THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY STEM CAMP By Karen Cooper
Tis summer, twenty-six budding turf managers gathered at Te Ohio State University (OSU) for a week-long day camp focused on the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) aspects of turfgrass science. Tese young scientists spent the week performing experiments, using equipment, completing turf management tasks, and even flying a drone.
When OSU turfgrass specialist Pam Sherratt was 16, she participated in a week-long camp near her home in England promoting horticulture as a career option. After a week of hands-on activities, she said, “I loved it and knew that I had found my people.” It was from this life-altering experience that the OSU Turfgrass Science STEM Camp was born!
Sherratt researched the various similar camps that were available and realized that the key to making her program successful would be hands-on activities. Much like her own remembered camp experiences of tractor driving, pruning, planting, and even welding, her research showed that students retain as much as 75 percent of information by actually DOING an activity rather than just hearing about it or watching someone else do it.
Sherratt and her team at OSU chose middle schoolers because they were old enough to understand STEM basics and focus longer than elementary aged students. In addition, they wanted to plant the seed about careers in turfgrass while they were young, and they felt that high school students might have already set career goals.
One of the unique aspects of the camp was its focus not only on turf management tasks but on the STEM
aspects of turfgrass science. One the first day of the camp, students set up small experiments and then gave short presentations about their results at the end of the camp. Experiments included soil settlement testing, soil erosion control, ryegrass germination, and nitrogen and iron applications. Tey also performed light meter experiments.
Sherratt made sure math was included as much as possible during the week, incorporating activities such as measuring an irregular shape, measuring bases and the height of pitcher’s mound, and calibrating fertilizer spreaders. She found that the students really enjoyed making a competition of trying to get the best time while using the fertilizer spreader.
Campers were able to take several field trips during the week to learn about different turfgrass environments. When they visited a local golf course, they were able to learn about the role a turf manager plays in environmental management as they saw birds, turtles, a frog, deer, monarch butterfly caterpillars, and different plants. Tis trip tied in nicely with a climatologist who discussed the effects of climate change on growing plants in Ohio.
Other field trips involved painting a logo at Mapfre Stadium, raking bunkers at Muirfield Village Golf Club, fixing a home plate area, and cutting a cup on a golf green. Students also had the opportunity to learn about and then use various turfgrass research and management tools such as a Clegg impact hammer, a shear vane, a TDR soil moisture meter, ball roll and ball bounce equipment, an infrared gun, a stimpmeter, a firmness meter, a macrometer, and a mowing height prism. But far and away, all of them said that their favorite thing was flying the drone.
OSU STEM Camp students and leaders posed for a group photo. 90 TPI Turf News November/December 2018
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