Getting involved with science research or project can be hard when you don't have a mentor. STEM From Scratch is an international youth-led organization with a mission to make STEM resources accessible to kids around the world.
The founder of the organization is Vibha Padmanabhan, is an 18-year-old from Bangalore, India. Vibha previously had trouble getting involved with science research or long-term science projects without having a mentor. She started to look into what kinds of resources were available and was able to find many helpful websites, YouTube channels, and online citizen science projects. There are many amazing but not well-known resources that can help with STEM opportunities. Vibha wanted to share these resources and opportunities that she found with other students who are looking to get more involved in STEM. In order to do this, she created the organization STEM From Scratch. Vibha is very passionate about bringing resources to underserved students, and so the organization amplifies low-cost and online STEM opportunities.
STEM From Scratch has a blog where they list all the resources they've found on subject-specific pages. They also put up weekly blog posts where members of their team write about their own experiences in the STEM field, or they can even elaborate upon a particular resource such as a research program or book. As of now, they have around 26 regular student bloggers from around the world sharing their diverse experiences in STEM. Included in the blog is a 'regional resources' page where opportunities are listed that are available locally to students around the globe.
The organization was founded last year in September, and has gained lots of followers and success. Their blog was started with resources that only covered three STEM fields: physics and astronomy, biology, and math. Since then, they were able to grow their coverage and even found resources for engineering, chemistry, computer science, and environmental science. The organization has gotten over 700 unique visitors from across the world and around 15,000 site views in less than a year. Many viewers say the site has been really useful and helped them discover opportunities they had no idea about.
In the future, STEM From Scratch hopes to connect with other like-minded people and organizations to promote their mission. They hope to start actively promoting their blog, and even create calendars for upcoming, one-time STEM events like webinars or workshops. As they become a larger organization, they plan on growing their team further.
Click here to view their blog.