outreach effort includes several summer academies. Summer academies have been ongoing since 2005 and have been held in Dahlgren as well as Quantico Marine base.  Summer Academy students engage in challenges related to engineering, robotics, ballistics, rocketry, electronics, biology and chemistry, and environmental science.  Stay tuned -- the 2013-14 year promises to be another year of remarkable students, teachers and S&Es engaged in hands-on, minds-on learning!