GATHERING STEAM: The Princeton Day School STEAM Committee meets in the new STEAM Center (for science, technology, engineering, the arts, and mathematics). From left, Chief Information Officer Jon Ostendorf, Upper School Head Jason Robinson, Interim Math Chair Chip Cash, Libraries Department Chair Sheila Goeke, STEAM Coordinator Jonathan Tatkon-Coker, Head of School Paul Stellato, STEAM Committee Chair and Scientist in Residence Leon Rosenberg, Science Department Chair Jason Park, Lower School Math Teacher Jennifer Vradenburgh, and Lower School Science Teacher Aaron Schomburg. (Photo Courtesy of PDS)

By Donald Gilpin

Princeton Day School (PDS), long known for its deep commitment and strong programs in the humanities and the fine and performing arts, has recently turned its focus to the establishment of a dynamic new STEAM program, with major construction of a STEAM Center and new faculty to support it.

“We have created a program and facility that has the potential to touch and shape the experience of every kid in the school,” said Head of School Paul Stellato. “The Upper School program is designed to speak to kids who have no experience, to introduce them to the subject, and also to meet the needs of kids who have extensive experience in the field. It’s an all-encompassing program.”

Stellato went on to explain the comprehensive nature of the STEAM program and to point out PDS’s significant advantage as a Pre-K to 12 school. “We have the opportunity to engage kids for as many as 14 years, from age 4 to 18,” he said. “That continuity of experience gives us opportunities that other schools don’t have.”
Describing the STEAM program as a consistent step in PDS’s development of challenging opportunities for its students, Stellato noted that the program “speaks to the qualities that all of our kids possess: ambition, curiosity, creativity, and intelligence. We’ve provided for our students another venue in which those beautiful characteristics can express themselves.”

Upper School Head Jason Robinson discussed another perspective on the impetus for the increased emphasis on the interdisciplinary approach to the study of science, technology, engineering, the arts, and mathematics known as STEAM. “The centerpiece of PDS is the strength of its academic program,” he said. “The larger national conversation about the future of STEAM education compelled our attention as a leading academic institution. We began to ask fundamental questions about what we teach, how we teach it, and how to align our program with the best thinking and practices in STEAM education.”

Already in use by more than 300 students each day over the past six weeks since school opened, the new Upper School STEAM Center, an expansion of the current facilities covering more than 2,000 square feet of space on the math/foreign language corridors, includes a large classroom area and an adjacent smaller classroom for the computer science classes, along with an office for the school’s new STEAM Coordinator Jonathan Tatkon-Coker.

“The new Center is open, well-lit, flexible, modular, and includes a minimum of fixed structures to better accommodate a wide variety of hands-on courses,” according to a PDS press release.

Included in the new STEAM curriculum this year is a freshman STEAMinar, providing a basic literacy in science, technology, engineering, the arts, and mathematics for all ninth graders; a redesigned computer science curriculum from Introduction to AP Computer Science Principles; a new course in robotics and information processing; and a project-based course introducing students to engineering in its many manifestations.

The program is designed to provide all students with a basic STEAM literacy “so they can be engaged, informed participants in a 21st century world increasingly defined by questions at the intersection of science, math, technology, and society,” according to the PDS STEAM website, and to challenge advanced students with a rigorous program of electives to prepare them for future professional opportunities as leaders in STEAM fields.

The STEAM Center and the expanded, powered-up STEAM curriculum are the products of the past year’s efforts by the PDS STEAM committee working closely with architects from Architectural Resources of Cambridge to design the new space and to develop the new program. Stellato and Scientist in Residence and Committee Chair Leon Rosenberg led the committee, which was comprised of faculty from all three divisions and key leadership staff.

STEAM Center renovations began last June under the supervision of Director of Major Projects Ron Tola and his round-the-clock crews and were completed on schedule before school started last month.
Additional plans are already underway to create similar STEAM Centers in both the Lower and Middle Schools in the coming year as PDS continues to expand its STEAM program.