Bettendorf, IA -- Extended 2-Day Workshop

This project was made possible with funding from the Arconic Foundation. Arconic Foundation’s mission is to support non-profit partners who advance STEM Education and Workforce Development in Arconic communities. This is the second time that Bettendorf has been a location for an Arconic workshop with CE.  As it is the second round of delivery for this region, a focus on expanding the initial impact was made and the workshop was extended to two days.  CE co-planned with a workshop with the district to get a sense of how the initial workshop had impacted their curriculum and hands-on instruction.

On Day 1 of the workshop, teachers worked through various hands-on activities to bolster their knowledge of renewable energy, energy fundamentals, and electricity concepts. Due to conversations with the district as well as with MidAmerican Energy, who provided a guest presentation, the primary resource focus for the workshop was wind energy, as it makes up around 60-70% of the energy mix for the regional utility. The hands-on activities that were explored included solar circuits, Energy Theatre, and wind energy engineering.  On Day 2, teachers focused largely on wind energy inquiry and engineering in the morning, as that is a heavily deployed resource in the region. In the afternoon, teachers were able to both work within their own district professional learning communities as well as collaborate across districts on implementing new curriculum.