Kingsport City Schools Recognizes National Engineers Week 2013
KINGSPORT, Tenn. ‚¬ Kingsport City Schools will be joining educators, students and engineers across the country in the sixty-second annual National Engineers Week, Feb. 17-23, 2013. The National Engineers Week Foundation is the global leader in attracting and cultivating the next generation of engineers and celebrating engineering as the invisible or stealth profession.
This years Engineers Week theme, Celebrate Awesome, is a call to celebrate the people in the profession, engineering students and technicians.
Engineers innovate, create and solve problems. They work together to make the world better, said Dale Jans, P.E. Co-Chair, Engineers Week 2013. Engineers are key to our health, safety and happiness. And when kids and youth get to experience it first-hand, they discover for themselves how amazing engineering is. Going forward, this is going to be even more true, as engineers develop solutions to such problems as bard security, energy sustainability, infrastructure and global climate change.
Monday, Feb. 18, John Sevier Middle School will have engineers from Eastman Chemical Company on-site for presentations throughout the day in sixth grade science classes. Presenters ‚ will discuss the engineering profession along with demonstrations and lab projects. Eighth grade science classes have presentations scheduled for Thursday, Feb. 21 while seventh graders will be scheduled at a later date once TCAP testing has been concluded.
We (John Sevier Middle school) are very happy to have engineers from Eastman visit our science classrooms during Engineering Week. We hope our students will get a glimpse of what engineering is all about and hopefully spark an interest in taking related coursework in high school, technical school or college, said Kim Harvey, principal, John Sevier Middle School. We also offer Project Lead the Way, which is a pre-engineering-type course in which students have the opportunity to experience hands-on activities related to engineering. Also, our entire staff would like to thank all of the engineers for taking time out of their busy schedules to work with our students.
Tuesday, Feb. 19, Ross N. Robinson Middle School will have engineers from Eastman visiting all eighth grade classes. Presenters will offer demonstrations and hands-on projects.
Engineering is an embedded strand within our science curriculum, said Bill Francis, seventh/eighth grade science teacher, Robinson Middle School.‚ The Eastman engineers reinforce the engineering design process through a hands-on activity that supports this curriculum, while at the same time promoting student awareness of engineering.
Thursday, Feb. 21, Dobyns-Bennett High School will have thirteen engineers from Eastman on-site for forty-three presentations throughout the day in computer, science and math classes.
Engineering is a great opportunity for students to see the marriage of science, math, and reasoning in an everyday context, said Dr. Chris Hampton, principal, Dobyns-Bennett High School. This is a great time to explore and expose students to engineering opportunities in a way they may have never experienced before. These activities remove the ambiguity from the title of engineer and provide clarity for it means to be an engineer.
The mission of the National Engineers Week Foundation and its coalition is to sustain and grow a dynamic engineering profession by leveraging the common outreach interests of corporate, professional society, academia, and government partners; expanding the pool of innovative engineers by seeding and nurturing a diverse future engineering workforce through K-12 STEM education outreach initiatives; and engaging the public to see, touch and embrace engineering through year-round innovative programming and celebration.
The Foundation, a formal coalition of more than 100 professional societies, major corporations and government agencies, is dedicated to ensuring a diverse and well-educated future engineering workforce by increasing understanding of and interest in engineering and technology careers among young students and by promoting pre-college literacy in math and science. The Foundation provides a portfolio of year-round outreach programs, each with an underlying framework and materials. Programs are compelling yet simple to execute so that anyone and everyone can innovate with them.
Visit eweek.org for ideas about how students, parents, administrators and engineers can participate.
Kingsport‚ City Schools is a public school system located in Kingsport, Tenn., serving students in Sullivan and Hawkins county. The district is comprised of 13 schools, including a Pre-K, eight elementary schools, two middle schools, one high school and an alternative school; with total enrollment reaching 6,500 students. The vision of Kingsport City Schools is to be, Student Focused ‚¬¦ World Class.
For more information on Kingsport City Schools (KCS), visit k12k.com, listen live on, WCSK 90.3 FM, The Voice of KCS, watch KCS Today on Charter Channel 16 at 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. or call (423) 378.2100.‚ Were social too; follow us on Facebook, Kingsport City Schools and on Twitter, @KptSchools.