Researchers from CU Boulder in partnership with UCAR, Utah State University, and the Vail Valley Foundation have created the STEM Career Connections (STEMCC) project titled 'Collaborative Research: DTI: STEM Career Connections: A model for preparing economically-disadvantaged rural youth for the future workforce'. Through a NSF funded Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) grant (NSF#12948709) the project pursues the broad goal to support economically disadvantaged youth in rural Colorado to develop their knowledge of and interest in STEM and computing careers.

STEMCC will build on resources and lessons learned from the Schoolwide Labs research and extend it to out-of-school time programs (summer camps and afterschool programs).

The project will consist of three interrelated components:

  1. a community partnership to support youth engagement in STEM and computing career pathways,
  2. a curriculum involving the use of programmable sensor technologies to engage in data-enabled science and engineering investigations, and
  3. integrated career experiences that encourage youth to make personally- relevant connections with local STEM and computing mentors and occupations. The STEMCC project will provide exciting opportunities for youth and have a positive impact on local rural communities.

Find out more about the project goals, partners, research questions.

Find out more about the STEM Partnership Toolkit.

Find out more about the personnel team on the ITEST project.