Stirring up STEM!

The specific problem I am working to solve within the Gender Equity and Stem challenge is the societal impact of the lack of programs available to support K-12 educators in effectively teaching and engaging girls in afterschool settings. 

The scale of the problem is that in the United States Women make up less than 30% of the workforce for careers in STEM, (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math).  Men vastly outnumber women in these fields.  This devastating statistic reveals the effects on our society by showing us the impact of the absence of our ability to access the creativity women possess and could contribute to these fields.  It also limits wage earning possibilities for women minorities as well.

The scale of the problem in the community I work with is the lack of afterschool and summer programs available that offer STEM instruction and engagement.  Because of the average income per household in this community, if there were a summer camp opportunity available, many students would then face the additional obstacle of affordability.  One hundred percent of students in the Halethorpe, Maryland area school I work with, qualifies for free and reduced lunch and approximately sixty percent of students take advantage of it.

In a population of 600 students in one school, there are no after school opportunities for students to participate in or access STEM instruction targeted to promoting interest amongst female students starting at a young age.  In this instance this problem affects just about 600 students. 

The specific problem I am working to solve in the gender equity and stem challenge is to increase the impact of my work with students by creating a program to support K-12 educators in effectively teaching and engaging girls in STEM in an after-school setting.

My solution is the service of an afterschool program to provide an opportunity to support K-12 educators in effectively teaching and engaging girls in STEM in an afterschool setting.  My STEM program will take place throughout the school year as an afterschool program which immediately follows the instructional school day along with a three-week, full day summer camp program.

The focus of study will be based in experiential education using the engineering process.  The afterschool program and summer camp will focus on two concentrations.  Students will participate in a flipped class model and lead experiential activities in two areas.

The first area is the study of STEM through technology, coding, mathematics and robotics.  Young learners will build, program and code to interact and innovate with technology and robots to study renewable resources and sources of renewable energy, they will learn about different forms of energy and build machines that support the use of renewable resources and discover how different forms of energy can help us to have a more sustainable environment.

The next focus is film production.  The students will select a team-member- job (career path) in news production using and become a member of a team in our news reporting station.  Students will produce a good news channel to research, produce, edit, and report news to cover three different topics on their YouTube channel.  The topics are good news in our community, good news in the community, what’s new in technology to make our lives easier and more efficient, and Interesting facts for kids. There will also be field trips to technology showcases, a public broadcasting news station, and a robotics competition.

I would like to offer this solution to support K-12 educators and provide STEM learning access to girls for either a very low cost or no cost at all.

The idea behind this STEM program is to help young girls understand that creativity is within them.  This minority needs easy access to exposure to STEM innovation and careers.  It is my hope that by supporting K-12 educators in effectively teaching and engaging girls in a STEM afterschool setting that we can create more opportunities for engaging girls in STEM and create more interest in future STEM careers for this minority. 

My solution will serve students and grades K to 12 and educators.  Overall it will support the community at large by engaging and promoting careers in stem for an underrepresented population. Women only represent 28% of the workforce in careers in science technology engineering and math my solution will serve to change that statistic in starting to expose young girls to stem at an early age in an afterschool setting.

My solution will serve to address their needs through supporting K-12 educators with a program that is not currently being offered to this community.  In seeking ongoing ways to address their needs my plan is to continue to work with the school’s Community Facilitating Officer.  It is this person’s role to identify the needs that are specific to the population served by each independent school.  Through this partnership, I will develop my own tools to further connect with the community in an effort to identify their needs.  Because I have worked with the BCPS community for seven years now, I have had a great deal of experiences working with the community and identifying, and meeting their needs in through teacher leadership, educational consulting, creating connections within the community first as a teacher and creating partnerships between the community and the services I provide as an educational consultant and tutor.  Part of my role with the community in the past was as an AET.  An AET (Academic Engagement Teacher has a role specific to identifying academic and familial needs of the community.)  Having made these connections, provided these services, and supported the community in these roles has helped me to identify and address the needs of this community. 

I am well positioned to deliver the solution because I have worked as a schoolteacher, educational consultant and community resource connector (AET) in this community for the past 7 years and have made several community connections as well as connections with the students and the parents this solution would benefit and support. 

I have connections with and have shared with three administrators my goals for starting an afterschool STEM program and my quest for inspiring more girls to be involved with STEM activities and how I would like to pivot my business to support this goal.  I have their support.

 Just recently one of the schools I am working closely with hired a community school facilitator whose role is to research the community needs and implement activities to support the specific needs of the community.  My connection to this CSF gives me the opportunity to develop a very meaningful solution based on the input of the community as it is the CSF’s job to research input from the community and support students at the school level.

I have also had the experience of working as an AET for one of the schools in the community I serve.  An academic engagement teacher utilizes testing data to create school programs based on student needs.  I have learned a great deal from completing this role.

In working with the principles of the three schools and the community that I have served, I have identified a substantial interest in providing a STEM program to promote more involvement from this minority. 

Best Yet educational solutions has provided several educational solutions in the community for the past 2 years in the form of providing individual and group tutoring and educational consultation.  As an employee of the school system, I started an afterschool robotics club which was well received but underfunded and very limited as program of the school system.  Thirteen out of fifteen participants were boys.  This further signifies a need to promote STEM activities to girls in the community.

For my solution, I will be pivoting my business Best Yet, to provide a different service in the community in the form of the afterschool STEM program and summer camp.

As the sole proprietor of Best Yet educational services I am connected with a network of small business owners who provide excellent guidance.  I have served the Baltimore County Public School system for seven years and have an extensive knowledge of the needs of the population my Gender Equity in STEM solution would serve.  In spite of all the provisions I have in place, I look forward to growing my knowledge and skill set with all of the offerings Made by MIT Solve to support the success of my STEM Program solution. 

