Hi all! Thanks for visiting our page. Our project begins with a central assumption: Middle school youth don't have to change who they are to engage competently in science, engineering, and/or technology (STEM). We designed our curriculum for multiple interest hooks, modes of engagement, and trajectories of participation including: investigating, inventing, tinkering, designing, acting as altruist, and acting as conservationist. These modes of engagement became helpful tools for curriculum design and for youths' STEM-linked identity work. Our curriculum for Saturday Academies, after-school programs, and the summer residential camp focused on various local environmental problems and youths' solutions (e.g., stormwater runoff, biodiversity).

When examining our 6 modes of engagement, what would you have included for a curriculum focused on environmental problems with middle school youth? Are there other modes you would include? Are these categories distinct enough or should we think about collapsing them? What other questions do you have about our program? We welcome discussion and questions. 

We thank our entire BRIDGES team for helping create these meaningful experiences for youth!

I love the elements you share.  I would love to hear more about the roles that students identify with and how that has supported them in being more engaged and true to themselves.  At the end of your video the students mention I am a tinkerer, an inventor, an explorer.... what in the curriculum builds this identity for them?  Also, are your materials publicly available?  Thanks!

Thanks for your comments. BRIDGES introduces youth to six "modes of engagement". We consider these modes of engagement as ways for youth to see that no matter who they find themselves to be and how they prefer to engage, that they are a STEM-person. Our modes of engagement include altruist (helping people), inventor (comes up with creator or logical solutions), investigator (studies and explains problems), conservationist (cares deeply about the natural world), designer (makes things visually appealing), and tinkerer (builds and fixes).  We deliberately designed our curriculum to allow for a broad range of entry points appealing to eachof these modes of engagement. For example, when youth explored the water chemistries of the wetlands there were ways for youth to engage as conservationists, investigators, tinkerers, altruists, and inventors through the various activities and investigations that were offered. 

I love the excitement and enthusiasm among the participants. How did you select the activities? What changes have you made while testing the materials?

Good to see what you are doing,

Marcia

Hi. Thanks for your inquiry. This has been a very exciting project to work on. We have a wonderfully talented curriculum team who bring a breadth of experience and skills with them. In planning we considered modes of engagement for each activity and how we might leverage those opportunities while offering activities in science, engineering and technology specifically. Through iterations we listened to the feedback of the youth to determine how to build on or tweak activities. For instance, over the course of three Saturday Academies we shifted the focus and modality of the culminating project. Initially the focal point focused on storm water problem spot on the university campus. For the second iteration of Saturday Academies we tried to make the task of addressing storm water management more meaningful by localizing it to youths’ school settings. Youth were asked to select a storm water problem area and using the maker space and technologies design an outreach project that suggested a solution or brought the issue to the attention of their community. This worked well, but we decided the maker space medium was not as compelling as we would have liked. Also, youth did not necessarily embrace the action component. This past February, we had the youth select their own environmental dilemma to bring to the attention of the public. Our curriculum team focused on exposing youth to a variety of digital tools as the medium for action through story boarding. Our final Saturday Academy youth shared with the wider community their digital projects. This gave them an authentic opportunity to explain to the public why the environmental problem they selected was important, share possible solutions they had devised and describe their experience with the digital tool they selected. Over time we worked to make these experiences more meaningful to youth by presenting them with more choice and different means of expressing themselves.

I love the "modes of engagement" and how they capture the nature of science better than any "scientific method" definition does! I think they would work great in some of our summer science camps and even in our first-year (undergrad) research-based program. Thanks for sharing!

I think undergrads would definitely get as much out of it. The modes of engagement work well as a mechanism, for not only our team to see shifts in identity work, but also for the youth to notice changes in themselves. So many of their exit interviews reflected surprise at their new interests and comfort in elements of the natural world they were initially unsure about. 

Another interesting element of the program is the involvement of Near-Peer Mentors (NPMs) and Counselors in Training (CITs). CITs (mostly high schoolers) are students who have significant STEM experiences and NPMs are students who had completed the Saturday Academy or Summer institute from prior years. They helped guide the students in the use of digital tools and in some instances were participants in the program. This gave the middle school participants a chance to see those closest to their age be excited about the activities and also the professional development opportunity for themselves so they can aspire to be a future NPM.  

I love how this work includes and elevates student voices. I'd love to learn more about your best practices for interviewing students, something we also try to do in our work whenever possible. I love the idea of multiple modes of engagement. Thinking about situated approaches to learning, the way students identify with modes of engagement highlights the importance of valuing students' own evolving purposes for engaging in STEM. I wonder if there is room for students to shift the mode with which they identify, identify with multiple modes, or combine elements of various modes of engagement across or within projects. 

Thank you. Our interviews were wonderful points of reflection for everyone involved. Youth reflected  multiple modes of engagement at various times and shifts in modes of engagement absolutely occurred over time and depending on the activity. Youth initially participated in a survey that helped us anticipate a STEM profile, which reflected how they saw themselves in relation to the modes of engagement. We discussed their STEM profiles with them at the beginning of Saturday Academies and the Summer Institute to see if they were surprised, agreed with or disagreed with how the profile reflected their perceptions. During our exit interview the modes of engagement were discussed with the youth as part of a card sort in the context of the different activities they engaged in. The cards included both photo cards of various activities and cards with the modes of engagement.The card sort was a visual prompt to help them remember everything that had happened over the duration of our time together. Youth organized the cards and explained to what degree they felt the modes of engagement were present in them during their participation in activities. The exit interview and card sort also gave them an opportunity to reflect on how they changed and if they felt their STEM profile has adjusted. 

