STEM RTP End-of-Year Report

END OF YEAR REPORT 2019 2020

Letter from the Director Friends,

Through six years of this program, the 2019-2020 season sure has been a year to remember. Complete with student, educator, STEM professional and virtual events, this year had something for everyone.

First, though, I'd like to address COVID and the George Floyd movement. Right now, the COVID pandemic continues to spread across the US and it has been shown to impact minority and low-income individuals at a disproportionately high rate. Additionally, there is nation-wide record-breaking unemployment. And culturally, the racial inequities in our society have been laid bare. As our heart breaks for the injustices in the world, we want to stand together for unity and justice.

During this historic time, we are all here together with the mission to increase STEM opportunities for under-served communities. I challenge all of us to continue to build this network of passionate individuals and organizations and to up lift those who need educational and career opportunities. From the boardroom to the sidewalk, we can all make a difference.

In that spirit, we would like to thank our 2019-2020 partners (on page 4) for your dedication to our mission. We know that STEM RTP’s ecosystem of partners is a powerful group for good here in RTP. Additionally, STEM RTP would not be here today without a powerful team consisting of ReShockie Furnace, Margo Greenawald and Anita Kamwendo.

That said, STEM RTP is now saying goodbye. We hope that you remember us for lifting lives up. Take a moment to read through our End of Year Report, which highlight our work and the passionate people who have made it possible.

My best,

Sarah C. Windsor, PhD Director, STEM RTP

2019-2020 Impact Numbers: Breakdown Students:

116 at Fall Tech and Engineering Fest 98 at Building Girls who Code 37 in Virtual Outreach

Educators:

15 at Fall Educator Externtrips 4 in Virtual Outreach

STEM Professionals:

78 at Fall Tech and Engineering Fest 57 at Building Girls who Code 22 at STEM RTP Happy Hour 5 in Virtual Outreach

STEM Program Partners Industry Partners AgBiome

Red Hat

Credit Suisse

Research Triangle Nanotech Network

BASF Cree

Duke Energy Fidelity Lord

RTI

Net App

Skanska UCB

University Partners

Government

North Carolina State University

K-12 Schools Alpha Academy

Carrington Middle School

Lakewood Montessori Middle

Reedy Creek Magnet Middle School Research Triangle High school Southern High School

Vernon Malone College and Career Academy

Zebulon GT Magnet Middle

Non-Profit and YouthServing Organizations Code the Dream Student U

NC Science Festival

Army Research Office

Environmental Protection Agency

Educator Externtrips: Wake and Durham Held in October, the 2019-2020 Educator Externtrips were an opportunity for Durham and Wake educators to transform their classroom teaching with immersive STEM experiences at local companies, organizations, and

institutions of higher learning. Externtrips are a ‘field trip’ for educators.

Educators learn about current trends in STEM fields, in order to help them

better inform their students about careers in STEM. Each Externtrip is different, as host organizations have the flexibility to tailor their educator experience.

ExternTrip activities include: Hands-on demonstrations Facility tours Speakers

Employee panels

2019-2020 host organizations: Credit Suisse The EPA-RTP

NCSU Biochemistry Department (STEMmy Award Winner!)

Research Triangle Nano-Tech Network

“Our amazing Professor was engaging and made Wake

County teachers feel welcome in his lab and program. The

topics that were discussed were relevant and the research

being completed was intriguing...As a Career Development Coordinator, I also was informed of the program and

requirements for successful graduation and transition from high school to college.”

- NCSU ExternTrip Attendee

Tech and Engineering Fest In 2019-2020, over 100 students from Wake and Durham counties joined us for Tech

and Engineering Fest. They met with STEM professionals from around the triangle for mentoring, hands on activities, demonstrations and design thinking challenges.

The STEM Fest model allows students to develop an awareness of the

opportunities available in STEM fields via meaningful conversations with STEM

professionals and engagement with STEM concepts that go beyond the textbook,

such as critical thinking and teamwork.

“This experience has sparked

an interest for sure in this field, it is very fun and diverse!” Student participant

Tech and Engineering Fest

78%

of students were students of color

64%

of students were girls

84%

of students were more interested in Tech and Engineering careers

Sponsored by: Duke Energy In partnership with: Americorps, Army Research Office, the EPA, Cree, Code the Dream, Credit Suisse, Net App, Red Hat (STEMmy Award Winner!), RTI, the Research Triangle Foundation, Skanska.

Cleantech Talent Initiative Award In December, STEM RTP celebrated winning the Research Triangle

Cleantech Cluster Cleantech Talent Initiative Award. The award was designed to honor a program or initiative that supports or develops individuals entering the cleantech industry. This award highlighted STEM RTP’s work leveraging the large pool of talented STEM

professionals in the Triangle, to introduce historically under-served student populations to career opportunities in STEM.

“We congratulate STEM RTP on fostering a more diverse

workforce that brings fresh

perspectives to the challenges facing our communities.”