I look forward to the resources of gaining network partners, the resource of Learning and development modules aimed at refining my business model, theory of change, and plans for scaling.  This guidance will play a major role in the success and growth of my solution!  Individual and group leadership coaching, a process of reflection, learning, and change to maximize my personal and professional potential, and a peer-to-peer network to build a community of practice with dedicated spaces to convene throughout the duration of the support program will be a greatly appreciated resource that is sure to further enhance my Gender Equity in STEM solution.

Additionally, I will need financial support to cover the costs of the program, the purchase or lease of a space, the kits the students will use, and the components of the television studio they will utilize.

I work within the community I serve through my baseline employment as a teacher and through my educational services proprietorship, Best Yet.  Because I am so connected to the community, I serve I am well aware of the interest in a service such as an afterschool STEM program to support K-12 educators regarding the needs of the community.

It is very simplistic how my solution is innovative. There are no programs in communities with demographics like the one that I will be serving that offer an after-school STEM program that promotes interest from this minority. What is innovative about my program is that it will give students experiential hands-on learning where they will have the chance to be innovative and completely interactive with the media they create. In my solution for Gender Equity, girls will learn the engineering process, but they will also learn how to articulate themselves using what is referred to as a “Big Voice”.  Part of the program involves creating a presentation and then presenting your learning.  It involves learning about things that affect the world around us. Gaining and expressing your understanding to create a feeling of autonomy which will lead to producing more female leaders in the STEM field where there is a big absence.

My Gender Equity solution involves project based learning in STEM in an afterschool setting which is an option that does not currently exist.

My impact goal for this year is to create a viable successful program in an afterschool setting.  Over the next five years I would like to create a partnership with the school system to provide programs such as this to multiple schools throughout Baltimore County Public Schools.

I plan to achieve this goal by starting small, building partnerships, connections, within the community and using data to drive growth.  I plan to utilize the guidance provided by the supports in mentorship and networking by the offers provided to solution recipients.

I would like to focus on the following indicators to measure progress towards my impact goals:

• End all forms of discrimination against all women and girls everywhere

• Promote the ideation that female participation in STEM activities and careers is essential to creating a sustainable future

• Adopt and strengthen sound policies and enforceable legislation for the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls at all levels.

Currently, there are no afterschool or summer programs available to promote involvement and access to STEM for students grades K-12 to my target area and school system.  It is my hope that by providing a pilot program such as this, female students will have an unprecedented opportunity to be engaged in STEM, to be exposed to opportunities to explore innovative learning, and to begin a discussion surrounding future careers in STEM they could later pursue.  

I believe this will grow into additional programs that will be fully embraced by the Baltimore County Public School system as this is part of their 21st century compass goals vision.  

In 2012, I started a similar pilot program in Prince Georges County Public schools entitled "Techno Kids" which garnered so much community support, it went from an opportunity for one class, to the entire grade level, and prior to my move to BCPS, I was asked to create a schoolwide Technology program.

One member that is full time and two additional part time members.  

Two years for this specific solution.  I have been working in this field as a sole proprietor creating similar programs since 2012.

It is important that we have a diverse workforce to help us understand the different perspectives held through different life experiences.  

Resources: I will need the resource of 2-3 people. Additionally, financial assistance to secure a location through the purchase or lease of a space and technology and equipment for the production studio as well as additional technology, computers, and the robotic kits.

Key stakeholders: The special partners or groups my solution could benefit from partnering with to deliver my program are administrators of BCPS schools and representatives from Baltimore County Public Schools board of education.  However, because of the connections I have made in the community and the connections I have within the school system already in place this is not a requirement but could benefit the growth of my solution.  I can use my business to introduce and promote the after-school program. Creating a connection with the Baltimore county public library system could also be beneficial in that a connection of this type could help promote Stirring Up STEM!
Cost structure:My biggest expenditure areas will involve the leasing of or purchase of a space and this would change as I scale up because as my Stirring Up STEM after school and summer program grows I will need to purchase more spaces in additional areas or secure leases or create partnerships with the school system in order to make use of their space I imagine that my Stirring Up STEM after school and summer program would have a greater impact and far fewer vulnerabilities as its own dwelling. 

Key activities: The key activities in my program are to provide instruction in after school and during the summer where girls can be inspired to innovate using experiential education techniques and project-based learning to be introduced to the field of science technology engineering, art, and math.  The Stirring Up STEM program has two focus areas: The first focus is exploring technology through experiential education.  Our girls (also known as future innovators, Stirring Up STEM Girls) will participate in coding, programming, and building robot.  As part of their study for this area, they will take a very close look at types of renewable energy resources, and participate in building machines which generate or harness renewable energy resources.  The second area is participation in a news broadcasting channel. We'll create a YouTube channel to present news reports from 3 topics: the latest innovations in technology, news reports of good news in the community, and news reports of tips, & interesting facts.  Basically, the students will apply their STEM knowledge to present Good News. 

Type of intervention:My intervention is a service.  It is an after-school program providing project based experiential learning through lessons and activities in stem for girls in an after school and summer camp setting, to address the deficit we face when it comes to females taking an interest in STEM in school and future careers. I am targeting that group so that we can normalize female participation and student success in the areas of science technology engineering and math so that more girls will be interested and engaged In stem.

My plan is to explore every avenue to fund my work.  I am interested in sustained donations, grants, selling products and services, service contracts to governments, raising investment capital for a combination of all the resources mentioned.  In the past I have utilized donations, a grant, and selling products and services. I would like to build this further and receive guidance and networking opportunities to learn more as these resources are provided to the solution supported recipients.