ImagineIT Phase 5For my ImagineIT teacher focus group I met with five of the female teachers in our science and mathematics departments. We discussed the best ways to get a STEM group for females off the ground. Through this focus group I found out that we currently have a 3-D printer available to use in our school. There is also a science teacher that takes part in a coding class a few Sundays a month and has students attend with her.
When looking at the needs of our school, the teachers thought that the girl students at our school not only need a chance to “play” with math and science, but also need help exploring what these fields of study and careers may look like after high school. We discussed having guest speakers, going on field trips, and planning STEM specific college visits as possible good solutions to exposing these students to what careers they may want to research. In meeting with students they admitted that they did enjoy math and science classes, but would be more interested in knowing what jobs use these skills. Many of them know that they love their STEM classes, but admitted that they do not know of how to carry this love into their life after high school. They said they would love to go on field trips in order to discover different jobs that would use these classes, but may not be jobs that they had considered. After speaking to both the student and teacher focus group I believe that I am going to change the focus of my project. I still want it to be about STEM for females, but now will focus on an exploratory group. They will still be able to “play” with their learning, but in a different way. I want to try to get a panel of STEM related career speakers to come in and hope that they will have activities that show the girls how they use math and science in their careers. I would like to work with them to try and connect what they do in their careers to what they are currently learning in their classes. I also will allow for this group to take the direction that the students want it to go. The most important thing is that the girls are involved and they are learning about taking their love of science and math out of the classroom and applying it to careers they can see themselves in after college. |