With Alberta kids out of school and the demand for content to keep them educated and occupied, a Calgary charity has made available their STEM content for parents and teachers across the country.
Mindfuel, a Calgary charity that’s been in operation for the past 30 years, is offering its subscription-based digital content free of charge during COVID-19, so families and educators have access to resources.
Alberta students ceased going to classes in mid-March after the ongoing concerns about coronavirus spread grew. At the time, Alberta’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, said that it wasn’t likely that students would be back at school until September.
Recently, Dr. Hinshaw said that they continue to work on a plan for kids to get back to school as a part of the province’s relaunch strategy.
In the meantime, parents and teachers are constantly on the hunt for curriculum-friendly Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics resources.
“Making our resources complimentary helps to offset the many challenges that teachers, parents and students are experiencing across the country with classroom disruptions,” said Mindfuel CEO, Cassy Weber.
“We hope students feel challenged and engaged, and that parents and teachers feel reprieve as they are still able to deliver world-class educational programming.”
Program tailored for K-12 education across the province, country
Under four primary titles: Wonderville, Codingville, Ignition Pack and geekStarter, parents and teachers access everything from science discovery, to specific coding and digital literacy programs.
Since opening their programs at no cost, Mindfuel has seen massive uptake.
In Alberta alone, access to the Wonderville program has jumped 62 per cent in the past month. Now, they’re providing material to more than 40,000 Alberta parents, teachers and kids.
“We’ve been astonished at the results and we are working hard to ensure we can support demand capacity,” said Weber.
“To see tens of thousands of teachers, students and parents in communities all across Canada participate in our online STEM programming has been truly rewarding.”
Mindfuel was founded in 1980 by Jim Gray. It was originally established as the Science Alberta Foundation dedicated to building a future-minded culture of innovators and problem solvers.
