THE WARREN-WATCHUNG CONNECTION PAGE 22 SEPT/OCT/NOV 2026 t h etchoenc no encnt ei oc nt i son j s. cnoj .mc o m theconnectionsnj.com AUTUMN’S ALLURE DINE, SHOP & CELEBRATE 257 N. Main Street, Manville, NJ 08835 908-842-2400 Open Monday-Saturday (11am-6pm) Receive 10% off when you spend $50 WHERE THE SERIOUS COLLECTORS SHOP. Sports card store offering baseball • basketball • football hockey • soccer • pokemon cards • memorabilia • hobby wax single cards • retail and supplies. Scotch Plains high school student volunteers for a nationwide student-led nonprofit that inspires STEM passion in students by introducing hands-on STEM education to elementary classrooms in New Jersey. Iona Nandy, a rising Junior at the Academy for Allied Health Sciences in Scotch Plains, balances her schoolwork, sports, and other extracurriculars with outreach coordination for STEMsters, a nonprofit delivering hands-on STEM workshops to elementary students in New Jersey and across the globe. She manages these activities remotely from her home in Scotch Plains. Founded in 2022 by three high school students from Arcadia, California, STEMsters was created to provide younger children with hands-on STEM education earlier into their academic journey. The initiative has expanded to 169 chapters across 25 US states and six countries, including Canada, Peru, India, Indonesia, and Turkey. Everyone involved in this mission, from the founders to volunteers like Iona, is a high school student. After four years since embarking on their journey, the organization has achieved a remarkable impact: across 170 chapters, STEMsters reaches about 96,000 students annually, records over 16,000 volunteer hours each year, and delivers more than 3,200 lessons. Each month, around 9,000 students around the world participate in “I’m so grateful for having exposure to STEM at a young age, but I know that is not the case for many kids,” she says. “When I discovered STEMsters, I saw an opportunity to give younger kids the kind of early exposure I was lucky to have. I truly believe that that first hands-on project is what sparks curiosity, and once that curiosity is lit, it paves the way for an innovative passion.” High school students interested in establishing a chapter may visit www.stemsters.org or contact STEMstersOutreach@gmail.com. Your contribution could shape your community’s next generation of STEM innovators. Community members and organizations seeking to support STEMsters are also encouraged to reach out. hands-on sessions building projects that let them, literally, take their learning home. The focus on hands-on learning is what sets STEMsters apart from other organizations. Each workshop lasts one hour, starting with a ten-minute introduction to concepts and vocabulary. Then, students get to work in small groups on projects like art robots, zipline carts, UV houses, and zoetropes. Some chapters even offer a coding track for students interested in the computational aspect of STEM. The curriculum is tailored to adjust to each different age group, with separate content for kindergarten through second grade and grades three through five to ensure the lesson fits their developmental needs. At the end of each session, the students have a physical representation of their learning. Volunteers come away with something too. They get to see young minds grasp new concepts and discover new passions under their guidance. STEMsters has an active presence in New Jersey, with chapters at Monroe Township High School and in Monmouth County. There, the organization partners with the Boys and Girls Club of Monmouth to provide these hands-on STEM lessons. Iona helps expand this outreach through her role on the publicity team and actively advocates for the program by reaching out to local stakeholders. A COMMUNITY CHAMPIONS Local Teenager Inspires Children to Develop a Passion for STEM By Iona Nandy CONNECTION
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