Grace Place students apply STEM skills in mini golf challenge

High school students at Grace Place for Children and Families put their engineering skills to the test this week during a Putt-Putt Engineering Challenge aimed at demonstrating the real-world applications of STEM education.

The event, part of the summer program, encouraged problem solving and collaboration, giving students a chance to design and build miniature golf holes from scratch while learning how STEM concepts apply beyond the classroom.

The mission of Grace Place, which immediately serves the Golden Gate neighborhood in Collier County, is to educate children and families in order to create pathways out of poverty.

Chief Program Officer Marcie Curry has been working at Grace Place for more than three years and manages the school-age programs: elementary, middle and high school.

While living in Chicago, she learned about the Putt-Putt Engineering Challenge. Every year, when Curry would turn on her television news, she would see this STEM school teacher incorporating the activity into math curriculum. What caught her attention was how engaged the students were when working on their own golf courses.

“I think that’s something I’m really passionate about, providing educational experiences where students are just so engaged that they emotionally invest in it,” Curry said. “It doesn’t feel like something they have to do, or that we’re making them do. But they can really dig into it and feel they’ve created something.”

Hoping Grace Place children would be as enthusiastic as those in Chicago, she replicated the activity she had witnessed on her TV for the first time this year. The hope was to create a nine-hole golf course, each student making their own.

Over the course of five weeks, 12 students researched, designed and built their own golf holes. The students even went on a field trip to a local mini golf course to get inspiration for their own designs. Grace Place provided the materials, including lumber and screws, to build the framing of their projects.

The students built their golf course with assistance from seven of the more than 300 Grace Place volunteers. They learned from the volunteers how to measure the necessary lumber pieces and joined them using a drill to make the students’ sketched plan.

Curry’s husband, Bill, helped two students, Wilmer and Maria, make their designs a reality.

“Neither of them had used any of these tools before today and they’re super excited about it. The first time they learned how to put the power pack battery in, Wilmer pulled the trigger. He felt super powerful,” Bill Curry said. “They’ve been measuring and learning about fractions on the measuring tape. They have very good math skills; they just haven’t seen their math applied in this way.”

As a volunteer, he enjoys watching students understand new things.

“They have these little moments that are like these little epiphanies,” Bill Curry said. “They’re like ‘Oh OK, 2 1/2 feet is 30 inches, and there’s 30 on the measuring tape. I get it now.’ It’s exciting for me to watch them grow.”

Wilmer has been attending Grace Place for six years. He liked learning from Bill.

“Mr. Bill is a very nice person, creative, hardworking and pretty smart,” Wilmer said.

Marcie Curry enjoys seeing the students grow from facing setbacks.

“They’re learning how to use a drill, measurement, drawing a scale model, problem solving as things go wrong — which is happening,” she said. “And I’m grateful for that because this is a great, safe place to try and fail, and we have all these supportive people around kids.”

Grace Place elementary students had the opportunity to test out the finished course.

“I thought the mini golf project really accomplished the creative part, the engagement part and then also just the community asset,” Marcie Curry said, “where we now have this little mini golf course that people can play and enjoy.”

Bill Curry believes if students can see how paper-based work relates to real life, they will find it valuable. He believes that additional activities should be implemented in schools to demonstrate to students how what they learn in the classroom might apply to their lives after graduation.

“You have to trust that it matters,” he said. “It may or may not directly show up on the standardized test scores that schools are under pressure to achieve certain levels at. I think these types of projects are massive boosts for students. In the short term, they [schools] might not see it on a standardized test. But it’s helping long-term, and that’s important.”

Though the putt-putt challenge is meant to apply STEM concepts to real life, Marcie Curry is happy if the experience is just a happy recollection for students.

“If nothing else, it’ll be a fond memory,” she said. “I think life’s hard enough with just the challenges they might be facing in their lives. If this project provides them joy, I’m still satisfied.”