People, Planet, Prosperity

It was a busy summer for me. One of the highlights of the summer was an opportunity to speak at a STEM Learning Ecosystems convening in Bay City, MI on all of the progress we have made with our RowingSTEM program in Tulsa. My thanks to Xan Black who serves as the chief of staff for SLE for the invitation.

Additionally, my trip to the convening would not have been possible without the support of the Schusterman Family Philanthropies who provided the financial support to help us spread the word about our RowingSTEM program.

Prior to the conference, I was invited to participate in a live stream flash talk at help convening attendees choose breakout sessions. It was a good experience and I learned a great deal about how to present our message in a short period of time.

One of the challenges of presenting on RowingSTEM is the difficulty of packing a Concept2 rowing machine when flying on a plan. Luckily, my friend and colleague Kit Bennett from Ann Arbor Skyline Crew offered to loan me a couple of rowing machines for the conference.

After I landed at the airport I picked up a very nice rental truck and headed out to the roadhouse in Ann Arbor. They really have a wonderful location that is absolutely beautiful. They support an ErgEd program similar to the one that we support in Tulsa. They have a trailer that they use to help transport the rowing machines from school to school in the program.

I had seen the trailer in pictures, but it was great to see it in person. After checking that my apps would work successfully with the PM5 monitors on the machines I loaded them up in the truck and then headed North to Bay City.

When I reached the hotel, I unloaded the machines and headed up to my room. I received many puzzled looks from the arriving conference participants as I wheeled the machines across the hotel reception and into the elevator. I said things like “I like to bring my own fitness center when I travel!”.

After completing a 40 minute row in my hotel room. I headed out to downtown to look for somewhere to eat. Just outside the hotel were huge letters that spelled STEM. I thought it would be cool to take a selfie, but I had trouble putting the phone in the right position to take a photo with all of the letters!

Luckily, a gentleman, Jeff Remington (who serves as a STEM Outreach Liaison at Penn State – Center for Science and the Schools) was walking by and offered to take a photo of me. I ended up taking to Jeff while we walked downtown and he told me all of the great programs they were running to nurture the next generation of young scientists. See the video below for more information.

https://stemforall2022.videohall.com/presentations/2425

The next day the conference started. There was great energy and over 400 people in the main conference room. Everyone was excited to be attending the conference in person after a two year delay because of COVID.  I was invited to sit with members of the Tulsa Regional STEM alliance. It was wonderful to get to know them during the conference and I appreciate all of the support they provided over the three day trip. Additionally, I met Kristen Bailey who is the Program Director of Global Gardens, another partner that serves Tulsa Public Schools. It was wonderful to have some support for the entire convening!

One of the first speakers was Reginald McGregor. He reminded us of the importance and meaning of Juneteenth. It was a great message for the room given one of our goals is promoting more equity in our various STEM fields.

After the initial session, various breakout sessions occurred. I sat in on a session that discussed research relating to why students choose STEM career pathways. The primary finding of the research is that students who feel a positive connection to their science teachers typically choose careers in STEM.

After the session, I set up the rowing machines in the food truck area. It was a great opportunity to showcase how RowingSTEM interacts with the rowing machine to provide an educational experience for students.

The next day, there were more breakout sessions. I attended a few sessions in the morning. I met a fellow computer science instructor who like me teaches AP Computer Science Principles. He told me about a data science project that he does with his students.

Essentially, the students complete a project where they track the number of cars that obey stop signs at a location close to his school. The project is helpful to the students because it teaches them concepts such as collecting data, cleaning the data, creating meaning from the data, and ultimately telling a story. I am planning on doing a similar project with my Applied Technology Principles class at Holland Hall.

As afternoon breakout sessions continued, I was invited to participate in a panel discussion on interdisciplinary education. There were a number of people on the panel and it was a privilege to be invited to speak given the company I was with. I got the opportunity to speak as the last person to do so on the panel (no pressure!). I discussed our mission to help provide more access to the sport and why we think that the intersection between rowing, STEM and Tech is a fertile area for development.

I also shared my experiences with competency-based-learning and how it has changed the way I think about my pedagogical approach as an educator. To read about my experiences as a computer science instructor and rowing coach and how CBL works well in both domains read this article.

After the panel discussion, I spoke with some folks from Lab Exchange. They run a platform that curates resources online that run in a browser to provide access to educational resources. We had a great chat and they were looking to build a team of educators to support a project they were working on.

As the afternoon continued, it was time to give my presentation on our RowingSTEM program. The session was reasonably well attended and the discussion of the progress we made was fruitful. It was wonderful to have the support of the Tulsa Regional STEM alliance. In fact, one of the high points of the whole trip was getting to know them all better. In turn, they had a better understanding of our mission and methodology. I had planned to show the video of the RowingSTEM program at the Union Alternative School, but there simply wasn’t time for that. I include it below for you.

Following my presentation I was invited to a dinner with the TRSA, and Kristen of Global Gardens. It was a great way to finish the day given the pressure that inevitably comes with giving your own presentation to an audience at a major conference.

In conclusion, I am grateful for the opportunity to be invited to the STEM Ecosystem Conference this past June. I am looking for other opportunities to present our work and curriculum resources to help with my broader distribution of our program. Everything we have created, including the app RowingSTEM, is open source and the apps are available on the App Store for free. 

I will be presenting at 36 Degrees North on September 13th at 6:00pm. It would be great to see you there! As always, I am happy to answer questions and provide information on the RowingSTEM curriculum which can be found here.

Until next time!!