“National Survey on STEAM Education: Emerging Technology Edition” Now Out
Beaverton, Ore. – Quality STEAM education is at the forefront of instilling a love of science in students and helping to grow the number of individuals who follow science careers. Catapult X, a leading STEM marketing company and founder of STEMREPORTS.COM, along with MCH Strategic Data, set out to determine where product and market opportunities are in STEAM education through the latest national survey, “National Survey on STEAM Education: Emerging Technology Edition.”
The media version of this report is available for free download at www.stemreports.com while a business and industry edition of the report is available for purchase from Catapult X.
“When educators and companies come together to help drive product development, it ensures tools and solutions are being created to meet the current and future needs of education. This is what our report uncovers,” said Daylene Long, founder of Catapult X. “It is an exciting time for education as things like virtual reality, project-based learning, and coding make their way into science classrooms. If we can keep innovation moving forward as a society, starting as early as pre-K and elementary school, we will be better positioned to compete on a global level.”
The report highlights findings from almost 3,000 educators and administrators who answered questions about their projected needs for science and STEM education. Educators were able to draw on their knowledge of content, standards, and pedagogy to report which emerging technologies have the most promise and opportunity for them.
Notably, the majority of respondents (61 percent) noted that STEAM in elementary classrooms is growing – they are either currently implementing or plan to grow its implementation during the next school year.
Another key finding was that a majority of science and STEM educators (74.9 percent) reported they collaborate with business or industry partners. Most had guest speakers present on science and STEAM careers in their schools, and many work on grants, donations, and sponsorships based on their collaborations with their business or industry partners.
When asked about future innovations, respondents named virtual reality/augmented reality (28 percent), coding (23 percent), and biotechnology (16 percent) as areas where they saw the most promise for student instruction. The following best represents educators’ current implementation of STEAM in the core curriculum: computer science courses (75.9 percent), project-based learning (75.2 percent), intro to technology (72.3 percent), robotics (70.7 percent), and career and technical education (69.4 percent).