We Energies STEM Center at MSOE

Initial Publication Date: March 18, 2025

The STEM Center at MSOE creates and supports inclusive, meaningful experiences for all K-12 students to explore the possibilities of their future, regardless of where their post-high school journey may take them.

Milwaukee School of Engineering
Established: 2017

[www.msoe.edu/stem]

Profile submitted by Elizabeth Taylor

Vision and Goals

The We Energies STEM Center at MSOE creates and supports inclusive, meaningful experiences for all K-12 students to explore the possibilities of their future, regardless of where their post-high school journey may take them.

With a vision to empower all students to see the world through an engineering mindset, the Center hosts year-round, hands-on programs in subjects ranging from artificial intelligence and robotics to engineering design challenges. Serving nearly 6,000 students annually, the STEM Center plays a critical role in advancing STEM opportunities for all students in the greater Milwaukee area.

Center/Program Structure

The STEM Center functions as a department reporting through Executive Vice President of Academics. The Centers primary function is to serve K-12 students through outreach programs, and while we hope students will come to MSOE because of their STEM Center experiences, recruitment to MSOE is not a success metric of the Center.

As of 2025, the team consisted of four full time and four part time staff members whose sole functions are to develop, lead and support the STEM Center's outreach programming. The STEM Center itself is a 10,000 square foot facility that opened in September of 2020. It consists of two classrooms, a large robotics area for VEX and FIRST teams for elementary – collegiate levels, a toolroom, and staff offices.

The Center collaborates with faculty, staff and students on STEM initiatives including advising for research grants and supporting outreach programs. MSOE student organizations have hosted outreach events at the Center as well as functioned as instructors for select programs throughout the year.

The Center additionally collaborates deeply with community partners including local school districts, corporate entities, and nonprofit organizations. Collaborations range from volunteer opportunities for corporate groups to leading a district wide robotics scrimmage in the spring with Milwaukee Public Schools.

Are there advantages of being structured this way?

Having a staff that is 100% allocated to the Center year-round is the only way we are able to operate as we do. Running daily school visits that are instructional in nature requires constant communication with schools, testing and developing activities, and facilitating outreach with community partners.

Prior to 2020, we did not have a dedicated facility and instead leveraged classrooms around campus and moved equipment for each visit. This was highly inefficient and greatly limited the quality of activities we could provide. Having a dedicated facility has enabled us to bring more in-depth activities – especially in robotics, coding and AI – to our outreach initiatives. It would otherwise be too difficult to move the volume of equipment around campus and we would have prohibitively high set up times.

Are there particular challenges that result from this structure?

Funding

The STEM Center has multiple revenue streams that support its work. This includes University operational funding, fees for programs, and philanthropic support from corporate partners, foundations, and individual donors.

Nearly 50% of the Centers funding comes from philanthropy which is leveraged to cover transportation support for high need schools, provide scholarships for all programs, and to keep equipment and content in robotics, artificial intelligence, and engineering relevant and engaging.

Corporate and foundation funding has been instrumental to ensuring every student has access to STEM Center programs and that all barriers – transportation and program fees being the most prevalent – can be removed for students and schools who would otherwise be unable to attend a STEM program. Roughly 87% of schools who attend STEM on Site programming indicate it's the only out of school STEM experience their students have. Many state that the transportation and fee waivers made possible by donors are what make it possible for their students to have a STEM experience.

How has this funding structure influenced the undergraduate STEM education programming the center offers?

What are the specific advantages of having a center funded in this way?

What are the challenges?

Has this funding structure has changed over time?

Description of Programming

The STEM Center offers year-round programming for K-12 students. A majority of the students we serve are in grades 3 – 8, however, programs are available for students entering 1st grade through seniors in high school. We serve roughly 6,000 students annually, with approximately half of the students we serve coming through our STEM on Site program that launched in 2017.

STEM Center programs fall into two categories: spark and sustain. Spark programs are intended to introduce a STEM topic, career or major and generally are short in duration. Sustain programs provide pathways for students interested in a topic or career to spend weeks or months focusing on a skill and area of study.
Some of our most successful programs include:

- STEM on Site: This program consists of 1.5 – 2-hour hands on, STEM activities that are led by a STEM Center instructor and are designed for classrooms to attend. Topics include robotics, artificial intelligence, engineering design, and coding. It is the largest program at the Center and runs September – May annually.

In 2023, a new muti-week STEM on Site was introduced called the Generac Youth Engineering Design Academy. This program consists of four consecutive weeks where a classroom learns about what engineers do, how to use scale in engineering designs, and how to think and design in both a 2D and 3D environment.

- FIRST Robotics Ambassadors: This program hires MSOE undergraduate students to be mentors for high need, central city FIRST robotics teams. Serving 5th – 12th grade FIRST FLL, FTC and FRC teams, this initiative also provides additional programming such as community build days and workshops to support educators and team mentors in bringing robotics to their schools or community centers.

- NFPA Fluid Power Challenge: Running for nearly 20 years, this program brings middle school students to campus to learn about fluid power and build a pneumatic lifter and rotator on the workshop day. They are introduced to that year's competition board as well. A month later, students come back to compete with their fluid powered devices and to be judged on their engineering design portfolio.

- Summer Programs: The Center runs non-residential summer programs ranging from one day to one week for K-12 students. Topics range from robotics workshops to art and engineering design studios.

- Partnership Programs: The Center annually hosts programs with local organizations such as our Girl Scout STEM Badge Day and Boy Scout Merit Badge Day. We also have programs such as our Girls in STEM Careers Day which features hands-on activities and a career expo powered by volunteers from local companies.

Partnership programs with corporate partners also are a core part of our work. As an example, since 2019 MSOE has partnered with Northwestern Mutual to offer a Girls + AI day during national computer science week to introduce girls to artificial intelligence and emerging technology.

Successes and Impacts

Since 2023, the STEM Center had issued an annual report to share impact data and stories from the year. These are available at https://www.msoe.edu/about-msoe/k-12-stem-at-msoe/we-energies-stem-center/

Evaluation and Assessment

How does your center demonstrate its value, both in terms of assessing its own programming and responding to external evaluation?

In 2024, thanks to the generosity of an individual donor, MSOE was able to fund a partial course release for an educational researcher position. Among other work, this researcher is helping the Center develop and implement evaluation and assessment mechanisms that allow us to better capture the impact of our programs.

In 2024 – 2025 data, early results showed that:
- 97% of teachers reported that their students experienced a significant or moderate increase in their knowledge of STEM and the engineering design process as a result of their visit

- 94% of teachers reported that their students experienced a significant or moderate increase in their interest in STEM as a result of their visit

- 100% of teachers cited that STEM Center programs aligned well with their educational goals and/or curriculum

Additionally, our team meets regularly with educators and nonprofits to understand needs in the community to adjust our programs accordingly.

Elements Contributing to Success

Having an institutional structure that values supporting K-8 students in addition to high school students through outreach endeavors has been transformative to the work we are able to do. We hope to provide a long runway for students to identify what things are at the intersection of what they like and what they are good at.

By not having a success metric correlated with admission to MSOE, we are able to serve the community widely and provide every student with the opportunity to explore the possibilities of their future from an early age.

Another critical pillar is community partnerships – whether it's through funding or volunteerism. Providing mutually beneficial partnerships has created unique outreach initiatives and enabled students and schools to access programming they otherwise would not be able to. For corporate partners, the Center provides an impactful and easy engagement pathway to do STEM outreach with local schools and organizations. It further has enabled us to deliver content in subject areas like AI that are rapidly changing and require a significant investment in equipment and activity development to stay relevant and meet community needs.