On April 24, 2014, an exclusive group of visionaries presented to over 4,000 students at the USA Science & Engineering Festival's inaugural X-STEM Symposium sponsored by Northrop Grumman Foundation and MedImmune. The all day event included interactive presentations and workshops with some of the top scientists and engineers in the country. Geneticist and Physician Dr. Francis Collins, Director of the National Institutes of Health, captivated crowds with his journey to the NIH. Watch his presentation below:  http://youtu.be/o214CyMbJ2c?list=PLFxuEWfG5k6F2dH21LFhUCD7jYcLOLm4C After being…
Guest Blog By X-STEM Speaker Aaron A. Alford, PhD, MPH, PMP Hands-on learning and human connections are essential to STEM education. Without exception, all of the scientists that I know were inspired to enter STEM career tracks by someone who helped them make an emotional connection to science and discovery. As a scientist and an educator, I was absolutely thrilled to be a part of the X-STEM Extreme STEM Symposium and the USA Science & Engineering Festival in Washington, D.C. at the end of April. Both events provided a grand opportunity to interact with students and learners of all types…
Guest Blog by Festival X-STEM Speaker Dr. Jeffrey Bennett Originally Posted on The Huffington Post May 9, 2014 What you cannot imagine, you cannot do. --Astronaut Alvin Drew (STS-118, STS-133) How many people are living in space right now? I've found that since the end of the Space Shuttle program, most Americans think the answer is zero, but it's not. There are currently six people living aboard the International Space Station, including two Americans (Steve Swanson and Rick Mastracchio), one Japanese citizen (Koichi Wakata), and three Russian cosmonauts. All the astronauts currently get…
Guest Blog by Festival X-STEM Speaker Dr. Joe Schwarcz How do you inspire students toward careers in science, and combat scientific illiteracy at the same time? First, you spend two years planning the USA Science & Engineering Festival, the largest of its kind in the world. Then you rent the gigantic Washington Convention Center to host it and line up 3,000 displays, many of which feature hands-on activities. You organize more than 150 stage presentations by Nobel laureates, athletes, astronauts, engineers and scientists of all kinds. You invite the likes of Bill Nye the Science Guy,…
Congratulations to the Kavli Science in Fiction Video Contest winners!! 1st Prize Winner: Zachary Katko Video:   "Superluminal Communication" Age : 17 School: Dansville High School, Dansville, Michigan What are your favorite subjects? Science and Social Studies mainly, though I also enjoy English. Can you tell us what inspired you to make this video? Firstly, my engagingly ruminative English teacher, Ms. Pauline Lee. She introduced me specifically to the Kavli Video contest. Secondly, I drew inspiration from numerous captivating science shows (eg. Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, How The Universe…
It is difficult to grasp the magnitude of what was accomplished not only this past weekend, but also the entire two years leading up to the 3rd USA Science & Engineering Festival.  The official numbers from the Washington D.C. Convention Center reveal that over 325,000 attendees visited our Nation's Capital to partake in the largest celebration of STEM or as we have dubbed it- the Superbowl of STEM! In addition to our Expo Finale weekend, we reached over 180,000 students and teachers with our STEM initiative programs including our Nifty Fifty and X-STEM School Programs. Numbers of course…
By Guest Blogger Jason OsborneExplorer, Innovator, and co-founder of both Paleo Quest™, a non-profit citizen science organization, and SharkFinder™ When most people think about scuba diving, they envision coral reefs and colorful tropical fish. But for me and my fellow professional-amateur paleontologist Aaron Alford, this is not the case. As the cofounders of non-profit organization Paleo Quest, diving is a tool for us. It is a method we use to reach places most people wouldn’t dare to explore. Imagine diving in a river with zero visibility and heavy currents – and throw in some submerged…
Guest Blog by Lindsey Shephard Rainmaker and Resident Mom at GoldiBlox At GoldieBlox, we truly believe there are millions of girls out there who are engineers, but they just don’t know it yet.  We’re thrilled to join this year’s USA Science & Engineering Festival, where we’ll be able to interact with girls and their families, showing them how fun engineering and science can be! Like many other festival goers, we feel as though the toy industry could use some STEM love, especially among girls’ toys.  If you take a stroll down the “pink” aisle at the toy store, you’ll come across princesses…
Guest Blog By Jerry Baker Executive Director of Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society Imagine a world where every child, who dreams of becoming a scientist or engineer, is provided with the opportunity to fulfill that dream. Think of the possibilities and the discoveries that can help humanity or global sustainability. Think of the new solutions that all those minds might discover. I look forward to meeting some of those young people during the USA Science & Engineering Festival in Washington, D.C. on April 24-27, 2014. It is the largest celebration of science, engineering, technology…
Guest Blog by Paul AnastasAssistant Administrator for the U.S. EPA for Research and Development and the Agency Science Advisor For too long sustainability and environmental protection have been defined by those saying that we need to do less, have less, expect less.   For too long, we have been told that we need to consume less energy, use less materials, travel less, give up the vast array of modern conveniences.  I couldn't disagree more and thank goodness the leading inventors and designers of our time agree with me. I believe the problem of sustainability largely isn't that we use too…
