Robertsville Middle School hosted STEAM Night
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Felicia Lee of Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education leads an activity at Roberts- ville Middle School STEAM Night. - Ben Pounds
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Oak Ridge Police Department officer Christina Askren poses with dogs from The Daney Rescue Farm. - Ben Pounds
On May 4, more than 30 presenters from different industries gave presentations on Science, Technology, Arts and Mathematics (STEAM) at a park in front of Robertsville Middle School in Oak Ridge.
Drones flew, Great Danes greeted visitors, and hair stood up as visitors touched the American Museum of Science and Energy’s generator.
These were just a few of the booths that people, including Robertsville Middle School students and others, found at the middle school Steam Night.
Presenters from area industries highlighted the different STEAM opportunities and careers available to students.
RMS Principal Nick Corrigan said there were almost 30 booths. The event also included a drawing for prizes.
While STEM is frequently an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, Bryson Leftwich, STEM teacher and STEM coach at RMS said adding the A for art was important, and the event reflected that goal. She was involved in planning.
“If we add that ‘A’ in there, that really brings in art,” she said, noting that the event included an art activity booth and an exhibition of student art.
“It’s all wonderful, beautiful art from our students,” she said. “It really just pulls in our artsier side of students rather than just our students interested in the STEM topics.
“Our goal at Robertsville at this STEAM fair is to bring the community together around a STEAM or STEM oriented activity or a festival,” she said. “To introduce kids to jobs that they thought never even existed, to introduce them into interesting businesses and organizations around our community.”
She said the event was open to the public, not just Robertsville Middle School students.
This year the festival added a port manager from Mississippi to discuss how shipping works across the world.
Oak Ridge High School classes came to show the middle schoolers T-shirt cannons and trebuchets, a type of medieval launching device.
Another exhibit included “creepy crawlies” from the University of Tennessee Entomology and Plant Pathology Department. Other presenters were the Oak Ridge police and fire departments, United Cleanup Oak Ridge, The Daney Rescue Farm, and the middle school’s own RamSat, a satellite that students built, which is currently in orbit.
Leftwich said the career focus made sense even for middle school students because planning for careers frequently starts in freshman year of high school.
“I think starting at the elementary and middle age, just opening their world is really important,” she said.
She thanked the RMS Student Council, saying its members had been on hand all night with walkie-talkies coordinating where people were going and ushering people around. She also thanked the Parent Teacher Student Association.
Corrigan, in an interview with The Courier News, extended his thanks beyond just the people associated with RMS.
“The Oak Ridge community at large has been tremendously supportive of our schools and helped to pull off this event,” he said.