By Laura Hammack, guest columnist
In my last column, I shared with our readers about an exciting arts installation taking place in all our schools where world musicians came from both Finland and Uganda to share their musical craft with our students.
In that column, I indicated that our district is learning from our industry partners that in order to best prepare our students for the workforce, our students need to be empowered with skills from the “STEAM” disciplines: science, technology, engineering, arts and math.
After publication of the column, I was asked by a reader to explain what STEAM-focused instruction really meant, and the reader wanted to understand what was different about this particular focus in education. Because of this question, I thought I would “unpack” STEAM a little bit more in this article and highlight one of our schools that has become a leader of the work.
To be clear, Brown County Schools have adopted “STEAM” as our model acronym. We insist to never abandon the importance of the arts in this curricular focus. I will refer to the acronym as “STEM” where I refer to the Indiana Department of Education, as their efforts have focused solely on those four components.
The Indiana Department of Education defines STEM education as, “An interdisciplinary literacy that seeks to integrate, in whole or in part, the four areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics into a comprehensive and coherent curriculum across content areas. STEM literacy includes, but does not simply mean, achieving independent literacy in these four strands; rather, STEM literacy focuses on relevant integration alongside independent literacy.”
The STEM classroom environment shifts students away from learning independent chunks of information and procedures and moves them toward investigation and questioning that is connected to components in the real world. The IDOE affirms, “STEM education aims to develop a student’s ability to think logically, solve problems, innovate in both academic and real-world contexts, engage in inquiry, collaborate with peers and self-motivate.” These are all skills that are being shouted by our industry partners as necessary components for a successful workforce.
I have been so impressed with the way in which our Brown County Junior High School has taken this insight learned from our industry partners. They have developed and deployed innovative methods for teaching and learning across the curriculum that engages students in STEAM curriculum, where sophisticated thinking and problem solving are the foundation of teaching and learning. Brown County Junior High School has applied to be a “STEM Certified” school by the Indiana Department of Education and has met rigorous criteria for this consideration.
One of my favorite parts of the process is the connection that Mr. Brian Garman, principal of Brown County Junior High School, has made with industry partners in our region. Mr. Garman put together a STEM Advisory Board where industry leaders meet monthly with a team of BCJHS teachers and leaders to plan STEM activities across the curriculum.
During the first semester, the STEM Advisory Board assisted with the creation of a “STEM Showcase” where student work from many disciplines was highlighted in an evening event for community participation. Also attending this event were the BCJHS industry partners who showcased opportunities in their workforce field for the participants to experience in an engaging platform.
During the second semester, the industry leaders posed some of their real-life industry problems to teams of students, and the students are working in a project-based team to find solutions to these industry problems.
During this experience, students from BCJHS took a field trip to the industry with the problem issue that is being addressed to learn more about the issue and to inspire them with creative solutions. Having this on-site experience was a really extraordinary way to present the students with a hands-on awareness of jobs and workforce issues that our students may not otherwise have known existed.
The culminating activity for these projects will be student presentations to the industry leaders where they will outline their recommended solutions. I can’t wait to see the end result.
We can’t thank the industry leaders who have spent so much time with our students enough. We honored these individuals during our March 22 board meeting and gave them all Eagle pins to let them know how grateful we are for the work that they are doing for our students at Brown County Junior High School.
With great thanks, we would like to thank to the following industry leaders of the STEM Advisory Board: Dave Redding, Cummins; Joel Lewis, Cummins; Kyle Deckard, NSWC Crane, Vic Makximenko, NSWC Crane; Elizabeth Eaton, Cook Medical; Bryan Gabriel, Mainstream Fiber Networks; Mark Stidham, Faurecia (retired); Dawn Stidham, Columbus Regional Health; Jeremiah Reichman, Columbus Regional Health; Tina Bedey, Columbus Regional Health; Bryan Rushton, LHP Engineering.
The following educators from Brown County Schools also participated on the STEM Advisory Board: Christy Wrightsman, Regional Opportunities Initiative; Erich Nolan, BCJHS science; Kady Lane, BCJHS science; Kevin Roush, BCJHS science; Tim Hebert, BCJHS math; Alyssa Stanley, BCJHS English/language arts; Justin Schwenk, BCJHS social studies; Dan Lewellen, BCJHS engineering/technology; Greg Pagnard, BCJHS assistant principal; Brian Garman, BCJHS principal.
I am so proud of the work that this group is doing and am confident that you feel the same. Witnessing school and community partnerships like this that have such an extraordinary impact on student achievement is inspiring.
I, once again, stand in gratitude for all that our community provides to our schools. Thank you.
Laura Hammack is superintendent of Brown County schools. She can be reached at 812-988-6601 or [email protected].
