Eighty-six middle school girls participated in the Science, Technology and Engineering Preview Summer (STEPS) Day Camp, hosted by Grand Valley State University on the Pew Grand Rapids Campus.

During the four day-long camp, the girls construct their own remote control planes, which they later showed off to family and friends at the end of the week at the Warped Wings Fly Field in Allendale.

STEPS was created specifically for middle school girls who showed an interest in technical careers, in an effort to help bolster the number of women engineers in the country, who only currently make up 10 percent of the field’s workforce.

“We live in a society that grooms young men to excel in math and science – it’s almost expected,” said Sara Maas, camp organizer and outreach coordinator for the Seymour and Esther Padnos College of Engineering and Computer. “Women are very capable, too, but there’s not a lot of role models out there or support. Many of the girls find comfort in the fact that there are other girls out there like them.”

The program’s main focus is to build self-esteem, confidence and self efficacy along with nurturing teamwork and increase knowledge about science, technology and engineering. This summer marks the 11th year STEPS has been at GVSU.

“People learn better by doing,” Maas said. “That’s the main goal of the camp. The girls get to do things and see things that they might not ever be exposed to. They all know what a doctor, lawyer, or a teacher does, but they don’t know what an engineer does.”

Seymour and Esther Padnos College of Engineering and Computing teams with the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences to run the camp every summer. Each year, around 100 GVSU student and faculty volunteers, along with members of the West Michigan Soaring Society and Warped Wings Radio Control Club help assist the campers to craft the perfect electronic airplane.

“My teacher told me about it,” said a camper, Jennifer. “I learned all this stuff about computers and we took trips to different places.”

Jennifer’s interest in science came from her father. She said they used to do experiments together, such as playing with dry ice with a spoon. Although she’s only in middle school, she already knows that she wants to build houses for a living.

Another camper, Megan, was amazed to see everything the camp had to offer. Just two days in, she said that she expected only the little details in the brochure, but instead, went on field trips and learned computer software she never thought she could use before.

“I learned a lot more here than I did in school,” Megan said.

When the campers weren’t building their airplanes, they took field trips to Alcoa Howmet, a manufacturer of advanced-technology components. At Howmet, the campers met other female engineers and participated in an impromptu design challenge where they built a catapult out of rubber bands, craft sticks and toothpicks. On Wednesday, STEPS took the girls to the Gerald R. Ford Airport where they rode on a four-seater Cessna airplane out of the Rapid Air hangar. Thursday night, the campers celebrated their hard work by testing out their remote control airplanes they built themselves.

“I like science because it’s hands on,” Megan said. “It’s fun to learn what goes on on Earth.”

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