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School Programs
Results are in from the 2023 Harvest Best Academy (HBA) Science Fair. This spring scholars in grades 5th through 8th at Best Academy Middle School were busy working with our Sustainability Educators to create projects demonstrating their mastery of the scientific method. Scholars and educators took several months to design experiments that would prove or disprove hypothesis around an area of their interest.
The following blog post was written by Andrew Rubin Co-Teacher at Spark-Y’s partnership with Friendship Academy, a twice-per-week STEM Enrichment program for elementary youth.
We’ve been having a blast at Friendship Academy during our Enrichment Spark-Y class! While most students were interested in STEM and sustainability before signing up, our hands-on, team-building activities have made the young scholars even more fascinated with all things science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
It may come as no surprise that making slime - using chemistry to bond glue to an activator - was very, very popular. Taliyah S, 3rd grade, put it best when she said, “I loved making slime because it’s fun and we can do it as a group.” Other students agreed how important it was to work together, as well. Also, of course, they simply liked it because, “I’m not going to lie…I just wanted to play with it after we were done,” remarked Nhia M, 9 years old. That’s okay, too!
We were perhaps most impressed with the reasons why so many students wanted to try out new experiments, learn more about STEM, and gain more knowledge. Most spoke about the future, especially involving their families or communities. One such student was Kaben P., 3rd grade, who said, “ I want to be able to grow my own food and feed my family without going to the grocery store.” Noel T, took it one step further by including the entire planet, “I liked learning about plants because they help the Earth and I really want to help the Earth, too.” That’s one of our goals, too! He later added, “I want to get really smart so I can do well in college.”
Whether it was water testing, engineering a bridge with popsicle sticks, creating crystals, or building marshmallow catapults, we had so much joy working together and learning. Taliyah S eloquently stated, “It’s very noisy but it’s really fun for creative and artistic kids. We can take turns.”
We look forward to building our very own aquaponics system in the classroom and sharing our adventures with you!
About the Spark-Y Right Track+ Internship: The Right Track+ program is a collaboration between Ramsey County, the City of Saint Paul, local employers, and community organizations including Spark-Y. The goal of this program is to provide job training and professional development to unemployed or underemployed young adults experiencing the negative economic impacts of the pandemic for the purpose of assisting them in entering an in-demand career pathway.
The following post was written by Chue Yang, Right Track+ Intern with Spark-Y.
Near the end of August, Spark-Y teamed up with some volunteers from Accenture to help build a raised bed and compost bin for Friendship Academy of Arts. I have been an intern with Spark-Y for a couple of months now and each week there were always exciting new projects for the interns to work on. There was the hope that it will not rain, as I helped the Sustainability and Agriculture Director, Caitlin, set up two large white tents for the compost bin and raised garden bed projects.
The day before, I had to grab a large 50 gallons water barrel from the University of Minnesota which barely fit in my little Prius for the project build. Spark-Y continued to find ways to reuse old and donated materials to create sustainable projects that are closely tied to its mission of empowering youth with hands-on education and sustainability.
As we prepared the materials and started to cut the wood pieces for the two projects, Accenture volunteers and the students at Friendship Academy of Art began to show up. Students take turns drilling holes and screwing the wood pieces together. The Accenture volunteers were great at leading and guiding the students. The structures for holding the compost bin and the raised garden bed started to take their form. The feeling of seeing the two projects coming together brought smiles both to the adults and small students.
Compost Bin Structure & Raised Garden Bed Project Build
It was such as cool experience to see the little shy students, who were a little scared of the loud noise of the saws and drills at first, started to want to take turns cutting and putting the wood pieces together for the compost bin and raised garden bed structure. One student proudly expressed that she “loved drill” as she finished screwing the last few screws for the structures that would hold the compost bin. A little student who was probably still in preschool bravely volunteered to drill some holes into the water barrel that will be used as the compost bin. It brought a smile to my face seeing how much joy the students were having with the project build.
Completing the two projects took less than three hours with the help of the students and volunteers. This experience made me realize how important it is to work together as a team. It showed that more students should have the opportunity to learn about sustainability. They learned not only the importance of creating a compost bin that will turn food waste and old plant materials into compost to grow more food but also got to try something new. I also noticed that not many organizations would have their staff with executive positions working on the ground to help students learn. It just showed how much Spark-Y cared about the learning of youth and creating growth through sustainability.
Learn more about Friendship Academy Build Day in our previous blog post here.
About the Spark-Y Right Track+ Internship: The Right Track+ program is a collaboration between Ramsey County, the City of Saint Paul, local employers, and community organizations including Spark-Y. The goal of this program is to provide job training and professional development to unemployed or underemployed young adults experiencing the negative economic impacts of the pandemic for the purpose of assisting them in entering an in-demand career pathway.
Greetings! My name is Caitlyn Hang and I am finishing up my last year of college at the U of MN Twin Cities. My declared major is Biology, Society and the Environment; I am currently considering medical school or graduate school for a Doctorate in cellular and developmental biology. My involvement with Right Track began as an opportunity through a previous apprenticeship with Spark-Y. Under the Right Track program, I assumed the role of building curriculum for various projects; this internship has provided me the platform to further my interest in education and constructing curriculum.
One point of focus during my internship was creating lessons for the Mobile Innovation Lab which is a mobile bus that offers students a hands-on space to learn and build upon their STEM knowledge. Some of the education modules offered on the Mobile Innovation Lab includes drones, 3D printing, basics of Scientific Inquiry, and renewable energy! I had a hand in creating lessons for all these modules. My favorite unit being the basics of Scientific Inquiry; for this module the goal was to build the students’ foundation in scientific methods and encourage them to explore scientific ideas. It was important for me to inspire students to think about how to formulate a scientific question and solve a problem. As a result, I created a lesson that directed students to determine the most common fingerprint pattern amongst the group of students they worked alongside with. The lesson prompted students to form a hypothesis and carry out an experiment to determine the answer to the question. All the work that I do for Spark-Y is carried out from home behind the scenes therefore unfortunately, I was unable to join students the day of this lesson; however, I did hear that it was successful and that students enjoyed the activity!
This activity stood out to me because it embodies the importance of wonder. It is imperative that society fosters a learning environment where students are encouraged to question and to explore. The Mobile Innovation Lab benefits the city in many ways, but most prominently the Mobile Innovation Lab invests in the community by educating and empowering their students in ways that otherwise may not have been possible for them. It has been a great privilege to contribute to the work carried out by Spark-Y and to help empower young students. I hope that the community continues to support outreach work done by Spark-Y!
