Last month, we were thrilled to welcome Van Independent School District (Van ISD) as a new member of the MLC. Since then, we've had the chance to dive into the remarkable initiatives happening within their program including the Van ISD STEAM Bus.
The Van ISD STEAM Bus has been operating since 2019 when the organization creatively transformed an old school bus into a STEAM Lab/Maker space. What makes this project even more unique is how students were involved in the process and development, contributing ideas to the direction and outcome. Additionally, the staff took on a "DIY" approach and handled most of the work in-house, helping keep costs low.
2024 Summer STEAM Bus Tour: Bringing STEAM to Rural Texas
Lead contact Jason Johnson, Chief Technology Officer, shared with us how this past summer marked a milestone for the program as they embarked on their first-ever Western STEAM Tour, visiting nearly 1,000 students from rural communities. The 1,800-mile trek showcased the dedication to making STEAM education accessible in underserved areas.
Brittany Rose, an instructional technology specialist at Van ISD, explained, “It was important to us to schedule events in communities that we felt were similar to ours: small, rural and having a high percentage of low socioeconomic students.”
Their summer initiative was funded entirely through sponsorship dollars and along with budgetary planning, as other mobile programs can probably relate, they had to carefully plan their trip around a 43-foot-long STEAM bus. Even more impressive, Van ISD high school students joined the tour as educators, gaining hands-on experience by teaching TEKS-aligned lessons under the mentorship of seasoned educators.
Learn more about the Van ISD STEAM Bus and their summer tour on their blog page. You can follow Van ISD STEAM Bus on Twitter and Instagram at @VanSTEAMBus. For more information about Van Independent School District, visit their website.
The MLC provides education, fosters collaboration and serves as a central resource of knowledge, curricula, and best practices for the mobile lab community. Please visit our website for additional information.
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