Photo By Heather Wilburn | Fleet Readiness Center East Commanding Officer Capt. James M. Belmont, left, shoots a...... read more read more
MARINE CORPS AIR STATION CHERRY POINT, N.C. – A new event promoting science, technology, engineering and mathematics education took flight Friday as part of the Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Cherry Point Air Show festivities.
Approximately 1,000 Craven County sixth graders attended the MCAS Cherry Point Air Show STEM Day, organized by the Fleet Readiness Center East (FRCE) STEM Outreach Team in support of MCAS Cherry Point and Marine Corps Community Services Cherry Point. Students had the opportunity to interact with members of the Blue Angels maintenance team and visit more than 30 interactive stations featuring activities including constructing wooden planes and foam gliders, digging for fossils, and demonstrating robots and drones. Ongoing practice sessions by air show performers, and aircraft and military vehicle displays added to the “wow” factor.
The 2024 MCAS Cherry Point Air Show STEM Day marks the first of what organizers hope will become a recurring event alongside the air show. It was a natural fit with the team’s mission of engaging, inspiring and educating students from eastern North Carolina while highlighting the wide range of career opportunities available at the depot, said FRCE STEM Outreach Team Lead Randall Lewis.
“Having a STEM education event connected to the air show provided such great energy, because the kids are already so pumped about all things aviation-related at this point – the timing couldn’t be more perfect,” he said. “This event was a huge success in terms of turnout and student engagement, and our team is hopeful that STEM Day will become a regular part of the air show schedule. We don’t get many better opportunities to reach out to this number of local students all at once.
“We’ll take any opportunity we can to get kids excited about STEM, and I’m optimistic that every one of these students left here today with newfound knowledge that the possibilities for STEM-related careers are nearly endless,” Lewis continued. “STEM Day allowed us to introduce them to the wide range of STEM-related careers both at FRC East and beyond. In just one day, these children were able to see how STEM skills can apply to career fields ranging from aviation to robotics to healthcare, and even archaeology and marine biology. Today’s activities really drove home the idea that STEM is for everyone.”
Planning for STEM Day began earlier this year, when MCAS Cherry Point leadership approached FRCE about the possibility of collaborating for the event. FRCE Commanding Officer Capt. James M. Belmont said there was never any doubt in his mind that expanding the continued partnership between FRCE and Cherry Point would benefit both commands and the community.
“Taking part in the Air Show STEM Day is really a win-win-win for everybody involved,” Belmont said. “This event allowed us to help inspire local students to consider future careers in STEM fields. We were able to be good neighbors and provide support to Cherry Point and their amazing Air Show. And best of all, nearly 1,000 kids got to take part in some really cool activities and unique experiences that they might not otherwise have a chance to.
“It gives me great confidence we’re building tomorrow’s workforce today, right here in eastern North Carolina,” Belmont continued. “Many of these students will one day be supporting our nation’s warfighters through work at FRC East and Cherry Point.”
MCAS Cherry Point Commanding Officer Col. Brendan Burks agreed there is a need to prepare future STEM professionals for careers in the eastern North Carolina region.
“With the current and future advanced aviation technologies and jobs coming to MCAS Cherry Point and advancements in our local communities, it is important that we build the opportunities and interests in STEM to support and develop our current and future job forces and leaders in the area, both civilian and military, to meet the future demands and challenges,” he said.
Activities like the Air Show STEM Day are part of cross-organizational, multi-faceted plan to increase STEM exposure for area students, Burks noted.
“This layered approach with the community is one of the bids for success to ensure this area can develop and hire the future job force needed to support the growth and expansion of not only the MCAS Cherry Point mission, but also the local communities,” he said. “This is a team sport, so we all have to work together to achieve success.”
Tina Vande Slunt, a sixth-grade teacher at Tucker Creek Middle School, said she was impressed by the variety and quality of the activities offered during the event. She said more events like the Air Show STEM Day are important to help prepare students for the future.
“I’m really excited about opportunities like this because we need more STEM,” she said. “These kids who are here today are going to be the ones who are going to go to the moon, they’re going to be colonizing Mars – they’re going to be our future astronauts, engineers and scientists. If they don’t understand what opportunities are out there for them for careers, we’re going to have a shortage of individuals with those skills.
“It’s really important for them to be here today,” Vande Slunt continued. “And they seem so excited about all the different activities, and we can use this to our advantage. I know I’m going back into the classroom to ask the students what they liked and what they didn’t, and use that information to help them investigate different career choices.”
In the end, the most important outcomes from events like the Air Show STEM Day are hard to measure, Belmont said – but they are apparent.
“We now have teammates working at FRC East who attended STEM-based summer camps supported by the command when outreach efforts first got started almost 20 years ago,” he said. “We now have families in eastern North Carolina who know they can make a good life right here at home in technical careers, and they never have to leave the area if they don’t want to; that applies to our skilled trades and engineering jobs, along with other career paths available at the depot. Outreach efforts like the Air Show STEM Day allow us to increase quality of life for our local communities and support our warfighters, and that really is the best possible result of these efforts.”
FRCE is North Carolina's largest maintenance, repair, overhaul and technical services provider, with more than 4,000 civilian, military and contract workers. Its annual revenue exceeds $1 billion. The depot provides service to the fleet while functioning as an integral part of the greater U.S. Navy; Naval Air Systems Command; and Commander, Fleet Readiness Centers.
| Date Taken: | 05.10.2024 |
| Date Posted: | 05.10.2024 17:13 |
| Story ID: | 471006 |
| Location: | CHERRY POINT, NC, US |
| Web Views: | 63 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Imaginations soar at Air Show STEM Day, by Heather Wilburn, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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