Guest Blog By Andrea BeatyNew York Times bestselling author of Rosie Revere, Engineer and Iggy Peck, Architect along with children’s novels, Dorko the Magnificent and Attack of the Fluffy Bunnies Kids are their own worst critics. Perfectionism can reduce even very young children to hysterics over toppled towers, drawing disasters and other creative catastrophes. It breaks our parenting hearts to watch and we rush in with hugs and kind words to soften the blow. I confess that when my kids were young, I sometimes resorted to less dignified tactics to calm them. “Look! . . . It’s Barney! . . .…
Guest Blog By Lek KadeliActing Assistant Administrator in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Office of Research and Development (ORD) Each spring around the same time that so much of the country is swept up in the “madness” of amateur basketball tournaments, a dedicated team of employees at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency are finishing up preparations to host student teams for another hard-fought college challenge: EPA’s P3 student design competition for sustainability. While participants may not grab national headlines, the long-term benefits of their efforts have the…
Guest Blog By David BolinskyFounder and Creative Director of e*mersion Studio In 1962, when I was ten, my family and I had the rare privilege of exploring the ancient caves of Lascaux in southern France to see 17,000 year-old Paleolithic paintings close up. Though sadly no longer open for public viewing, these iconic works changed me forever. In his film ‘Cave of Forgotten Dreams’, Werner Herzog documented limestone galleries of astonishing thirty-thousand-year-old artwork in the French Chauvet Pont d’Arc. Having practiced the visualization of science for nearly forty years, I resonate with…
Guest Blog By Stacy JannisScience Media Producer and the Manager of the USA Science & Engineering Festival’s Kavli science video contest Can science fiction influence science? Many theoretical physicists and astronomers seem to think so, and quite a few scientists say they were inspired to go into science by reading Jules Verne, or watching TV episodes of Flash Gordon and Star Trek. Do you think it’s just a coincidence that NASA’s first space shuttle was christened the Enterprise? At NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, a formal partnership with science fiction writers was announced three…
Sponsored by Northrop Grumman Foundation and MedImmune, our X-STEM Symposium featured multiple presentation sessions covering a wide array of subject areas including space exploration, storm chasing, oceanography, the science of social networks, the physics of superheroes, mathematical puzzles and much, much more! As a special treat, the Senior Science Advisor to President Obama, Dr. John Holdren delivered the opening address. Thank you speakers! And thank you students for attending!! View all of the photos from the event here.                                
Discover the STEM Power of Lockheed Martin at the USA Science & Engineering Festival Expo in April Have you ever wondered what it would be like to pilot the F-35 or a flying robot? Or how cold it is in Antarctica (a region known as the most frigid place on Earth)? In addition to what the next big thing in batteries is, and can medicine really be  personalized for every individual? At Festival Expo 2014 you'll experience the answer to these and other questions in unforgettable ways with founding and presenting sponsor of the Festival, Lockheed Martin through exciting interactive,…
Guest Blog by Adora SvitakUSA Science & Engineering Festival Youth Advisory Board Member Note: See Adora as part of the Teen Inventors Panel at the Festival on the Lockheed Martin Stage!  When I was little, I hated a lot of things. I refused to practice piano or violin. I didn't eat my leafy vegetables. But most of all I hated math. By extension, I disliked anything that stank of equations: physics, chemistry, technology, engineering. After falling in love with Corinthian columns and the University of Washington's collegiate-Gothic buildings, I wanted to be an architect... until I…
Guest blog by Dr. John SotosGetting the Science Right in Hollywood Panel Member and Book Fair Author at the USA Science & Engineering Festival  I love medicine.  But maybe not for the reasons you think. Most people go into the field desiring to help others.  Not me, at least not at first. Many people go into medicine to make scientific discoveries.  Not me. And, alas, some people go into medicine to gratify their ego, pad their wallet, or satisfy parental expectations.  Not me, thank goodness.  I went into medicine because, well . . . I don't really know why.  And that's the point. One of…
Under the theme of "Start Your Journey," Caterpillar, as a major Festival sponsor and leader in STEM and skilled trades, is set to wow audiences at the Expo this month with a dynamic array of interactive exhibits and presentations designed to demonstrate the breadth of opportunities that exist at Caterpillar and Cat Dealerships around the country in STEM-related frontiers and career paths. Says Gwenne Henricks, Caterpillar's Vice President of Product Development & Global Technology & Chief Technology Officer: "We want attendees to leave with the impression that Caterpillar is an…
Guest Blog by Dr. Catherine MohrSenior Director of Medical Research, Intuitive SurgicalUSA Science & Engineering Festival X-STEM Speaker I work on surgical robots - at the intersection of cool, high tech, and helping people get well. One of the things I like most is that my job changes every day as I look for new technologies that might help us improve patient outcomes.  For example, one day we may play with new kinds of lasers for cutting bone, the next we are looking for new less invasive ways of accessing the body to do more effective surgeries, and the next we are looking out 10 to 15…