For the 6th year, STEM Week has been celebrated across the state of Massachusetts, and the STEM Education Center has coordinated several activities through the Central MA STEM Network Ecosystem. WPI continues to support the Central region by partnering with several different PreK-12 schools and community-based organizations to showcase STEM.
Chemical Engineering students talk about biofilms and infection models with the public at the Family STEM Night at the Boys & Girls Club.
Some of the WPI STEM Week 2023 highlights are:
- Mass Academy of Math & Science (MAMS) students visited Abby Kelley Foster Charter School in Worcester to deliver STEM lessons (i.e., bird beak adaptations and spool racers) to all their grade 4, 5, 6, and 7 classrooms.
- Biomedical Engineering graduate students and Prof. Jeannine Coburn visited with 5th graders at the Worcester Belmont Community School to do hands-on STEM activities (as part of an on-going partnership throughout the year for several years now).
- Pre-Collegiate Outreach partnered with the Girls Scouts for the annual Geek is Glam event at WPI.
- The STEM Education Center Professional Development Team supported PreK-7 educators in preparing for STEM Week and throughout the year using their I am STEM curriculum.
- Family STEM Night at Boys & Girls Club, Worcester included WPI exhibitors: Mass Academy making take home lava lamps, the Robotics Resource Center and MAMS demonstrating their large robot catching balls, the STEM Education Center displaying ferrofluid and live images with a hand-held microscope, and Chemical Engineering students of Prof. Elizabeth Stewart explaining biofilms by having kids model bacterial infections with stickers.
Guests make lava lamps with Mass Academy students at the Family STEM Night at the Boys & Girls Club.