The world-changing potential of STEAM-powered youth

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The last timeI profiled a young technologistworking to change the world, she went on to be honored as《时代》杂志的年度第一个孩子. Just sayin’ — we know how to spot a rising star.

在这一点上，认识丹妮尔·博耶（Danielle Boyer），他承诺也不例外。博耶（Boyer）是一位土著教育家，发明家，作家和环境活动家，在20岁时，已经取得了比大多数成年人的成就，可以提高蒸汽教育领域的多样性，可访问性和可负担性 - 科学，技术，工程，工程，艺术和数学。

If you care about accelerating an equitable clean economy, then you need to care about STEAM — specifically, thewoeful underrepresentationof women and people of color working in these industries, and the disparate access to quality STEAM education that precedes it.

研究表明，拥有多样化的劳动力不仅drives innovation and market growth，但也强调了永久不平等当有色人种被排除在创建我们都使用的产品和服务的情况下。

如果我们要利用科学技术的全部潜力来应对我们最紧迫的全球挑战，那么开发这些解决方案的人们必须代表整个社会。

这就是为什么Boyer正在努力通过扎根来解决这个问题的原因 - 确保有色人种，尤其是女孩和土著社区中的年轻人可以接受优质的蒸汽教育。我最近赶上了她，谈论技术创新和环境教育。为了清晰和长度，已经编辑了以下对话。

Shana Rappaport: Your work is rooted in the belief that ensuring equitable access to environmental education and engineering opportunities is a social and environmental imperative. Why is that?

丹妮尔·博耶（Danielle Boyer）：I believe that every child has the potential to be an Earth Innovator — someone who uses their unique talents, interests and skills to benefit our Earth. Giving kids skills in technology, engineering and science to use in their lives as innovators, activists and changemakers is so important. Us youth are the ones who are being affected the most by climate change, and we need, as I say, all of our superpowers to fight it. Each of our superpowers are different and can contribute to positive change, but we must be taught how to use them.

Unfortunately, not every child has the opportunity to discover their superpower, because they don't have access to learning technical skills — skills that will not only transform their future, but the future of our Earth, too. Underserved communities are isolated from learning these important skills, leaving these kids at a huge disadvantage.

我的任务集中在为这些孩子提供资源，重点是对颜色和女孩的青年，尤其是在我自己的土著社区中。我认为我们所有人都应该了解我们的超级大国是什么，并有机会使用它们。

Rappaport: Talk a little bit about the organization that you founded,STEAM Connection，以及诸如您的旗舰计划之类的计划如何，每个孩子都有一个机器人，旨在实现您的任务。

博耶：I founded the STEAM Connection in January 2019, which wasn't that long ago. Our work brings accessible, affordable and diverse STEAM education to children all around the world, and it has been such a cool journey. I work with a team of all minorities — we're all students in STEAM and we work to bring things like robotics, classes and more to youth.

我最喜欢的项目之一叫做Every Kid Gets a Robot这是我发明的机器人 - 价格不到20美元，是由可生物降解和可回收材料制成的，我在12个国家 /地区免费将其发送给孩子，这真是太疯狂了。机器人去过比我更多的地方。我用它来教孩子们的技能，从电气工程到计算机科学再到机械工程。我绝对喜欢机器人。

Each of our superpowers are different and can contribute to positive change, but we must be taught how to use them.

所有这些举措对我很重要，因为我能够使用它们来补充我教授的环境和蒸汽课程。这真是太有趣了，因为我现在能够与我指导的35个青年机器人团队一起到达成千上万的孩子。

One of my most recent initiatives is calledHands-On Techie Talks— it's a podcast that I started with my 13-year-old mentee, Vinaya Gunasekar, which is crazy — she's 13! We started a podcast for kids to bring resources for environmental innovation in a hands-on way to kids during the pandemic, and it has been so much fun.

Rappaport: What are your impressions of how Gen Z views the role of technology innovation in accelerating solutions to environmental problems?

博耶：This is a really interesting question — because honestly, when I was 10 years old and got started, I had never used a computer before. Things have changed so much since I was a young kid.

Technology now drives everything that Gen Z does. But, I often think that many young kids don't necessarily see environmental activists as designers, programmers and scientists. Many of them see activists as media figures who lead protests — and while that certainly is an aspect of it, I think that it puts them off because it may not suit their interests, or they may not see environmental role models who look like them.

Showing kids that they can use their skills right now affects how they see themselves and their potential impact, and everyone needs to play an active role in our Earth. We need people to design robots that clean up oil spills. I believe in doing more than just advocating for a solution, but also being an active part of creating ones, too.

对我来说，这看起来像教育，创造了良好的创新者，重点是机器人技术，因为就像我鼓励学生这样做一样，我正在利用自己的独特技能来竭尽所能使我们的地球受益。而且我也接近他们的年龄。

Rappaport: What kind of support can the private sector provide to you, and to Indigenous communities, either as corporate partners or as intergenerational allies?

博耶：我总是很高兴回答这个问题，因为企业拥有如此多的变化的关键。他们能够解决我们在社区中看到的许多问题，无论公司的规模如何，它们都有很大的影响力。

我认为您不一定需要在组织中采取环境行动计划或主动性来做出重要的改变。我相信人们应该从支持自己社区的年轻改变者开始，并以我们的讨论为主题，以使用自己的技能。例如，您是财务顾问吗？利用您的技能帮助试图开始非营利组织的年轻人。您在营销吗？帮助一个正在创建在线平台的人，需要将其平台放到那里。

为了找到这些年轻人，我建议参与迎合学生的非营利组织，尤其是从事土著问题的学生。我们土著人民在热带雨林中照顾世界80％的生物多样性，在社区土地上，我们将至少24％的地上碳含量在世界热带雨林中存储。很多人不知道。我建议检查等组织，例如美洲印第安科学与工程学会to see how you can get involved and be engaged as a mentor, a role model and a leader.