STIMEY: Science Technology Innovation Mathematics Engineering for the Young
STIMEY takes STEM education forward.
In order to bring science and society closer together in Europe, thus increasing the continent’s international competitiveness, STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education must be more relatable to European youth and their everyday life.
The STIMEY (Science, Technology, Innovation, Mathematics, Engineering for the Young) project researches and develops a hybrid educational environment with multi-level components that are being designed and developed based on a well-researched pedagogical framework. The aim is to make STEM education more attractive to young people aged 10 to 18 in this digital era. This environment combines components from the social media, robotic artefacts and radio in order to educate, engage and increase students’ interest in STEM education and careers from a young age. Additionally, it offers educators necessary modern tools to deliver STEM education in an attractive and engaging manner in or out of class. What is more, it enables parents to keep track of their children’s education, and collaborate with their teachers on their development. Finally, STIMEY’s open platform allows businesses to invest in the growth of youth talents and skills in line with economic and labour market needs through entrepreneurial tools and competitions.
Thus, with the help of STIMEY, universities, schools, teachers, students, parents, and businesses come together to complete a circle in which STEM becomes part of the daily life of European youth through a hybrid educational environment that also prepares them for future careers.
Basic information
The main idea of the STIMEY project is to unify under one roof: an open source platform, STEM education, communication, intrinsic and extrinsic motivational tools, social media concepts, and gaming based on a pedagogical framework, while simultaneously considering gender issues and combining interfaces with multiple languages. These elements are aimed at increasing European youth’s interest, engagement and involvement in learning, careers and entrepreneurial activities related to STEM. In general, the hybrid STIMEY environment is developed by combining the following factors:
- A web platform for multimodal communication, social media concepts and tools, and professional identity development [virtual element];
- buildable and upgradable robotic artefacts [physical element];
- an informational yet interactive radio broadcasting channel [support element], and;
- serious gaming and entrepreneurial tools [cognitive tools].
The overall objective of the STIMEY project is to contribute to the competitiveness of the European Union’s economy, with results that equip young people from ages 10 to 18 with the capacities to become highly competent in STEM subjects and be motivated to pursue STEM careers.
The specific objectives, stemming from the general goal, are to:
- Create a pedagogical framework that exploits the full potentials of Social Media for STEM subjects in formal and informal contexts where recommendations and guidelines are developed and widely used;
- integrate the major target groups and stakeholders into the learning environment’s development and implementation;
- create a lifelong sustainable STEM-based open-source, social media, sharing, gaming, training, learning, personalised e-profile platform;
- create a student life-long e-portfolio of certified and STIMEY-guaranteed STEM diplomas and awards as well as STEM experience. This STIMEY e-portfolio supports successful career choices (university and/or job application);
- evaluate performance progress in relation to the target audience and the project;
- create and effectively use socially assistive robot fellow artefacts for pupils’ emotional engagement, community bonding, efficient learning and motivation;
- design and develop entrepreneurial tools for engaging schoolchildren in innovations and stimulating their creative thinking;
- complement the above objectives by establishing interconnectedness with the existing tools such as solutions provided via SCIENTIX (community for science education in Europe) to support interoperability and connectivity by developing a learning component description language;
- design and develop a 24-hour STEM broadcasting radio to communicate, interact and inform young people from ages 10 to 18, and;
- successfully harmonise the project modules to support European youth from primary school on in STEM education so that a critical mass of end-users will be motivated for a STEM career.
On a larger scale, the STIMEY project aims at “bridging the gap between education, research and innovation in the commercial sphere, and improving communication between the teaching and research world, the business world and the wider economy”, which is the key challenge identified in the Europe 2020 Strategy, the Strategic Framework for European Cooperation in Education & Training (ET 2020; 2009/C 302/03, p. 2).
The STIMEY concept offers teachers a novel method to introduce new exercises, new approaches and teaching/learning technologies, stimulate and motivate students, change the learning atmosphere in the classroom, give feedback to students individually based on their portfolios and progress, communicate and collaborate with other teachers, and stay in contact with parents and wider society.
STIMEY also provides teachers with necessary modern tools in order to teach STEM topics in an attractive and engaging manner in-class or remotely, while also following up on their students’ progress. Furthermore, STIMEY enables parents to keep track of their children’s progress, and easily communicate with their teachers to collaborate on the children’s development. Moreover, the open platform allows organisations (whether for-profit or non-profit, governmental or non-governmental) to invest in the development of the students’ talents and skills in line with economic and labour market needs through entrepreneurial tools, activities and competitions.