Mobile Making After School ProgramAt — CSUSM Center for Research and Engagement in STEM Education (CRESE)

Mobile Making After School Program

Outstanding undergraduate students who are part of CSUSM's STEM outreach efforts. They share their unique experiences at CSUSM with prospective students, they promote CSUSM science and math programs at local high schools and community colleges, and they serve as role models for current and future STEM majors.

Funded by the National Science Foundation, the Mobile Making Program aims to develop a research-based model for supporting and evaluating a making-centered afterschool program for different social, cultural, and socioeconomic settings. This project brings making to local schools by taking equipment and undergraduate STEM Ambassadors to after school program sites with the use of a van provided by the Vista Unified School District.

Currently, STEM@CSUSM has established after-school making clubs at 10 middle schools in Vista, San Marcos, and Escondido. STEM Ambassadors visit these sites each week to engage students in design-based, DIY activities such as building basic robots with toothbrushes and cell phone motors, making solar-powered vehicles from recycled materials, powering motors and buzzers with conductive play dough, creating electronic textiles with microcontrollers and conductive thread, and creating unique designs with 3D printing pens.