We asked Newton parent and engineer Kevin Osborn for his ideas for STEM holiday gifts and activities during the holiday break. He responded with these ideas for gadgeteers of all ages (more details on his blog):

Instructables.com has thousands of cool projects, from the outrageous to the absurd — much of which is doable with kids and full of STEM. Continue reading Holiday STEM Ideas for Gadgeteers and Makers →

Needham-based engineering-software firm PTC recently hosted the MetroWest STEM Education Network at its headquarters.  PTC supports STEM education in Massachusetts by donating its engineering software, providing accompanying education resources, and participating in partnerships among government, industry and education. Educators are invited to contact Ayora Berry (aberry@ptc.com) to explore ways to collaborate, or to visit www.ptcschools.com for school resources for software, curriculum, and competitions. For donations of PTC’s engineering software and related curriculum, contact Mike Stuart (mistuart@ptc.com).

MetroWest STEM Education Network is one of several regional Massachusetts networks set up under the Governor’s STEM Advisory Council, and its region includes Newton.  It recently released a five-year plan (PDF) of activities to increase interest and achievement in STEM among K-12 students. For further information, contact Kevin Thurston (kthurston1@framingham.edu), Executive Director.

In his keynote at the MA STEM Summit last week, Raytheon CEO William Swanson announced that his company will increase its earlier pledge of support to the Boston Museum of Science’s Education is Elementary (EiE) program by an additional $1 million.  This fund, part of the company’s MathMovesU initiative, will create the Raytheon-EiE Teacher Scholarship fund to facilitate teacher access to STEM training and materials. In his keynote, Swanson emphasized the need for better alignment between academia and business regarding workforce development, pointing out that too many students and adults are training for jobs in which labor surpluses exist and demand is low, while high-demand jobs, particularly those in STEM fields, go unfilled. Swanson also unveiled new videos outlining Our STEM Challenge and Raytheon’s Support of STEM Education.

Gentle Knowledge, a local math education organization, is offering a free weekly math circle for students in grades 5-8. These weekly one-hour sessions are based on the same principles as Eastern European math circles, where collaborative learning around a set of interesting extra-curricular problems and ideas replaces lectures. Each session involves a set of “non-standard” problems from an area of mathematics, like number theory and combinatorics, that does not usually appear in the standard school curriculum. The goal of the math circle is to introduce students to the beauty of mathematics while both exposing them to useful problem solving methods and inspiring them to further pursue mathematical studies. Occasionally, sessions may feature guest speakers who are practicing mathematicians. For more information, visit: gentleknowledge.com/mathcircle or email info@gentleknowledge.com.

Microsoft has released STEM Perceptions:  Student and Parent Survey (PDF), reporting the results of two Harris Interactive surveys — one of college students pursuing STEM degrees, and one of parents of K-12 students  The goal was to gain insight into how to better prepare and inspire students to pursue STEM in college and STEM careers.  The PDF linked above is a 20-page Powerpoint of charts, stats, and insights.  Its summary findings: Continue reading Parent/Student Perceptions of STEM Preparedness, Inspiration →

The YouTube channel MinutePhysics offers a new video every week, each about 90 seconds (OK, more than a minute) on topics such as: What is Fire?, Distance and Special Relativity, What is a Dimension?, Adding Past Infinity. They’re fast-paced, entertaining, and thought-provoking — similar to the math/music videos by the multi-talented Vi Hart. Vi Hart’s Math Doodling videos carry a motif of “I’m bored in class, and this is so much cooler,” which makes them less useful for classrooms.  But her others, including her latest video, What is up with Noises? (The Science and Mathematics of Sound, Frequency, and Pitch) present information and arguments in a challenging and entertaining way.

The Governor’s STEM Advisory Council met on June 23 and approved criteria for identifying scalable STEM projects (PDF) for the regional STEM education networks (e.g., Newton belongs to the MetroWest STEM Education Network). The state’s STEM Pipeline Fund received $500K in the FY2012 budget.