STEM Club

A chance for students to explore various fields of STEM

Background Information

Grayson Lockwood grew up in Manchester-by-the-Sea, MA. Her high school has 100 students per grade and not a huge amount of resources to create a very diverse learning environment. Furthermore, almost all the students at her high school show some sort of interest in the STEM fields and many want to pursue it as a future career. Many students were frustrated with the lack of opportunity to support their interests and therefore, Grayson and Syvlie decided to start the STEM Club. Their goals are to provide students with educating and engaging lessons, experiments, and videos about the fields of STEM, give the students a chance to explore various fields of STEM and engage them, and create engaging ways for the students to become more aware of STEM in the world around them. Their goals during and after quarantine were to post at home activities (during quarantine), field trips (post quarantine), and future career and college planning by researching fields that they may be interested in.

Implementation of Project

When Gray started to work on the project, it was difficult to get teachers fully on board with the idea since they had busy schedules and her team needed the approval of both a mentor as well as the principal in order for the club to be able to begin.  Furthermore, the communication was a bit difficult with the busy schedules of everyone and it created a lot of chaos in trying to find time for meetings. Many people were interested in joining the club and the team did a good job of covering all social media platforms including Instagram, Facebook, and email in order to make sure that every student was seeing their message. Furthermore, the team recruited 30 students to join within a week, which was more than expected and a huge success in their eyes. After the long road of emails leading up to the approval of the club, things went very smoothly as we created a Google Classroom, website, and started posting assignments and Zoom calls in order to get the club up and running.

“There is something about bringing people together with a common goal that will always motivate me. It always brings me enthusiasm and joy when I see the passion on everyone’s faces, and the passion exemplified in their own enthusiasm and joy.”
Grayson Lockwood

 

Results of Project

The project ended up being a huge success.  STEM Club has a little over 30 students currently and the Google Classroom, Zoom calls, and assignments are still very much up and running. Many students have reached out to the founders with a thank you.  The club still has the support of the school principal and the two teachers who helped them get this project in place, as they are the mentors of the club who overlook the Google Classroom.  Sylvie and Gray likely have spent almost 50 hours on this project between the emails, proposals, meetings with teachers, FaceTime vide calls with each other, Zoom calls with the students, creating the classroom, and making up the assignments.

“I hope to continue this not only because of my passion for it, but because of the beauty in joining together as a group in order to collaborate, share our passions, and grow from it.”
Grayson Lockwood

What’s Next

Gray and her team are going to continue with this club and further its complexities once they are able to pursue it within our school. Furthermore, they will be the leaders of this club next year and are working on a school wide Rubik’s cube solving project right now as the school year comes to an end.  After the founders graduate, there is a boy in the grade below them who will continue the club (he is also the head of the pre-med club).  Gray also plans on completing her original CLP idea next Spring, as she remains very passionate about it and hope to spread the message of female empowerment in my community.

“I will always use what I learned at Alzar School throughout the rest of my life. That includes the leadership skills that I learned. My new passion for helping the community around me will take me far and wide, and I have my experience at Alzar School to largely attribute that to.”
Grayson Lockwood