Future STEM Gen – Enabling a Better Future: STEM Making Within Low SES Regions

This project, now titled Future STEM Gen, will empower youth from low socioeconomic status regions to gain leadership and STEM skills and address local and global challenges. Students will be provided with STEM maker kits for projects that genuinely contribute to their community, themed around smart gardens, sustainable energy sources (dye-sensitised solar cells, biodiesel from algae) and water purification. They will be supported in the development of these projects through mentoring by STEM educators including First Nations scientists. Leading STEM Maker activities at established school, community and university events, these students will become inspirational role models for further youth under-represented in STEM and will promote STEM as an enabler of a better future.

This research, in collaboration with Macquarie University and other partners, is a Maker Projects: Community STEM Engagement grant recipient ($100,000), awarded by the Australian Federal Government.