STEM van teaches local girls

Several young local girls, from ages eight to ten, participated in the Girl Scouts of Montana and Wyoming's newly designed mobile Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) program Saturday.

The Mobile STEM Learning Center event began with teacher Jess Carley working with an anatomy model named Annie Tomy. After removing the organs and discussing the purpose and identifying aspects of each part, Carley asked the kids to help her replace them as she named the body component, its position in the body and its function.

As the child who answered correctly was invited to put the organ back in its proper place, the student was able to feel the lifelike texture of the piece.

Carley explained in a fun and simple terms, making this learning experience enjoyable as well as memorable for the youth.

The next station hosted a fundamental geology class with seemingly common rocks; this science deals with the history of the earth as recorded in stone. The girls were involved and entertained by teacher Liz Evans, who also is the Girl Scouts' senior summer camp director and outdoor programming specialist, of whom Carley spoke appreciatively: "She joined me after camp because it was just a lot of work... it's been awesome to have Liz with me, she's been very helpful."

These are only two of the myriad STEM projects available through the mobile unit and Carley, who has been the sole traveling educator since the van's first trip in March and has conducted the visits about 115 times throughout this inaugural season, smiled as she said, "I am the only STEM program specialist for the entire council so I've put almost 10,000 miles on the van this summer...There have been a lot of good times and a lot of fun stories."

Among the onlookers were member experience manager Kimberly Neece and troop leader Laura Whisler, who anticipate helping girls within the Girl Scouts to work in STEM for a number of accomplishment badges.

Neece expressed her thoughts as she watched the interactions in the stations: "I'm absolutely loving it Not only are we bringing STEM to it, but we're bringing new girls into the troop. We're using this as a recruitment tool to bring them in and show them this is something they can actually do in the Girl Scouts."

Mothers Courtney Goodnough and Tiffany Heling, who were observing, were also impressed. Goodnough said, "It's definitely to have a great change to have something new in town for the girls to do. I hope that with the new experience, that they take that and learn more about the anatomy and the rocks. I think that STEM in any aspect is definitely beneficial as they get older."

A sentiment with which Heling agreed "a hundred percent".

Carley is already working on next summer's schedule and, while she is not sure she will be chosen to lead in this endeavor next year, she is proud of the realization of how well the program has done so far.