Lewis and Clark Community College (L&C) is developing a STEM-based outreach program using hands-on activities for the design and construction of trebuchets. Project activities include constructing STEM-based learning objectives for the trebuchet competition, expanding an existing trebuchet contest to a broader and diverse number of high schools, building collaborative relationships with schools of engineering at regional universities, arranging strategies for tracking the enrollment histories of engineering students, and building partnerships with regional industries to support STEM-based engineering and engineering technology programs. L&C is expanding the level of participation of high schools to at least 25 schools (and 80 teams). Collaborating partners are the Schools of Engineering at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE) and Missouri University of Science & Technology (MST). Industrial partners include Covidien Pharmaceutical and Boeing (both of St. Louis). A freshman-level course to introduce students to engineering is also being developed. The project consults with leaders of a related project at Sierra College (CA) and their NSF/ATE Center for Applied Competitive Technologies.