-Jim Goodnight, CEO of SAS

STEM Internship Program In collaboration with Student U, a Durham-based after-school and summer enrichment program, STEM RTP laid the groundwork for a high school and

college internship program in RTP. Our goal was to place local, diverse students into STEM internships for the summer of 2020. Starting in the Fall with an

informational session, more than 10 companies were interested in hosting both high school and college internships and we were able to place 8 students at local companies. Due to COVID, the program had to pivot to virtual and 2 students were able to finish a shortened internship experience.

Building Girls Who Code The 3rd annual Building Girls Who Code, in partnership with Net App’s

Women in Tech, saw 98 girls from Lakewood Montessori Middle school

join STEM RTP and over 50 volunteers at Frontier RTP. Students had the opportunity to participate in the following activities:

App Development workshop with tech professional mentors

Speed Mentoring with tech professionals from 13 different companies including NetApp, BD, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Cisco, Citrix, Clorox,

Credit Suisse, Fidelity, HPE, IBM, MetLife, UNC, and Vondata Systems Presenting their app concepts in a poster-session

Guest speaker Daisy Magnus-Aryitey, from Code the Dream

Students came up with many incredible ideas for apps, including an app that aggregates information from local shelters to streamline the pet

adoption processes and an app that aimed to help teens get quality sleep.

Building Girls Who Code

50%

of students were more interested in a career in tech

71%

of students learned about the diversity of tech careers

78%

of students learned something new

STEM RTP Partner Happy Hour In March 2020, STEM RTP had its

first-ever Partner Happy Hour! This event was an opportunity for STEM RTP’s partners to network and meet other people who are

passionate about STEM education outreach. Guests from ARO, Cree,

the EPA, NetApp and RTI joined us for drinks, snacks and awesome conversation.

Virtual Pivots In mid-March, COVID began sweeping through RTP. Though we could not complete our spring Educator ExternTrips and Science and Math Fest as scheduled, with the help of our partners, we were able to pivot.

Virtual Resource Page In April, a new resources page was launched on our website that gathered virtual STEM resources, such as lesson plans and experiments, allowing us to continue reaching students and educators.

Virtual Tutoring: STEM RTP also piloted a virtual tutoring initiative that leveraged our network to pair educators and STEM professionals. One STEM professional assisted in one-on-one tutoring, another acted as a consultant for a senior class’s engineering-based final project, and yet another lent their time to help an educator create engaging STEM material for the 2020-2021 school year.

2020 Virtual STEMmy Awards July 8, STEM RTP went virtual for the 5th Annual STEMmy Awards

Celebration. Hosted via Zoom, we

were joined by partners, volunteers,

and friends of the program. It was a wonderful evening in which we

recognized our winners for the 20192020 partnership cycle and shared STEM RTP’s accomplishments.

2019-2020 STEMmy Award Winners: Educator Externtrip Experience of the Year:

NCSU Biochemistry Department Outreach Organization of the Year: Red Hat

Community Serving

Organization of the Year: The US EPA

"I challenge all of us to continue to build this network of

passionate individuals and organizations and to lift up those who need educational and career opportunities. From the

boardroom to the sidewalk, we can all make a difference.�

-Dr. Sarah Windsor Director of STEM RTP

Closing out STEM RTP and Americorps VISTA After six years of high impact programming for students, educators and

STEM professionals, STEM RTP is coming to a close. As we do, we’d like to

take a moment to remember the fantastic time it has been working with the Triangle STEM community to bring STEM opportunities to historically under-served populations in North Carolina.

In the past six years we have: Impacted 11,0098 students

Facilitated over 3385 Speed mentor conversations

Provided professional development for 266 educators Worked with over 500 different organizations Mobilized 3,830 STEM professional volunteers Totaled 16,444 volunteer hours

We’ve hosted STEM Expos, STEM Fests, STEMmy Awards, Building Girls Who Code, and many other events. We’ve run mentoring programs, internship programs, educator professional development, and connected schools, companies, and everyone in between. We’ve brought industry and outreach experts together in Industry Summits and partner Happy Hour events. We could not have done all of this without the help of the many VISTAs who have donated their time and to the staff who worked hard to make our goals possible.

11,098 Students reached

3,830 STEM professionals engaged

266

Educators impacted

16,444 Volunteer hours achieved

A Big Thank You To:

2014-2015: Christine Abernathy, Brett Brenton (Program Director), Hannah Strom, Kelsie Martinez

2017-2018: Christine Lee, Madi Evans, Sarah Windsor

2015-2016: Brett Brenton, Zack Rubin, Tatiana Cleveland

2018-2019: Ivana Vazquez, Allie Schrock, Sarah Windsor, Olivia Lewis

2016-2017: Jen Awuku, Chichi Orji, Sarah Windsor (Program Director)

2019-2020: Margo Greenawald. ReShockie Furnace (Program Manager), Anita Kamwendo, Sarah Windsor Not pictured: Lindsey Morgan, Intern