An additional method of data collection/youth reflection were our identibeads. Youth were given an additional ribbon on their name laniard. At the end of each day youth selected colored beads that were associated with modes of engagement to add to their ribbon. In small groups they picked out beads that they felt reflected in what way they participated in the various activities. This was an opportunity for the youth to reflect collectively with their peers about their day.

We worked hard to be intentional about making sure the data we collected and our interviews were the youth telling their own story and interpreting their experience rather than us extrapolating.

Nice video - it really caused me to think about how we identify ourselves in the world. For a diverse group of students, instead of aligning with typical gender-centric and/or culture-centric identities, you've provided ways students can cross those invisible boundaries and think of them selves by their innate skills, interests and aptitudes. You identify six interest hooks, modes of engagement and trajectories in the video and in your summary-- investigating, inventing, tinkering, designing, acting as altruist, and acting as conservationist--how did you select these? Have you added to this list during the implementation of your project? 

Love this! I apologize for my limited knowledge of the program curriculum, but I'm wondering if students are exposed to any basic topics of cell biology/molecular biology/microbiology/medicine. Back in my day, and even now, I think many young kids see science as "playing outside with plants and animals," which leads them to think that if they aren't excited about the outdoors then they aren't fit for science. I wish someone had shown me earlier than science can have so many different faces!

Hi Anna! Thanks for your question. Our curriculum centers big ideas from environmental science, field science, environmental engineering, computational thinking, and scientific communication. It's a big lift to integrate these fields substantively. So, in this particular program, we're not drilling down to cell/molecular/micro/biology in any great depth.

I do love the multi-faceted nature of this program, but there is so much more to science, engineering, and computing than what we represent here!

Hi Heidi et al! It's wonderful to see this work come to life in such a rich and engaging way. I love the fact that you use the initial identity survey as a starting point for discussions with the students. Did most students agree with the main identities they fell into? If you took notes/observations or recorded these conversations, they could also serve as a point of validation of the initial scale. In other words, if for example, 80% of students felt their profiles were accurate, this speaks volumes for the kinds of questions you created to generate the profiles. If on the other hand, the majority of students disagree with their profiles, then the questions and/or analysis of responses may need some additional tweaking. Of course, it could also be that students haven't internalized their STEM identities, and so may not think of themselves as an inventor, designer, altruist, etc. I really look forward to seeing materials once they are publicly available!

I really enjoy the use of the modes of engagement as a way for students to feel personally connected to what they are doing through the program. For the projects, are students grouped based on these modes and having different modes come together? Or is it primarily based on the environmental dilemma they decide to focus on?

The only change I am curious about with the modes is potentially incorporating a policy aspect such that the students could consider recommendations to help prevent these dilemmas from occurring. I feel that this could either be incorporated into the project overall or as its own mode, as students who may be very interested in political/social science could fit themselves in as a problem solver in that way. Do you think this might be a viable option?

The "I'm a..." at the end gave me chills. I would love for my students to position themselves in similar ways.

This seems like a rich and fun summer learning experience. How you measure the success or impact of the project? 

Hi Heidi! It's great to see your work here after hearing so much about it! I love the simple (but explicit) change in language to indicate that everyone is welcome (and needed) at the STEM table (i.e., all have a place through there exploration, tinkering, etc.). After discussions with you, we began incorporating this language into our recruitment materials.

It looks like the different ways of conceptualizing roles -- tinkerer, investigator, etc -- truly help middle-school students feel a sense of engagement and ownership in this work.  Fascinating project.

Wow! I love this work! This video is so informative. As always I am fascinated by your work! Lead us, Heidi!!!

Experiences with nature have a lasting impact on our appreciation, beliefs, and understanding of our world.

So true Sarah and current times are making us realize it even more :) Take care and be safe.

Heidi, I love this project and see how it combines your interests in science and identity to create really engaging science experiences for children. Doing science is the best way to develop science literacy and learning. Thank you for sharing this wonderful project!

Excellent project! One question is have is, “Does the project help students to see the importance of science to non-scientists? If so, how do they develop this perspective?” 

Also in response to Heidi’s question about other modes of engagement, one possibility is entrepreneurship. The ability to craft marketable solutions to environmental problems might be another mode of engagement. Great work

Hi Jomo! Thanks for engaging with the project and for the excellent suggestion of entrepreneurship. Good idea! Timely and relevant. 

Re: Your question about the importance of science. We didn't study this directly, but we're trying to cultivate an understanding of the importance of multiple ways of knowing to environmental problem-solving and conservation. The focus on cultivating youths' STEM-linked identity work means that, in part, youth begin to see science (and other ways of knowing) as thinkable for themselves and valuable to solving problems that matter to them. So, we're getting at that question in an oblique way, but not directly. That question is super important, however, especially right now. Again-- a great addition to our next round of programming. Thanks, Jomo.

Heidi, so exciting to see this work! Love the multiple roles!