1 day agoMentoring 2023: Access Your Superpower and Make the Million Girls Moonshot a RealityBy: Linda Kekelis and Teresa Drew We love starting the new year with a spotlight on mentoring. For this year’s National Mentoring campaign help us reach the Million Girls Moonshot. With the Million Girls Moonshot, STEM Next Opportunity Fund is re-imagining who can engineer, who can build, who can invent…6 min read6 min read
Dec 19, 2022From a Week of Computer Science to A Year of PossibilitiesBy: Linda Kekelis and Teresa Drew Five Ideas to Take into 2023 We celebrate the incredible effort that made Computer Science Education Week 2022 a resounding success. What began as a one-hour coding challenge has expanded into a worldwide phenomenon with millions of kids taking part in Hour of Code in classrooms, afterschool programs, libraries, and…8 min read8 min read
Dec 19, 2022Counting down 2022 with our favorite Federal STEM policy actionsby Ron Ottinger and Melissa Moritz As we close out 2022, STEM Next reflects on some of the big policy opportunities that the year brought for out-of-school time (OST) STEM learning. …8 min read8 min read
Nov 23, 202210 Holiday STEM Gifts for Girls 2022by Linda Kekelis Bringing Joy and Inspiration Before you start your holiday shopping, I encourage you to reflect on the power of your choices. Marketing, stereotypes, and routines help shape our shopping lists and our imaginations. They may also limit what we introduce to girls. It’s not that we are trying to limit girls’…8 min read8 min read
Nov 2, 2022Telling Your STEM Story: A Compelling Strategy for Sustainabilityby Ron Ottinger and Melissa Mortiz It’s midterm election time and that is the focus of most conversations in Washington, DC. Beyond encouraging everyone to vote, afterschool and summer programs can continue to tell compelling stories about the youth impacted by programs funded with state and federal dollars. By lifting…Education Policy5 min readEducation Policy5 min read
Oct 10, 2022Decoding D.C.’s Alphabet Soup of Legislation — Implications for STEM Learning for Back to School Season 2022By Ron Ottinger and Melissa Moritz A lot of new legislation has been passed recently and it can feel a bit like sinking into the alphabet soup of acronyms coming from Washington, D.C. We are also in back to school season, with kids and educators heading back to now open…9 min read9 min read
Aug 20, 2022Welcome Back to Afterschool 2022Five Big Ideas to Spark Family Engagement in STEM — coauthored by Linda Kekelis and Ron Ottinger Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) can spark a curiosity in children that can inspire a lasting love of learning. …9 min read9 min read
Jun 23, 2022Announcing #GirlsLeadSTEMby Ron Ottinger Announcing #GirlsLeadSTEM — A new, collective voice for STEM equity While women have made gains in STEM career fields persistent gaps remain, particularly in engineering and a variety of science fields. While research abounds to highlight this challenge, we continue to fall short in empowering young women to lead the way, especially those who have been historically…2 min read2 min read
Jun 1, 2022Looking Beyond the Classroom to Get Students Back into Learningby Ron Ottinger Looking Beyond the Classroom to Get Students Back into Learning A note from Ron Ottinger, Executive Director STEM Next Opportunity Fund Everywhere we turn, we see headlines and stories hyper-focused on student “learning loss” with the release of daunting new data assessing student learning. It can be overwhelming at best. However, this moment gives us the opportunity…Learning3 min readLearning3 min read
May 26, 2022Summer of Love for STEMcoauthored by Linda Kekelis and Teresa Drew Seven Fun and Family-friendly Ideas for a Summer of STEM Summer is coming. So is the search for ideas to support summer learning. With less structure and more time for self-directed play, summer is an ideal time to encourage children’s interests, confidence, and creativity. …5 min read5 min read
