FALL RIVER, Mass., May 14, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Atlantis Charter School announced today that STEM Academy instructor Alekzandr Hirschmann was recently honored with an Lemelson-MIT Excite Award. The award is given annually to a select group of educators across the country who have applied to receive a Lemelson-MIT InvenTeam® grant for the following school year and have been selected as a finalist. Award recipients participate in invention education learning opportunities as part of an all-expenses paid trip to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for the Lemelson-MIT Program’s annual EurekaFest, a multi-day invention celebration in mid-June.
“Excite Award educators who attend EurekaFest leave the event prepared to ignite an interest among high school students in science, math, engineering and invention,” said Leigh Estabrooks, invention education officer from the Lemelson-MIT Program. “They gain new techniques to empower their students through problem solving and encourage a sustainable culture of invention in their school and community.”
Educators are selected for this award based on their capacity to lead a year-long, open-ended invention project with students at their school. At EurekaFest, Excite Award recipients meet and are inspired by current InvenTeams, teams of high school students, teachers and mentors that received grants of up to $10,000 each to invent technological solutions to real-world problems. Hirschmann will see the InvenTeam projects, learn more about the InvenTeam experience and attend hands-on workshops and discussions led by MIT professors about invention - unique technological solutions to real world problems.
“I am honored to have been selected for an Lemelson-MIT Excite Award, ” said Alekzandr Hirschmann. “Our invention would relate to the ocean, and Atlantis students would play a large role in identifying the problem we would attempt to solve. Whether we study energy creation, ways to mitigate our population’s impact on our environment, or ways to enhance the global food supply, Atlantis students would be in the unique position to solve a problem facing their community here on the SouthCoast of Massachusetts.”
Hirschmann, STEM instructor at Atlantis, initiated the InvenTeam application process in the spring of 2019 and will be invited to submit a final application for the InvenTeam grant after attending EurekaFest. Hirschmann will work with the students and mentors throughout the summer to finalize Atlantis’s grant application, which is due in September. Hirschmann will also reach out to community members with relevant expertise who can provide insight and guidance on how their invention can best serve the community.
A prestigious panel of judges composed of educators, researchers, staff and alumni from MIT, as well as former Lemelson-MIT award winners, will assemble in the fall and select the final InvenTeam grantees.
More information on the Lemelson-MIT InvenTeam initiative and Excite Awards can be found here.
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ABOUT ATLANTIS CHARTER SCHOOL
Atlantis Charter School, based in Fall River, Massachusetts, is a leading public charter school that serves nearly 1,400 students in kindergarten through 12th grade across the SouthCoast region. Its mission is to provide students with an education second to none, yielding life-long academic excellence and learning skills. Founded in 1995, Atlantis was one of the first charter schools in Massachusetts. It is now one of the largest, consistently ranking among the highest-performing public charter schools in the Commonwealth. The high school is frequently recognized for its ground-breaking career academies which were developed in partnership with industry and higher education to prepare an educated 21st century workforce and drive economic development.
ABOUT THE LEMELSON-MIT PROGRAM
Celebrating invention, inspiring youth
The Lemelson-MIT Program celebrates outstanding inventors and inspires young people to pursue creative lives and careers through invention.
Jerome H. Lemelson, one of U.S. history’s most prolific inventors, and his wife Dorothy founded the Lemelson-MIT Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1994. It is funded by The Lemelson Foundation and administered by the School of Engineering at MIT, an institution with a strong ongoing commitment to creating meaningful opportunities for K-12 STEM education. For more information, visit Lemelson.MIT.edu.