USA Science &
Engineering Festival is a science festival held in
Washington, D.C. The Festival is the nation's largest celebration of
STEM and was founded by serial entrepreneur
Larry Bock and Ray O
Johnson,
Senior Vice President and
Chief Technology Officer of the
Lockheed Martin Corporation. Due to the Festival
Sponsors, including the Founding and Presenting
Host Lockheed Martin, the Festival is a free and open to the public event.
The inaugural event was held from
October 10, 2010 through
October 24,
2010, the second Festival was April 27--29,
2012 (attended by a quarter million visitors) and the third Festival attracted over 325,
000 visitors on April 24-27, 2014. The 3rd Festival featured the first ever X-STEM
Symposium on April 24, 2014, presented by
Northrop Grumman Foundation and MedImmune, with interactive presentations and workshops by an exclusive group of visionaries who aim to empower and inspire kids about careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
The Festival took over the entire
Convention Center this year, utilizing over 2.3 million square feet of space to inspire the next generation of our countries STEM workforce.
Based on estimated numbers from the Convention Center, more than 325,000 people attended over the 4 days (X-STEM and
Sneak Peek Friday included). Many exhibitors reported that roughly 11,000 visitors stopped by their booth over the course of the 3-day
Expo. Attendees from all
50 states in the
U.S. and international attendees from over 20 different countries visited the Festival! Sneak Peek Friday included 40,000+ students, teachers, military families, government officials and press -- a 30% increase from 2012. Sneak Peek Friday attendees included students from 38 states -- and 3 countries! The inaugural X-STEM Symposium was a huge success, with more than 4,000 students and teachers from area and underserved schools, homeschoolers, and military families in attendance.
Another
300,000 individuals celebrated science & engineering at
200+
Satellite Events and
Affiliate Festivals across the country and beyond. In addition, over
180,000 people participated in our
Nifty Fifty and other pre-Expo events.
To bring a new STEM decision maker audience to the Festival, the Festival hosted over 20 other major STEM
Professional Events at the Convention Center at the same time as our event, including the
U.S. News STEM Solutions
Conference and the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency (
EPA) P3 college student competition. More than 400 new organizations that had never participated before with big increases in the areas of
Advanced Manufacturing, Robotics, Skilled Trades Professionals,
STEAM (i.e.
Design) and DIYers/
Makers, and overall doubled the number of participating exhibitors from 2012.
Highlights:
More than 3,000 hands on activities
Over
150 live performances by science celebrities, explorers, best-selling authors, entrepreneurs and world-renowned experts
More than 1,000 participating organizations
50 noted science authors
2,000 participating schools
Over 1,400 volunteers
Science Celebrities including
They Might Be Giants,
Mike Rowe,
Bill Nye the Science Guy,
Danica McKellar,
Apollo Robbins,
Michio Kaku and many others.
The Festival was attended by key
White House officials such as U.S.
Secretary of State John Kerry (
State Department Reception) and
Catherine Novelli,
Under Secretary of State for Economic
Growth,
Energy, and the
Environment;
Arne Duncan,
Secretary of Education;
John Holdren,
Senior Advisor to the President for Science and
Technology Policy;
Todd Park, U.S. Chief Technology Officer and
Assistant to the President, and many other notable government figures.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_House_Science_Fair
- published: 11 Jun 2014
- views: 79933