SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. — Seminole County continues to drive creative ways of learning.
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On Friday, the school district revealed the final piece to a long-time project meant to promote STEM education among elementary school-aged students.
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Seminole County Public Schools received several donations to help create their third and final “Physics Bus.”
The buses will give local fourth and fifth graders access to STEM education in a fun, hands-on, creative environment.
Today, we cut the ribbon on our 3rd SCPS Physics Bus focusing on "Electricity & Magnetism!" It now joins our other 2...
Posted by Seminole County Public Schools on Friday, April 1, 2022
“We want to provide kids with the full exposure of physics, so they have to start with mechanics, and go to optics, and then go to electricity and magnetism,” Seminole County Public Schools Assistant Superintendent of ePathways Shawn Gard-Harrold said. “If we only had two buses, we wouldn’t be providing them the full scope of physics.”
Jean Vansmith, Executive Director of the Foundation for Seminole County Schools, says the bus will visit every elementary school in the county, starting with Title I schools.
“So every fourth and fifth grade student will have a chance of being on the bus,” Vansmith said.
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The goal is not to turn every student into a physicist, but to open a kid’s world up to the opportunity of being one, if he or she decides to.
Gard-Harrold says the overall goal is to show students that physics can be fun.
“Physics is nothing to be scared of,” Gard-Harrold said. “Physics is something you should embrace.”
Vansmith says that message is especially important for female students and students of color so that they might pursue careers in science and math.
“Even in my job at a non-profit, I use accounting. I use math everyday,” Vansmith said. “It would have helped me as a child.”
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