Dawn: GESTEM: Girls in STEM Education

Overview
Program Element / Activity Title:
Dawn: GESTEM: Girls in STEM Education
E/PO Project Name:
Dawn
Contact Information Shown to the Public:
McREL International
4601 DTC Blvd.
Suite 500
Denver, CO 80237
Program Element / Activity Website:
Short Description for Projects Page:

Dawn  education team members presented new science findings and activities as well as background information to a variety of student audiences in informal education settings. Here, a set of workshops about the Dawn Mission were presented at GESTEM, Girls Exploring Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, events in Denver, Colorado, April 20, 2012 and May 9, 2014 sponsored by the Colorado Women in Engineering Society. Aproximately 150 middle school girls were reached during three workshops at each event. One highlighed the Dawn mission using an activity developed for NASA's Discovery and New Frontiers Programs, Art and the Comic Connection, in which students used the elements of art to perform visual analysis of images of giant asteroid Vesta and create an individial piece of art. In two workshops, Dawn engineering using ion propulsion was highlihgted piloting a kinesthetic model of coding the spacecraft's trajectory to its destinations.

Program Element / Activity Status
Audience Metrics
Who is the primary audience of your program element / activity?:
Who is the secondary audience of your program element / activity?:
Evaluation
National Priorities and Coordination Approaches as Articulated in CoSTEM:
  • Increase and Sustain Youth and Public Engagement in STEM
  • Better Serve Groups Historically Under-represented in STEM Fields
What is the design of the evaluation process for your program element / activity?:
Designed by Society of Women Engineers
What are the main impacts of your effort to date and how do they correlate to the project’s goals and objectives:
Feedback on piloted activities informs steps for improvement in their efficacy