As more Nevada teachers join the workforce to shape and educate the youth in the state, and as technology continues to advance, it is important to build confidence in educators who teach STEM. Enter the Nevada STEM Co-Lab Project.

A collaborative partnership between UNLV’s College of Education and Center for Mathematics, Science and Engineering; the Desert Research Institute (DRI); and the National Institute for the Advancement of Education — the Nevada STEM Co-Lab project aims to bridge formal and informal education in Nevada communities by providing access to curriculum-centered STEM activities and training for educators.

“This project has been a nice collaboration between UNLV and DRI. It was a successful partnership and is paving the way for additional proposals and ongoing collaboration,” said Hasan Deniz, a science education professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning.

The project comes from a congressionally directed STEM grant with three important parts. “The overall grant was to support the development of the STEM Co-Lab, or the technology learning space in our Las Vegas DRI campus, as well as the development of 16 new Green Boxes covering kindergarten through fifth grade,” said Emily McDonald-Williams, STEM Education program manager for DRI. 

Fostering Innovation: Collaborative STEM Co-Lab Sparks Creativity

The Nevada STEM Co-Lab, which is housed at DRI, is a collaborative space for educators to access STEM education resources for training purposes. The grant for the project allowed for DRI to upgrade an existing space creating a dynamic lab for educators to engage in STEM resources and materials, gain practical, hands-on experience and training opportunities in STEM.

The Co-Lab allows for collaborative STEM education that aims to bridge formal and informal curriculum-centered STEM activities and training. The STEM Co-Lab fosters robust experiences and inspires life-long student engagement of K-12 students in Nevada. It is a place where educators, students, industry professionals, and community partners can collaborate to create a dynamic environment for STEM learning and innovation.

“This is a wonderful space for educators to experience hands-on learning activities and training that they can take back to their classrooms,” said McDonald-Williams. “Now that the Co-Lab is a permanent fixture, it can be used for future professional development opportunities for educators, and we encourage all educators to take advantage of the space.”

Green Boxes Get a Makeover 

The Green Boxes were originally created by DRI nearly 10 years ago as a hands-on method of connecting Nevada’s students with cutting-edge environmental science. Green Boxes are self-contained teaching kits that provide educators with three weeks of lesson plans along with all of the supplies necessary to conduct each activity in the curriculum. Topics of instruction include water conservation, recycling, and more

“The lesson plans in the kits are all grade specific and Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)-aligned. All the curriculum is written to be hands-on and engaging, so that students are doing hands-on activities around the STEM topics,” said McDonald-Williams. “We also include everything they need to engage in every part of the curriculum, be it microscopes or pencils and everything in between; it’s all in the box for a class of up to 40 students.”

Although the Green Boxes have been around for some time, this grant allowed for kit redesign and the creation of 16 additional kits. “By creating these newer Green Boxes differently, we were able to test them with our UNLV pre-service teachers who provided instant feedback so that we could implement adaptations before the Green Boxes were distributed formally,” said Maria Marinch, executive director of the National Institute for the Advancement of Education.

STEM Saturday Kit Testing

UNLV STEM Saturdays provided the perfect opportunity for the newly designed Green Boxes to be tested by educators with kids in a classroom environment. Every Saturday, young minds gather for STEM Saturdays on the UNLV campus in the spirit of exploration, curiosity, and hands-on learning, to discover the wonders of science and technology beyond the classroom.

Deniz, a faculty partner in this project, was actually the one who started STEM Saturdays 10 years ago.

“If there is something new, a new curriculum for example, and it needs to be tested in an informal environment to make sure it’s ready for the actual classroom setting, STEM Saturdays is the perfect place to do just that,” said Deniz.

The grant allowed for UNLV undergraduate students who were majoring in education – or pre-service teachers – to test out the Green Boxes on various STEM Saturdays. Micah Stohlmann, a Teaching and Learning associate professor was involved in recruiting pre-service teachers to help test out the kits. “The pre-service teachers felt that testing the kits out was a fun experience and they gave good quality feedback in ways the kits could be improved,” said Stohlmann. “I thought it worked well and partnering with DRI was a great experience. We all worked really well together throughout this project.” 

Empowering Educators Through Training

Testing out the Green Boxes on the STEM Saturdays proved to be a great idea and also a great opportunity for educator training.  While the Green Boxes are exceptional, they would not be utilized to their full potential if educators did not receive training on how to effectively use them in the classrooms. Part of the overall project was to support professional development, and where better to do so than at STEM Saturdays where the very model of the program is to provide exciting opportunities for students.

“We can control science teaching and provide a great experience for the pre-service teachers at the STEM Saturdays. The teachers can see actual science teaching and in-turn receive coaching from our faculty,” said Deniz.

On top of the STEM Saturdays, Nevada educators had two separate opportunities in August 2023 to attend a STEM Educator training event – either in Reno or Las Vegas. DRI hosted these events where educators could attend and receive training on the newly designed Green Boxes, as well as receive free classroom supplies, raffle prizes, swag bags, and more.

“The intent for these events was to make sure we had a diverse selection of local community partners to highlight what they offer teachers, predominantly free of charge. We had a variety of educators come and were able to participate in professional development training, covered the curriculum in the Green Boxes and different methods of implementations to help support the teachers,” said McDonald-Williams.

Professional development workshops will continue at the Nevada STEM Co-Lab on the DRI Las Vegas campus. And as STEM fields continue to evolve, these training workshops can provide Nevada educators with the resources they need to cultivate curiosity, spark creativity, and guide students toward a deeper understanding of the world around them. In addition, there is a collection of Green Boxes housed at DRI that can be checked out to anyone statewide free of charge.

Although this particular grant is coming to a close, the partnership between UNLV and DRI continues.

“It’s important for our institutions and community to continue creating collaborations so that we can maximize the resources in our community in addressing STEM education opportunities in school, like creating targeted Green Boxes,” said Marinch.

This article was originally written by Jessica Zimmerman on behalf of the National Institute for the Advancement of Education.