STEAM-Powered
STL
WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY
St. Louis is a home for STEAM, and one shining example of this is St. Louis’ own Washington University. Founded in 1853, Washington University serves as a world-class education, healthcare and research institution.
As part of a STEAM-powered St. Louis, Washington University’s research efforts comprise fields like medicine, the environment and energy, plant science and more; and Washington University
employs over 19,600 local workers.
In St. Louis’ growing biomedical and health services sector, institutions like Washington University play an important connection between hospitals, local companies like Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, Bayer and more, as well as STEAM groups and organizations like BioSTL, the Cortex innovation district and the Science Center.
In fact, Barnes-Jewish Hospital, located in the Central West End neighborhood and the largest hospital in the state of Missouri, serves as an adult teaching hospital for the Washington University School of Medicine and a major component of the Washington University Medical Center.
19,600+
Local employees
Ranked 
in the St. Louis Business Journal’s Largest Employers list
3.8 billion
Annual Revenue
879.27 million
Research funding received in 2021
More than
3,000 research projects
conducted each year in fields including:
- Medical
- Engineering
- Environmental
- Life sciences
- Public health
YES Teen
Networking
Innovative Professionals Meet the YES Teens at the Youth Exploring Science Networking Extravaganza
On Thursday, July 21, the Youth Exploring Science (YES) Program hosted the YES Networking Extravaganza, a special event at the Taylor Community Science Resource Center providing teens in the YES Program the opportunity to meet and learn from innovative local STEAM professionals in short one-on-one networking sessions.
FOX2 news anchor Elliott Davis served as the event’s keynote speaker and emcee, and the morning event drew a number of professionals from a wide range of STEAM industries and fields, allowing the YES Teens the unique opportunity to connect with real professionals and practice important networking skills.
Thank you to everyone who participated in this year’s YES Networking Extravaganza!
This summer the YES Teens from the Aerospace and Engineering components helped ignite curiosity through the YES Program’s new STEMtastic Camps. These off-site summer camps, made possible thanks to a generous donation by Boeing, took place in the University City and Riverview Gardens school districts, where the YES Teens engaged kids in fun, hands-on STEAM activities.
The Aerospace component focused on designing gliders and learning about space. For designing the gliders, the STEMtastic Camp curriculum used inquiry-based methods to allow children to take ownership of their learning and to emphasize the importance of asking questions and experimenting. Utilizing flight simulators, the YES Teens taught the children how to fly airplanes, and they discussed pursuing a career as a pilot. In late June, students enjoyed a special day with Boeing employees including Pratyush Kumar, president of Boeing India and vice president of Boeing International, who spoke about his childhood in India and his career with Boeing.
The program’s curriculum also introduced the children to space and astronomy. Here, in addition to creating pinhole planetariums and building satellites, the students learned about the scale of the solar system and the phases of the moon. The YES Teens supplemented the activities using hands-on experiences with drones and iPads equipped with a constellation-finding app.
In the Engineering component, the YES Teens explored robots and coding with the children. The YES Teens introduced the students to Sphero robots and—with a space-themed mat that allowed the students to take their robots on a space adventure, an 8-foot by 8-foot portable floor maze (designed and built by the YES Teens), and a roster of fun games—led them in fun activities dedicated to the excitement of coding, racing and even battling interactive robots.
The STEMtastic campers explored coding through a Scratch-based block programming language, allowing them to learn the elements of coding through hands-on play. By interspersing art-themed lessons—including designing custom armor for a Sphero battle—the program also engaged the students’ right- brain development. At the end of the program, the students demonstrated their skills in how to use block code to take their robots on game-based galactic quests, space adventures, maze races and more.
This summer’s STEMtastic Camp reached 320 students.
