Two new instruments created to assess perceptions of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) disciplines and careers are analyzed and found to have respectable to excellent internal consistency reliability, as well as good content, construct, and criterion-related validity for the areas assessed. Cronbach's Alpha for the individual scales on the STEM Semantics Survey and the STEM Career Interest Questionnaire ranged from .78 to .94 across the eight constructs represented. These were judged to be acceptable to assess anticipated changes resulting from MSOSW ITEST project activities

The Invention Factory is a nontraditional youth-based, after-school program in Honolulu that teaches information technology and mechanics to teenagers through interactive, hands-on projects that improve human computer interaction for individuals with disabilities.

The Girl Game Company, an ITEST program, was featured among 38 best practice programs in the 2010 edition of the Bayer Corporation's Planting the Seeds for a Diverse US STEM Pipeline: A Compendium of Best Practice K-12 STEM Education Programs.

The University of Montana’s Paleo Exploration Project (PEP) was a professional development program for K-12 Montana teachers, which also provided authentic, field-based, residential summer research experiences for over 80 Montana middle school students. The program’s scientific focus was the ancient environments and fossils of eastern Montana, which to leveraged student’s innate interest in dinosaurs to build a deeper understanding of “doing science” and encouraged future pursuit of STEM coursework and careers.

Presentation by Gerald Knezek and Rhonda Christensen at the The Out-of-School Time STEM:Building Experience, Building Bridges Conference, San Francisco, CA, October 2009.

With funding from NSF, the Prime the Pipeline Project (P 3) is responding to the need to strengthen the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) pipeline from high school to college by developing and evaluating the scientific village strategy and the culture it creates. The scientific village, a community of high school students, teachers as learners, undergraduate students as mentors, and university scientists as leaders, collaborate to solve challenging long-term problems/projects that develop villagers’ expertise with STEM concepts/skills and give them a taste of the work of