DESIGN – BUILD – INSPIRE!

Engineers and scientists find a sense of meaning while inspiring the next generation of inventors.

These are the ways we support Scientists and Engineers’ outreach initiatives:

Our team produces a video about your work to be published in the Curiosity Machine. We conduct interviews, write the script and put together a 3-5 minute story. You can find examples of current videos here.
We offer a collaborative process to work on the design challenges related to your research during a one day DBI training.
Support to develop a 4-5 session Family Science Course where you can teach families in a local school or library, resulting in approximately 400 direct contact hours.
We put the experiment and concept as a chapter in our Making Machines book series.

Here’s why scientist Sheila Patek recommends Iridescent:

“The program has been a wonderfully engaging and rigorous way to look at core principles of biological movement and engineering devices. Not only do the folks running the program develop fantastic visuals and materials, they have actual trained scientists working with them who thoroughly understands my research and can translate it to a broader audience in a technically rigorous way.

The exercises are fantastic. I’ve enjoyed seeing what the younger participants have come up with. I’ve used the same exercise in my college classroom, adding a few more challenges, but still finding the underlying principles valuable and challenging for advanced biology majors. I even had my college students join the program and post their ideas on the website.

Why participate in this program? I do a lot of outreach, and I often feel like either the science is not represented correctly, my time isn’t used well, or I don’t have a meaningful connection to the project. I really like this particular program. I had opportunities to help shape the outreach material and I can stay involved as a mentor through the website. It really feels worth my time and has meaningful outcomes for the people involved”

Design-Build-Inspire! workshops

A one day workshop that brings together engineers, scientists, teachers and parents to develop a multi-session hands-on family science course for children and parents. After the workshop, additional support is provided through online resources that help engineers create effective lesson plans and engineering design projects.

There are three main stages for this program:

The one-day Design-Build-Inspire! workshop
Online training and support (complete and refine lessons and Family Science Course logistics). This takes place over a month following the workshop.
Implementing and teaching the Family Science Courses (once a week in the evening at a school for 3-5 weeks)

At the Design-Build-Inspire! workshop:

Engineers, scientists, teachers and parents meet each other, form teams and set dates for the Family Science Courses
Each team works to identify an overarching story and 3-5 open ended engineering design projects.
Parents learn about implementing a Family Science Course in their school.