Sandwich STEM Academy's
Exploration & Discovery Day
On April 6th, 2016, Students from the STEM Academy participated in the first "Exploration & Discovery Day". The event was designed to showcase how broad future career options are, to demonstrate how new career paths are constantly developing, and to build student understanding of how real-life 21st century careers rely on skills already being developed during 7th & 8th grade at STEM!
Thanks to the assistance we received from many individuals and organizations with an impressively diverse array of careers, we were able to offer 36 different hands-on workshops. After an opening presentation, students attended 4 workshops throughout the morning and then had the opportunity to reflect on the experience with their advisories.
The event kicked-off with a motivational presentation from Michael Withington, titled "What is the Most Important Letter of the Alphabet?". Michael Withington is a Senior Specialty Chemical Sales Executive for Axiall Corporation. He has 30 yrs of marketing and sales experience on a national level. Aquaculture farmer-owner of Rock Oyster LLC in Plymouth, Mass. Plymouth Town Meeting Representative, an elected position for past 18 yrs. He is also a trustee of The Hornblower Foundation; a charitable organization that endows funding to education, conservation and medical research.
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Student Feedback Samples
Is there anything that all the careers/presenters you saw today had in common?
- "They all seemed to be really passionate about their jobs. They really liked what they did. They were also very knowledgeable about their jobs".
- "Throughout all the presentations, all of the presenters worked hard and were passionate".
- "Really educated, passionate about their job, wanted us to be involved…"
- "They were all really into their profession and motivated about what they do".
- "You have to be hard working. If you don’t enjoy what you do, you won’t enjoy your life"
- "In STEM classes, we do a lot of group work and presentations. Experience with these things teaches you how to compromise, work with different people, and speak out in front of an audience/be more comfortable in class-like settings".
- "Some skills at STEM I might use in a future career are time management and organization. Organization is important so you can keep track of what you’re doing and time management because you should always be able to do everything in the time allotted"
- "STEM teaches us how to organize, use time wisely, and work in groups. Most of the workshops use all of these skills, especially the healthcare workers".
- "Many skills that are required for school are also required for work. For example, to be a lawyer, you have to be good at reading, writing, and researching, which are also some of the most important skills to be a good student".
- "Like these workshops, STEM classes give us an option of what we want to study or do and I like that because it helps us shape ourselves for what we want to be in the future”.