Project Description
This April, Camp Helen Brachman welcomed 51 mini-Einsteins for two days and two nights of STEM fun during our first ever overnight STEM Camp! Youth from ages eight to 15 from COA’s Auer Ave Community Learning Center (CLC), Westside Academy CLC, MLK Jr. Safe Place, and Keefe Ave Safe Place, as well as youth from various agencies in Milwaukee visited Camp Helen Brachman (CHB) in Almond, WI as part of COA’s Kohl’s Explore Your Future Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) program. Launched in 2017, this innovative program has given over 1,500 children and youth exciting opportunities to explore STEM.
STEM Camp provided young learners with exciting opportunities to blend STEM skills with nature, explore the great outdoors, and learn how to apply classroom lessons in the real-world. Campers spent their days immersed in STEM activities led by counselors and COA’s STEM Program Director, Lina Nguyen. Campers went on scavenger hunts, performed real-life owl pellet dissections, experimented with Sphero Bluetooth robots, competed in relay races, made ice cream from scratch and created light-up LED cars. Youth also enjoyed fun activities each night: they stayed in cozy cabins, enjoyed a toasty campfire, hit the dance floor at a camp-wide dance and made tons of new, STEM-loving friends.
“campers loved the opportunity to combine STEM with nature and learn how science, technology, engineering and math can be explored all over”
According to COA STEM Coordinator Lina Nguyen, campers loved the opportunity to combine STEM with nature and learn how science, technology, engineering and math can be explored all over — not just in the classroom or computer lab. For many kids, this was their first time ever camping! Camp Helen Brachman is a key component of COA’s year-round youth development program and COA’s mission as an agency. COA sent our first group of kids to camp in 1906. 113 years later, COA is grateful to Kohl’s for making 2019 the year of our first ever STEM Camp!