This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project seeks to design and develop the BrainSTEM Network, a breakthrough eLearning solution designed to overcome national deficiencies in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) and other fundamental academic competencies. Today's antiquated, largely pre-Internet pedagogy fails to empower educators with course creation tools needed to rapidly and economically re-author curricula for the increasingly interactive digital age. Student learners, in turn, endure the absence of effective, engaging or motivational online learning experiences they demand to keep pace with technology's rapid advance and compete for precious attention span. This research seeks to design and develop a working prototype of the BrainSTEM network-based on innovative instructional designs and functional requirements for a transformational course authoring system. The research focuses on the functional tool design required to build educational game-enriched STEM courses that integrate with social networks and online communities. The anticipated Phase I results include completed technology designs, functional prototypes of authoring tools and social network interfaces, as well as a demonstrable STEM content module.
BrainSTEM will enable a comprehensive renovation of curricular content, academic publishing, course delivery and pedagogy as they have existed in the United States since the advent of nationwide public education nearly 100 years ago. Today, the 21st-century digitization or 'Internet enablement' of education is long overdue despite growing economic pressure on educational institutions and a national, if not global, focus on academic competency. BrainSTEM offers the two-fold promise of (1) reinventing education and academic publishing for the Internet age by empowering educators with breakthrough self-publishing tools and (2) promoting viral learner motivation across a demographic of students rapt in electronic games, social networking and wireless devices. Public and private education in the United States reflects roughly $1 trillion in national spending, of which the vast majority is consumed by labor costs. The commercial opportunity for BrainSTEM centers on its ability to help mitigate escalating labor costs using uniquely effective and engaging online courses as a complement to instructor-led education. Information technology enjoys a well-established role, go-to-market and business model in education but only now can revolutionize the commercial value, social appeal and underlying efficacy of curricular content itself.
BrainSTEM’s investigation and resulting design and development was guided by our project’s Principal Aims. The project’s three (3) areas of investigation were balanced in Phase I to allow research into each area for their contribution to a breakthrough STEM learning innovation: AUTHORING: The self-authoring by subject matter experts (SME’s) of STEM learning games and associated education content leveraging the Qube Learning platform; SOCIAL NETWORKING: The connection of STEM learning games and content as embodied within BrainSTEM with existing social networks to drive learner motivation and engagement; and MOBILE DEVICES: Seamless access to the BrainSTEM learning game system using mobile devices such as Apple iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch devices. In each area, substantial progress was made and technical feasibility established through prototyping or the development of a fully-functioning initial release of BrainSTEM functionality. Importantly, our blend of R&D shifted within these three areas of Innovation during Phase I to reflect the relative urgency and degree of innovation we found necessary within each. Our findings led to our relative prioritization of Phase I research and development, as summarized here: Priority 1 LEARNER MOBILITY: During Phase I research, we concluded that mobility deserved our greatest attention given the dramatic success of Apple’s iPhone, iPod and, in turn, iPad mobile device. Similarly, the corporate education marketplace’s keen interest in mobile device-enabling STEM learning systems contributed to our increasing emphasis on mobility during Phase I. Given our research findings and commercial experience, researching, designing and building fully functioning BrainSTEM capability for the Apple family of mobile devices became our primary Phase I objective. Feasibility and extensive proof of concept for LEARNER MOBILITY were achieved in Phase I. Priority 2 SUBJECT EXPERT AUTHORING: The self-authoring of learning games linked to educational STEM content and curricula became our secondary priority in Phase I. Specifically, we concluded that existing curricular content—ranging from educators’ PowerPoint files and audio lectures to PDFs and animations—must be incorporated "as is" with the BrainSTEM eLearning platform. Here, educators’ own acute time constraints and their plethora of extant course materials reduced the need for BrainSTEM to enable new content creation tools per se. Learning Game creation and the linkage of such games to extant content, however, was found to be of great value and remains a priority. To establish technical feasibility, Phase I made use of Microsoft Excel-based templates for learning game authoring. Priority 3 SOCIAL NETWORK INTEGRATION: Linking BrainSTEM to Social Networks for learner motivation remains a critical innovation of this project, but not a technical innovation given our success deploying web services in Phase I. Specifically, in Phase I BrainSTEM web services were successfully developed to enable Apple iPhone mobility through a real-time integration that is identical to the type used for integration with other platforms, including social network APIs. Phase I research resulted in the completion of a fully functioning browser-, iPhone- and iPad-based learning game application, complete with curricula from a university partner, representing a substantial accomplishment which demonstrates the successful completion of Phase I research activities and efforts.
