CBC STEMathon brings middle schoolers together for creative problem solving

On a Monday afternoon at Blessed Teresa of Calcutta School in Ferguson, eighth graders Nathan Smith and Terry Mooney were building an app through MIT App Inventor.

Anna Furlong, a junior at Incarnate Word Academy, listened as they explained the features they wanted to add, aimed at a target audience of senior adults living alone. Anna attended Blessed Teresa of Calcutta until second grade and is a member of Incarnate Word Academy’s robotics team.

“I love connecting with them — it’s cool to see them how I used to be,” she said.

Blessed Teresa of Calcutta middle school students were among more than a dozen schools working to solve a problem in this year’s STEMathon competition at Christian Brothers College High School. Now in its second year, the CBC STEMathon challenges middle school students to use science, technology, engineering and math to design a remedy to a real-world issue.

CBC collaborated with Visiting Angels of St. Charles, which offers home care services to seniors, on this year’s problem statement: How can we reduce loneliness or sadness among isolated elderly community members?

It was a purposefully broad question, designed to garner a broad range of solutions, CBC STEM Academy director Joe Henken said.

“We don’t want to give them any kind of indication of what we think the solution is,” Henken said. “We want the solution to come from them.”

The STEMathon competition began as a response to a need CBC saw in Catholic grade schools for STEM education assistance. Schools were calling CBC requesting help with things like 3D printers or robotics projects, Henken said.

The competition is sponsored by the Josh Seidel Memorial Foundation, which supports young people participating in programs and schools that build science, engineering and technical skills, encourage entrepreneurism and foster the connection of people for the greater good of the community. The foundation is named for a CBC 1997 alumnus who died in a work-related accident in 2013.

Fourteen middle school teams — 13 Catholic schools and one public school — participated this year, an increase from nine teams last year. Five teams were chosen as finalists and presented their solutions in person to a panel of judges, including Visiting Angels of St. Charles, on Nov. 15. Each participating school received a minimum of $300 for participating, and the finalists shared $10,000 in prizes for their schools.

High school students from CBC, as well as all-girls schools Incarnate Word Academy, St. Joseph’s Academy and Nerinx Hall, were assigned as mentors to the middle school teams. Mentors met at least weekly with their team, on location at their school, to help students develop their solution.

This year’s finalists were Christ Prince of Peace School in Manchester, Sacred Heart School in Florissant, Holy Infant School in Ballwin, St. Alban Roe in Wildwood and Parkway Southwest Middle School.

Christ Prince of Peace was named the winner for their solution: Together Chess, a prototype chessboard that encourages connection with another person even while alone at home.

The proposed Together Chess combines existing technology from Chessnut, which produces electronic chessboards, and chess.com, a popular website and app for online chess. Together Chess users would be able to play a game with an opponent who has the same kind of board or who is connected via an app, and the board’s technology moves the opponent’s pieces on your board in real time, Christ Prince of Peace’s team explained.

Together Chess also includes special considerations for an elderly population: magnetic squares to help shaky hands place pieces without knocking them over; large, simple buttons for the different controls; and most importantly, an Internet-enabled voice-to-voice calling feature to allow the two players to chat as they play the game.

“My grandpa taught me chess, and my grandpa taught everyone in my family how to play chess, and that’s around the same for everyone here,” sixth grader Connor Bussmann said. “So that’s how we came up with the chess game.”

Seventh grader Meghan Mensinger took the lead on editing the video presentation for the group. One of the biggest lessons she took away was how to work collaboratively in a group with many different ideas, she said.

“I definitely learned how to work with a diverse group of people,” she said. “I learned how to work with other personalities to try to include everyone doing what they’re best at and what they want to do.”

It was rewarding to work with the Christ Prince of Peace students and be inspired by their creativity, CBC senior and team mentor Sam Matusofsky said.

“These kids are so creative and have better ideas than me. That’s been awesome to see play out,” he said. “…I’m just here to encourage collaboration and make sure they meet their goals.”

Visiting Angels of St. Charles director of operations Kathy Versemann, who served as a judge for the final presentations, was excited to be part of the STEMathon process from the beginning, she said. She was impressed by the range of solutions and the careful thought that went into them. The students will present their idea at the Visiting Angels of St. Charles office in a couple weeks.

“Anything that I think can connect the youth to the elderly is a huge win,” she said.

As a Catholic high school, CBC is eager use its resources to support Catholic elementary schools in the area, CBC president Philip Riley said. The STEMathon is just one opportunity to do that.

“We want to see what we can do to make sure these schools remain vibrant,” Riley said. “One of things we say is, ‘I am one. I am not the only one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something.’ We view this as part of our mission as a Lasallian school.”

Incarnate Word Academy STEM outreach

While Incarnate Word Academy students served as mentors in CBC’s STEMathon, the academy’s STEM ambassadors have also been working on their own ways to share their expertise and resources with area grade schools.

Incarnate Word Academy STEM ambassadors have developed Innovation STEM Mobile Labs, carts full of supplies and tools that can be used in STEM projects across a range of skill levels. Their goal is to deliver 10 of the mobile labs to Catholic grade schools this school year.

In addition to the new mobile labs, ambassadors also create and distribute STEM education kits, which include materials for specific projects, and visit schools as requested to help with STEM activities.

“Their whole philosophy is bringing STEM to them (grade schools),” Incarnate Word Academy STEM coordinator Jennifer Martin said.

The STEM ambassador program is now in its fifth year. It also receives funding from the Josh Seidel Memorial Foundation.

To read more about Incarnate Word Academy’s STEM Ambassadors, read our previous reporting at stlreview.com/4ifsEtS.