On January 23rd and 24th, 2019 the third
annual Synapse Innovation Summit was held at the Amalie Arena in Tampa,
Florida. This event is designed to bring together organizations, funders,
entrepreneurs, their innovating ideas, and advanced high-technologies from a
wide range of industries and organizations to support regionally-based
innovation in the technology, education, and entrepreneurial ecosystems
throughout Florida. Synapse was produced by the nonprofit Synapse, named for
the link between nerve cells in the body. Innovation Summit included workshops
and seminars about learning, exploring and celebrating the possibilities in
advanced high-technology and innovation, to help connect and establish
relationships among those who can contribute to the growth of the Tampa Bay
entrepreneurial ecosystem. There were 334
exhibitors, 111 breakout sessions, 415 speakers, and 5,542 attendees who
flooded into downtown Tampa’s Amalie Arena to participate in the high energy
event.
Highlights included “spotlight” sessions devoted to Augmented
and Virtual Reality, robotics with the latest on humanoid robots, health and
wellness centers with medical advances that restored muscle memory, cyber
defense technologies, and top STEM high- technology education programs that are
transforming our world and more. In addition, ConnectWise and Synapse teamed up
to fund approximately $20,000 worth of scholarships to winners of their
Crowdsourcing Innovation Challenges. For more information on Crowdsourcing
Challenges, click here.
Augmented & Virtual Reality
in Classrooms
The Synapse Innovation Summit had several growing companies that
focused on improving the educational experience in classrooms. One company,
SproutXR intends to create a learning portal where teachers can download
educational games for their students on their smartphones. SproutXR offered a
session to try out one of their latest games, where the user plays as a knight
that is ordered to defend a gate from upcoming monsters while having to solve
simple math problems. SproutXR is hoping teachers will use their games as
homework, ice-breakers, and practice problems. Click here to
visit their website.
Synapse STEM Pavilion
The
Florida Advanced Technological Center-FLATE and at least 15 educational
programs and non-profit organizations from around the greater Bay area participated
in this great event with booths located in the Synapse STEM Pavilion. In
addition to FLATE, other educational booths’ included University of Florida’s
Brain-Drone eRacing League, Tampa Bay STEM Network, St. Petersburg College, and
more. The STEM Pavillion provided a
great opportunity for educational programs to learn more about cutting edge
technologies as well as network with colleagues to build a stronger, more
connected STEM Education Ecosystem in our area.
FLATE Continuous Support with the Tampa Bay STEM Network
Through
a strong network of academic, business, and community partnerships, FLATE continues
supporting the Tampa Bay STEM Network which goal is to provide time, talent,
and treasure to create a well-connected portfolio of experiences that result in
the academic success of and multiple opportunities for citizens of all ages to
explore and enjoy STEM, thus strengthening our talent base and STEM pipeline,
contributing to the vitality of our community.
STEM Ecosystem - Building a Better Tampa Bay
The
STEM Ecosystems Initiative is built on over a decade of research into
successful STEM collaborations, and seeks to nurture and scale effective
science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) learning opportunities for all
young people. The 56 communities selected from across the United States compose
a national Community of Practice and have demonstrated cross-sector
collaborations to deliver rigorous, effective preK-16 instruction in STEM
learning. These collaborations happen in schools and beyond the classroom—in
afterschool and summer programs, at home, in science centers, libraries and
other places both virtual and physical. Strong STEM Learning Ecosystems
feature dynamic collaborations among schools, out-of-school time programs, STEM
expert institutions (such as museums, science centers, and institutions of
higher education and STEM professional associations), the private sector,
community-based organizations, youth and families.
The
Tampa Bay STEM Network was created in January 2016 and is funded through a generous
grant from the STEM Funders Network and Samueli Foundation, with local support
from Mr. Jeff Vinik, the Tampa Bay Lightning and Moffitt Cancer Center.
Partners of the Tampa Bay STEM Network include Hillsborough County Public
Schools, Museum of Science and Industry-MOSI, The Florida Aquarium, Glazer
Children’s Museum, The Florida Advanced Technological Education Center-FLATE,
Lowry Park Zoo, University of South Florida, Alliance for Public Schools, and Hillsborough
Education foundation.
Strengthening
our local talent base and STEM pipeline, will contribute to the vitality of our
community and Building a Better Tampa Bay.
For
more information contact Larry R. Plank (larry.plank@sdh.k12.fl.us), Director,
K-12 STEM Education, Hillsborough County Public Schools, Tampa Bay STEM Network.
FLATE Supporting Code.org® Computer Science Fundamentals
Code.org
is a nonprofit dedicated to expanding access to computer science in schools and
increasing participation by women and underrepresented minorities. Every
student in every school should have the opportunity to learn for FREE computer
science. Code.org organizes the annual Hour of Code campaign
which has engaged 10% of all students in the world and provides the leading
curriculum for K-12 computer science in the largest school districts in the
United States.
Some FREE Courses from Code.org
Elementary School – Computer Science Fundamentals
Courses from Code.org
for students in grades K-12 and professional learning for teacher. Designed to
be fun and engaging, Code.org’s progression of CS Fundamentals courses blend
online and "unplugged" non-computer activities to teach students
computational thinking, problem solving, programming concepts and digital
citizenship.
Middle School – Computer Science Discoveries
Broader introduction
to computer science topics, appropriate for 6-10th grade students. The course
takes a wide lens on computer science by covering topics such as programming,
physical computing, HTML/CSS, and data. The course inspires students as they
build their own websites, apps, games, and physical computing devices.
High School - Computer Science Principles
Designed to prepare
students, appropriate for 9-12 grade students (and teachers) who are new to
computer science for the AP CS Principles exam. The course covers many topics
including the Internet, Big Data and Privacy, and Programming and Algorithms.
For more information
about Code.org, visit https://studio.code.org/courses
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