KC STEM Alliance offers experiences designed to inspire and motivate Project Lead The Way (PLTW) engineering and biomedical science senior capstone students toward excellence; recognize and reward a job well done; and help students with innovative projects connect with resources and mentors in the business community.
This series of videos produced in partnership with STARTLAND Education is housed on Startland Education’s YouTube Channel. The series takes students through the design process so they can make it real!
| VIDEO TITLE | Use it … |
| What does it mean to “make it REAL”? | As you begin your project! Start here : ) |
| Design Thinking 101 | To get a big picture view of design thinking |
| Finding a Problem Worth Solving | If you’re trying to figure out which problem to solve. Watch the companion video for tips from local entrepreneurs! |
| Determining Frame and Focus | To figure out the parts of a problem to solve for users. |
| Building Empathy for Users | To further understand the people whose lives you want to affect with your solution |
| Organizing Your Data | To help you decipher your findings once you have completed interviews, observation or surveys |
| How to Create a Project Management Plan | To help you and your team get organized and ready to tackle your project |
| How to Define the Problem | To break down the problem you’re trying to solve for others |
| Ideate | To come up with solutions for your problem |
| Prototype | To help you figure out what you should prototype first when you’re ready to build a first version of your idea |
| Test | To help you plan how to test with users once you’ve built your prototype |
| Iterate | To make adjustments to your idea based on feedback from your main users |
Use this pitch flow to form your message.
This sneak peek at the judges’ rubric will help you do a self-check to see if you’ve built enough empathy around your targeted users and to see if your idea is novel, useful and viable according to the rubric’s suggestions.
More tips and tricks to consider:
KC STEM Alliance will provide a list of contacts for teacher-coordinated virtual or in-person mentoring from professionals in the engineering and biomedical fields.
The Connector, built on the Nepris platform and managed by PREP-KC, is a convenient platform for connecting industry professionals with your students via videoconferencing. Districts with access to this tool are encouraged to use for mentor connections.
Teacher Guide to Virtual Mentoring Sessions: Download this guide for ideas and resources compiled by KC STEM Alliance and STARTLAND.
Contact Teri Kriege for additional assistance with connecting to KC-area mentors.
The Make It REAL scholarship is an opportunity for students to reflect on their capstone projects and Make It REAL experiences, sharing what they’ve learned along the way and how they perceive it will influence their future.
Agilities Rock! In September, all students were invited to take the Agile Work Profiler and learn their top Agilities when they kicked off their capstone projects. After six months of ups and downs, students have used their Agilities to solve problems and navigate their projects. Now, we invite all of your students to take a moment to stop, take the Agile Work Profiler again, and reflect on the skills they’ve used and developed during their capstone experience. Please use the attached slide and resources in your classroom and encourage every student to tell their unique story by entering the Make It REAL scholarship. Using the language of the Agilities will help them better articulate their stories in words that colleges and future employers care about.
The Engineering and Product Design Competition is for engineering OR biomed students who use the engineering design process to design a product or solve a problem. Your projects will be judged by professionals against an engineering design rubric. Competition participants submit projects online using a platform called Zfairs. Zfairs registration and detailed instructions will be sent to capstone teachers. All capstone students are requested to create an account. Practicing industry professionals then evaluate how the projects illustrate students’ design-thinking and problem-solving capabilities. Scholarship Awards will go to the top two teams, with each team member receiving a $500 scholarship. See the competition rubric.
January 15, 2024: Competition registration opens
March 15, 2024: Deadline to register for this competition in Zfairs.
April 3, 2024 (11:59 p.m. CST): Deadline to submit projects in Zfairs
April 4-17: Online judging by STEM professionals
April 23, 2024: Top awards recognized during PLTW Senior Showcase
Biomedical students and teams working on experiments will be eligible to enter the Biomedical Research Competition. Projects will be judged by medical professionals and scientists against a biomedical research rubric. Competition participants submit projects online using a platform called Zfairs. Zfairs registration and detailed instructions will be sent to capstone teachers. Scholarship Awards will go to the top two teams with each team member receiving a $500 scholarship. See the competition rubric.
January 15, 2024: Zfairs account registration opens
March 15, 2024: Deadline to register for this competition in Zfairs
April 3, 2024 (11:59 p.m. CST): Deadline to submit project in Zfairs
April 7-15: Online judging by STEM professionals
April 23: Top awards recognized during PLTW Senior Showcase
KC STEM Alliance, Startland and Commerce Bank team up to put together the Innovator Awards, which recognize innovativeness and marketability. The Innovator Awards are a ‘pitch’ competition. Students should review the application for questions they need to answer in their pitch and/or be prepared to answer when pitching to Investor Judges. All students who submit an engineering, product development or experimental research project are eligible to enter.
Investor judges will evaluate projects at the in-person PLTW Senior Showcase on April 23 and will choose 10 winning teams. Winners will be announced and Commerce Bank will recognize the winners with gift cards.
In this annual challenge from Climate Action KC, students are invited to imagine how we might improve access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy through the lens of the United Nation’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals for eliminating poverty and tackling climate change.
Any student entering one of the competitions in Zfairs may also enter the Sustainability Challenge. Solutions to this problem should make progress toward one of three main targets that will aid in achieving this goal by 2030, as identified by the UN. Deadline to apply in Zfairs is April 3, 2024. The winning team will receive a $500 scholarship.
Students are invited to imagine how we might improve people’s health and well-being through the lens of the United Nation’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals for eliminating poverty and tackling climate change. Any student entering one of the competitions in Student Corner can also enter the Public Health Challenge.
Solutions to this problem should make progress toward one of nine main targets that will aid in achieving this goal by 2030, as identified by the UN. Deadline to apply in Zfairs is April 3, 2024. The winning team will receive a $500 scholarship.
This annual event celebrates graduating PLTW students and highlights their senior capstone projects from the Engineering Design and Development and Biomedical Innovation courses in a festive event for friends, family, educators, businesses and community members.
