On April 9, 2016, the inaugural Project ENspire happened, and it was everything I wanted it to be and more.
Project ENspire was a creation all my own. I came up with the idea, planned everything, got the volunteers together, did the advertising, everything. Putting it all together was one of the most challenging yet rewarding things I've ever done.
I'm a part of the Montgomery Leadership Program. It's a three semester long program, and the last semester involves a capstone project. Every student teams up or works alone on a capstone project of their choosing. They come up with the idea and make it happen. Back in October we started with our capstone brainstorm papers. We had to come up with two ideas we could make into a project and write about them to turn in to our teacher. One of my ideas was a day of engineering fun for young girls. I wanted to bring them to MSU and give them hands-on activities that not only taught them engineering principles but also showed them that engineering can be fun.
I had all of these ideas for the day swirling around in my head, and I wanted everything to be just right. No other students were thinking of doing projects along the same line as mine, so I chose to go at it alone. I wanted every part of my dream to come true.
Now there were times when I wondered why I let myself do it alone. I had to get out of my comfort zone sometimes. I had to do a lot of work. I never realized just how much time and effort go into planning an event. It's exhausting. But it was fun. I enjoyed going through things and deciding what I would need for the day and covering every detail. I enjoyed getting to make decisions about things.
I enjoyed getting to come up with the three activities. I did some research and finally decided on popsicle stick towers, golf ball ziplines, and Coke bottle taxis. For the popsicle stick towers, each group had popsicle sticks, sticky tack, and tacky glue. They had to build a structure to hold their people (little glass pebbles) at least 4 inches in the air. The golf ball ziplines seemed to be the fan favorite. Each group had to use the materials provided to build a zipline for a plastic golfball. For the Coke bottle taxis, each group had to take a Coke bottle and make it into a balloon powered taxi with the materials provided. My first concern about the activities was, "what if we get to the day and the girls can't make anything work? What if all of my activities are duds?" Then I had the idea to test the activities. All of a sudden it seemed obvious. So I had engineering student volunteers come a few weeks before the big day and go through each activity as if they were a group of 4th and 5th grade girls. They had all of the same materials and restrictions. They went through the activities and gave suggestions as they went along. Give less of this material, more of that material. Change these regulations. Those testing sessions were really helpful, and because of them, all of the activities went smoothly on the actual day. Talk about avoiding a stressful situation. All of the activities used many materials the girls could find around their houses or easily get a hold of. I wanted to show them how easy it is to be creative every day. I had 13 4th and 5th grade girls, and they were divided into four groups. Each group had a MSU engineering student as a group leader. I had some awesome group leaders. They were so great with the girls, and I think they really enjoyed themselves. I had more awesome volunteers leading the activities and going over the lessons taught in each activity. I made a Book of ENspiration for each girl to take home, and in it was an explanation of the engineering principles used in each activity. The activity leaders did a great job at going through the book and explaining every activity to the girls.
It was really encouraging to walk around and hear the group leaders enforcing what the activity leaders just went over. For the zipline, we discussed friction and potential and kinetic energy, and I heard group leaders ask their girls questions like, "what here can you use that will cause the least amount of friction?" and "what kind of energy does the ball have when you hold it the top of the zipline?" It was even more encouraging to hear the girls answer the questions correctly.
We had lunch out on the Drill Field because it was a beautiful day outside. After they got done eating, some girls went out in the grass and started playing. Eventually all of the girls and volunteers were out playing games together, and as I looked out at it all, at everyone enjoying themselves, I had a great feeling of accomplishment. I did all of that. I made it happen.
My tagline for Project ENspire is Design. Create. Explore. I wanted the girls that came to see the wide world of creativity that many times leads to a career in engineering. As a female engineering student, it isn't uncommon at all for me to walk into a classroom of 70 people and be one of seven girls in the room. For me, it hasn't ever been super intimidating. I know I can hold my own with the boys. I know I'm just as smart and hard-working, if not more, than many of them. The reason I think there are so few female engineering students is because not enough girls have that mindset. Engineering is hard. It really is. Solving problems can be hard. Math and science can be hard. The problem is that so many girls look at engineering and science or math related things and say, “I can’t,” because it’s hard, and then they look around and see how few women do them and think, “and it’s okay because they can’t either.” And that goes for boys in female dominated professions. We aren’t doing our jobs well enough to push kids to break barriers and try to do the hard things. So that’s why I wanted to do Project ENspire. I wanted to show these girls that they CAN and not only that, but it’s fun. It’s fun to design, create, and explore.
And you know what? I think I did just that. Throughout the day I saw smiles. I saw that face full of pride and accomplishment when a zipline worked. I saw enthusiasm to make their ideas come to life. It gave me hope. It gave me hope that it really is possible to make young girls believe that they are smart, strong, and capable.
I stayed on my toes the entire day just waiting for something to go wrong, I kept waiting to discover one missed detail. But I never did. Sure, there were bumps and lessons learned, but they weren't major issues. They didn't ruin the day. Everything went as according to plan as I hoped, and it was one of the best feelings. I did it. I planned an entire day. I did have help along the way though. I can't forget that. My MLP teacher was great and always available to answer my questions. My friends were a great support system and offered advice and also just kept me sane. My friends also were so great about helping me out on the actual day. They all told me, "put me where you need me," and they did their jobs almost flawlessly. Some were there the entire day, and some came when the were free and helped where they could. I couldn't have done it at all without all of the extra help.
I walked around that day with a name tag that read, "Morgan Green, Director," and I felt at home. It was a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, experience, and I can't wait to do it again next year. But next year I won't be in MLP anymore and I won't have the budget that each MLP student receives from the program. I'll have to go out on my own and hopefully partner with the Bagley K-12 outreach and other organizations to make the 2nd Annual Project ENspire happen. But you know what? I'm ready for the challenge. It'll be fun. Crazy busy, but fun. I can't wait.
Until next time
Mo
P.S. You can see all of the pictures from Project ENspire here
P.P.S. You can see the Project ENspire website here
