University of Arizona Augmented Reality Project and J Rêve International Global Educator Program
The 2016 Beauford Delaney: Resonance of Form and Vibration of Color art exhibition in Paris, France provided fertile ground for WIF’s journey into STEAM Education. We collaborated on two major initiatives through the exhibition: the University of Arizona (U of A) Resonance of Form Augmented Reality App project and the J Rêve International Global Educator Program.
Through a first-of-its-kind collaboration with U of A, six (6) undergraduate students created an Augmented Reality (AR) app that allowed visitors to watch videos that provided background or anecdotal information about individual works when they were viewed with the visitor’s smart device.
The app also worked when the images were viewed in the exhibition catalog.
Accompanied by Professor Bryan Carter (who is currently Director of the Center for Digital Humanities at the university), the students flew from Tucson to Paris to create the app and present their work to the ~300 people who attended the exhibition opening. Five of the six students applied for their first passport to participate in this project.
University of Arizona students, Dr. Bryan Carter (far right), and
WIF Founder & CEO, Dr. Monique Y. Wells (third from left)
In collaboration with J Rêve International’s Global Educator Program, WIF organized a second STEAM project through which seven (7) K-12 educators learned to incorporate the arts into the teaching of science and math using Beauford Delaney works as inspiration. This was the first trip abroad for two (2) of the educators who participated in the program.
We cross pollinated this initiative with the U of A project by organizing a virtual meeting between the sponsors of the AR app and the Global Educators to introduce the educators to the app so they would be well-versed in the use of this innovative technology in their classrooms.
STEAM+ Arts Integration and Advocacy Conference
J Rêve International is an international STEAM organization that reaches more than 40,000 people globally to encourage arts education advocacy for students and multi-subject educators around the world. Inspired by our successful collaboration with J Rêve in 2016, WIF partnered with them for the STEAM+ Arts Integration and Advocacy conference in Washington, D.C. The goal of the conference was to foster collaboration between interdisciplinary artists, programmers, policy makers, and educators on issues relating to development, learning, and the implementation of arts education.
From July 28-30, 2017, participants gathered at the Pepco Edison Place Gallery, the American Institute of Architects, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Museums of Women in the Arts and African American History and Culture to celebrate achievements of professionals in the visual, performing, and literary arts, as well as learn from delegates from leading arts and education institutions.
Dr. Christine Mann Darden, one of the African-American mathematicians featured in the book and film Hidden Figures, spoke at the opening reception. Dr. Darden attended the conference on behalf of NASA.
Awards for Inspiring Leader, Exemplary Educator, and Emerging Educator in STEAM were presented. Special acknowledgement was accorded to the participant who traveled the farthest to attend the conference – Felroy Dsouza flew in from Australia to attend the event. The STEAM+ Arts Integration Anthology, featuring 12 contributing educators and STEAM specialists, was released during the conference.
Future Innovators
Our inaugural Future Innovators Career Exploration Day took place at the Children’s Museum of Houston on Saturday, September 29, 2018. With over 90,000 square feet of interactive, hands-on exhibits, the museum serves one of the largest child populations in the United States and hosts more than 1 million children and families every year. After a prosperous collaboration with the museum for our Story-time event for literacy in June 2017, our Future Innovators event was our second successful collaboration.
The objective of Future Innovators was to give elementary and middle school children an opportunity to assess and analyze their academic abilities in conjunction with their creative interests. Conceived by chemical engineer Kaylan Young (WIF volunteer in 2017-2018), it was our first dedicated STEAM Education initiative.
At least 150 children in 60 families and thirteen (13) teachHouston volunteer students from the University of Houston participated in the event. The volunteers manned the activity stations, encouraged the children’s thoughtful consideration of the tasks at hand, and congratulated them on their efforts. teachHouston is open to undergraduate mathematics and science majors interested in secondary STEM teaching or who want to expand their professional skills.
See Future Innovations photos at the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/future-innovators-photos/
Classes Duo Paris/Knoxville
One of our greatest successes to date has been Classes Duo Paris/ Knoxville – a groundbreaking two-year cultural exchange program (2018-2019) that brought 42 U.S. and French elementary school students from Nature’s Way Montessori School in Knoxville, TN and Jean Zay Elementary Public School in Paris together through Beauford Delaney’s life and art.
Classes Duo Paris/ Knoxville was accomplished through WIF’s collaboration with the City of Paris’s CASPE (Circonscription des Affaires Scolaires et de la Petite Enfance) office, which is responsible for after-school activities for school-aged children. CASPE embraced the use of several of the works shown in the Beauford Delaney: Resonance of Form and Vibration of Color catalog as the inspiration for the children’s artistic activities.
Several arts-based activities served as the anchor for lessons in science and math:
• Chemical composition of Tennessee clay
• Properties of oil and water
• Science of photography
• Science of sound and the development of the phonograph
• Arithmetic through art
Arithmetic through Art
Youth Veterinarian Initiative
With initial funding from the Troan Foundation, the Wells International Foundation and the Philanthropy Alliance Foundation launched the Youth Veterinarian Initiative (YVI) in June 2021. Our goal is to reach minority youth (ages 9-17) who have a passion for animals to encourage them to consider veterinary medicine as a career.
YVI’s message inspired an 11-year-old girl to achieve perfect attendance at our first several sessions and volunteer at her local animal shelter to prepare herself for her future application to veterinary school. These sessions also inspired a 6th grade science teacher to incorporate PowerPoint slides and videos of our sessions into a new curriculum called “Careers in Veterinary Medicine.”
Ninety 6th grade students will benefit from this curriculum. Two additional PreK-7/8 schools are planning to create an after school program inspired by our sessions.
Click here to find links to recordings of our Saturday morning sessions: YVI Sessions
