Evansville Renewable Energy Inquiry and Engineering Deep Dive

This project was made possible with funding from the Arconic Foundation. Arconic Foundation’s mission is to support non-profit partners who advance STEM Education and Workforce Development in Arconic communities. This is the second time that Evansville has been a location for an Arconic workshop with CE.  As it is the second round of delivery for this region, a focus on expanding the initial impact was made and the workshop was extended to two days.  CE co-planned with workshop with the district to get a sense of how the initial workshop had impacted their curriculum and hands-on instruction.

On Day 1 of the workshop, teachers worked through various hands-on activities to bolster their knowledge of renewable energy, energy fundamentals, and electricity concepts. Some teachers had attended the previous year, while most did not, and it was decided to provide background for everyone to ensure that teachers could dive into specific curricular work on the second day. The hands-on activities that were explored included solar circuits, Energy Theatre, and wind energy engineering.  On Day 2, teachers spent the morning discussing engineering principles and their relation to NGSS.  In the afternoon, teachers worked in colleague cohorts to pinpoint areas of their yearlong plans that could use new curriculum, and discussed specifically how resources from the workshop could be utilized. The specific curricular focus for the afternoon was Melody Childers’ “Chemistry of Emergency Energy Sources” unit.