PopTech : Blog : PopTech Part of White House "Educate to Innovate" Campaign

PopTech Part of White House "Educate to Innovate" Campaign

Kristen Taylor ( Bio / Posts ) | Monday, November 23, 2009 UTC

This morning, President Obama announced Educate to Innovate:

“… a campaign to improve the participation and performance of America’s students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). This campaign will include efforts not only from the Federal Government but also from leading companies, foundations, non-profits, and science and engineering societies to work with young people across America to excel in science and math.”

The “Educate to Innovate” campaign page lists the goals:

- Increase STEM literacy so that all students can learn deeply and think critically in science, math, engineering, and technology.
- Move American students from the middle of the pack to top in the next decade.
- Expand STEM education and career opportunities for underrepresented groups, including women and girls.

The President also announced partnerships with private companies, non-profits, universities, and foundations, citing an initial private sector investment of $260 million, which he expects to grow.

PopTech is partnering with Time Warner Cable (TWC) as part of the “Educate to Innovate” campaign for TWC’s “Connect a Million Minds” initiative.

We are excited to have PopTech’s video archive used to promote STEM skills with a younger audience, and this effort joins our work on the new PopTech Science Fellows program (you can nominate a Science Fellow).

What PopTech videos in science, technology, engineering, and math would you recommend we include in our offering? Let us know in the comments.

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Comments

Name: Russell Ong

I had no idea that the US was lagging that far behind in science and math literacy. Thinking for a moment, what are we doing as a culture to offer incentives to our youths to pay attention to Science, Technology, Engineering and Math? surely one of the reasons for this malaise is that the children are disinterested in the subjects?

Personally, I like the idea of a balanced approach to both STEM and arts subjects. But some attention to education is better than no attention.

Name: Andrew Zolli

Here’s a nice piece on NY1 on the launch of Connect a Million Minds:

http://ny1.com/5-manhattan-news-content/ny1_living/109420/twc-launches—million-minds—initiative

Name: Arlene Jurewicz Leighton

From the NY 1 article :
Dean Kamen:
"They very rarely see the connection between the very difficult concepts that are being given in algebra or trigonometry and a useful purpose and until kids can see a connection between why they should work hard to learn something and what benefit it will be to them they’re not going to put passion to it," Kamen said."

I think is is key. Science student too often learn science definitions but do not have underlying concepts to be able to apply what they know to real life problems.

"Time Warner Cable is also building an alliance with the PopTech Community — a renowned unique innovation network designed to explore how to take classroom lessons and apply them toward helping the entire planet.

"PopTech got started as a place to look at the social impact of technologies not so much about the gadgets but more about what they mean for us — medicine and health and energy and space travel what these technologies mean for how we’re going to address some of the most pressing problems on earth," said Andrew Zolli of PopTech.

To learn more about how best to get a child in your life more enthusiastic about helping to solve those problems in fun and interesting ways through science and technology, visit www.connectamillionminds.com"

Carolyn Porco and Marcia McNutt Pop Tech pres are two that come to mind. Will post more………….

Arlene JL

science specialist / online educator

Name: Arlene Jurewicz Leighton

I also agree with Russell about the balance of art and science.

I think Chris Jordan pres on Running the Numbers ( Pop Tech 2007) is a blend of looking at statistics and the enormous scale of our mass consumption and giving them emotional context.

I explored some of these images in a recent workshop on looking at sustainability and data information. This presentation could be used with students in middle school to high school to give them a way to visually understand the huge numbers involved about our consumptive culture.

Chris mentioned that our minds can not wrap around such large numbers and his images may give students a way to visually understand scale.

It might also be possible to give students adept in digital photography some tools to ’ run their own numbers’ on data and statistical information they need to explore based on Chris’s techniques.

Just some additional thoughts…..

http://www.poptech.org/popcasts/chris_jordan__poptech_2007