The Million Girl Moonshot STEM Mini Grant Program provides funding to recruit and engage girls and BIPOC (black, Indigenous, people of color) individuals in STEM, build an engineering mindset in students, and create activities to help develop STEM identity. This year, grantees faced the unique challenge of navigating out-of-school activities in the time of COVID-19. Despite the obstacles posed by the global pandemic, these organizations found creative ways to provide safe, fun, meaningful, and engaging programming to the kids they serve. Educators worked to build virtual and/or socially distanced workshops, made STEM kits with fun activity supplies for kids to use at home, and even brought in local female STEM professionals to speak virtually, act as role models, and foster career exploration. Through diligent work and dedication to improving the lives of Alaska kids, facilitators of these programs have helped increase access to out-of-school STEM opportunities for those currently underrepresented in the field, and have made it possible for more young students to see themselves in any career field, no matter their background.
Nenana Public Library: Women in STEM Afterschool Program
2 participants in the Women in STEM Afterschool Program using their Fairy Tale STEM kits to design, learn, and build an engineering mindset.
Last year, as the pandemic made it impossible for students to attend group-setting afterschool programs, Nenana Public Library developed “Fairy Tale STEM kits” so that girls could still participate in out of school STEM activities. The kits included 6 storybooks, like The Three Billy Goats Gruff , that families could read together and then solve a problem about. For The Billy Goats Gruff, they tackled how to build the bridge so the goats can cross without breaking it. Funds were also used for a “Maker Space Mobile Cart kit” that came loaded with wood, tubing, gears, spools wires, foam, and other supplies to help engineering imaginations grow.
Participants said that they “absolutely love” the program, and the library plans to continue them into the summer! Facilitators have been in touch with Civil Air Patrol and hope to have them join the summer reading program by doing a tour of one of their planes at the airport.
ARE Smart Girls Rock STEM program
Alaska Resource Education used grant funding to ship reusable STEM kits to students across the state, allowing them to participate in a hands-on activity led through Zoom. Each week of the program, students were challenged to build, design, and problem solve. Activities were designed to increase girls’ interest in STEM-related careers and confidence in their STEM capabilities. ARE also connected with 9 different organizations to bring in female guest speakers to share their experiences in STEM and the wide range of STEM job opportunities. The presenters helped the girls to envision themselves in STEM careers.
Girl Scouts of Alaska STEM Patch Series
Social distancing made connecting girls to hands-on activities difficult, but the Girl Scouts of Alaska got creative! In their STEM Patch program, Girl Scouts of Alaska created hands-on experiences that girls could do at home through a monthly webinar series. Girls were encouraged to consider problems in context, envision multiple solutions, persist, learn from failure, work together, and see themselves in successful STEM roles. They were able to develop a stronger sense of self, positive values, and critical thinking, and gain practical life skills.
The Girls Scouts of Alaska collaborated with the US Air Force, the Sloth Conservation Foundation in Costa Rica, and US Forest Service, to provide enriching experiences like their Sloth Science and Forester webinars and Holiday Circuit Events. With an over 60 year history in Alaska, Girl Scouts has established relationships with schools and rural communities. By joining Girl Scouts, girls will have the opportunity to discover STEM fields and participate in the Girl Scout Leadership Experience, all of which can inspire them to explore STEM careers for themselves.
Inspiring Girls to Reach for the (sea)Stars - Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies
The Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies offered both virtual and in-person learning to girls and families, through three outdoor STEM workshops and three unique STEM kits available for check out at the Homer Public Library. The kits were centered on the themes of:
the Properties of Water
Environmental Monitoring
Remote Operated Underwater Vehicles (ROVs).
At the workshops, participants had the opportunity to go on a night-time tide pooling excursion to conduct biodiversity and sea star wasting monitoring surveys, build and test ROVs in the harbor, and conduct cloud observations and water quality sampling.
Likewise, the kits provided supplies for ocean, cloud and ice observations, a marine debris cleanup, designing a personal monitoring study, and conducting water quality sampling on home water supply. CACS also offered virtual presentations by female scientists and Traditional Knowledge Experts to engage students with diverse role models.
Virtual After School at the Museum: Engineering – Anchorage Museum
Completed student project for the Anchorage Museum Virtual Afterschool Program
This virtual program offered by the Anchorage Museum taught kids how to design, test, and retest a prototype, and worked to instill an engineering mindset into the participants. During Week 1, each student designed a spacecraft to explore Mars or Saturn. Participants go to choose between an orbiter and lander spacecraft and decide whether that spacecraft would be powered by solar or nuclear energy. In later weeks, participants designed paper airplanes and built egg drop landers.
Students were taught that failure and unexpected outcomes are an important part of the design process, and that we often learn more from our failures than when things work perfectly the first time. Surveys showed that students felt that the program provided a safe environment for them to share their thoughts and ideas, and that they would continue to use these strategies for learning in the future.
Success of the October Virtual After School at the Museum program led to the development of a series in February with the topic of Renewable Energy, and a third series in April with the topic of Space Exploration.
Marine Debris Engineering Club - Sitka Sound Science Center
Through this club, the Sitka Sound Science Center (SSSC) gave high school students the opportunity to exercise their creativity and do their part to help reduce ocean plastic waste. Students were able to get outside, conduct beach cleanups, and use the marine debris collected to create their own artwork and even design and construct pieces of jewelry. Students now have the goal of one day designing a larger art installation for the aquarium, and have also spent time designing a prototype for collecting marine debris, with the hopes of building this prototype in the next few weeks These projects taught the students who participated the ways that innovation, creativity, and artwork can be a force for good in their community and the world.
Six high school students attended the Marine Debris Engineering Club on a weekly basis, three girls and three boys, and the program reached both low-income families and Alaska Native youth. SSSC works closely with faculty and AmeriCorps volunteers at Pacific High School, an alternative high school in the Sitka School District that struggles with attendance. To have at these six students regularly attending the Club is a major accomplishment and indicates that the students feel comfortable, confident, and excited about working with SSSC staff and engaging in science, art, and engineering practices.