Impact

What this means: This is an overarching number to measure how many youths globally have engaged with our educational resources, robots, curriculum, and programs. Please note that some of these numbers may include overlap, as we are measuring reach on a per event/program basis, meaning that individual students may attend multiple events or programs over time.

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A Breakdown:

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Classes & Events
Direct student reach and impact: These numbers measure the attendance of both in-person and virtual participants in the programs we organize, sponsor, or partner on.

Smaller Scale Programs: More localized, ongoing programs like after-school clubs and classes.

Students: This refers to the direct number of students attending our programs and classes in a classroom or program setting. This number also reflects students attending for one or more sessions and is not based on registration figures.

Programs Included: We measure attendance across a wide range of programs we either organize, partner with, or sponsor. These include, but are not limited to:

• After-school programs/camps

• Summer programs/camps

• Clubs we sponsor and/or youth ambassadors run

• In-person and virtual classes we run or teach

• Pilot users of new inventions in our Pilot Program

• Participants in community studies and research

• Live mentor hours and peer mentorship

• Long-term programs (e.g., SkoBots Shop, Engineering Design Club, School to School EKGAR Manufacturing Program, Anishinaabe Futurisms Build Initiative)

• Guest teaching 

• Online learning series

• Career exploration programs

• Field trips

• Study groups

• And more

Student estimate: 49,000 reached over 5 years and 10 months

Larger Scale Programs: Events with broader, more varied reach like conferences, workshops, and community-wide initiatives.

Attendees: This refers to the direct number of students attending our larger-scale programs, both virtually and in-person.

Programs Included: This category measures the reach or large-scale programs and collaborations, such as:

• Community events we organize (e.g., ambassador-run Fungi Walk)

• Workshops at large events (e.g., Maker Faire robotics workshops)

• Robotics competitions we’ve organized 

• Interactive STEM exhibits & film screenings

• Language and cultural initiatives

• Youth conferences and festivals we sponsor or collaborate with (e.g., Sponsored Cal Poly Pomona AISES Regional Conference 2023, Sponsored Three Sisters Garden Community Festival)

• Youth conference, events, and corporate events we partner with

• Robot manufacturing kit assembly days and demos

• Large scale activations for new programs, often at conferences or events like MIT Solve

• Hackathons we’ve collaborated on

Attendee estimate: 120,600 attendees over 5 years 10 months

Calculating Reach Through Downloads + App Users
Our virtual reach is primarily tracked through a combination of analytics and intake surveys from app usage and resource downloads. These tools provide insights into how many individuals are actively engaging with our educational materials.

A significant portion of our reach comes from teachers and educational networks who share our resources within their classrooms as well as our strategic corporate partnerships. Additionally, our social media presence, which spans over 65,000 followers across various platforms, plays a key role in extending our reach. Through these channels, along with press coverage and our mailing list, our content is distributed to a broad audience, reaching millions of individuals worldwide. This audience engages with our content by downloading resources and testing our apps and new products.

It's important to note that these metrics focus on active engagement—such as downloads, app usage, and resource testing—and do not include passive interactions like social media "views," "likes," or other forms of engagement that do not involve direct interaction with our educational content. 83% of our content is downloaded by teachers. For our app Super Sisters, 76% of our app is used by youth ages 20 and under. 88% are girls.

Robots
Important distinction: Robot kits (physical distribution) and robot resources (digital downloads and resources).

• 20.3k free robot kits distributed 

  • 20,000 EKGAR robot kits distributed, on average 

  • 350 SkoBots distributed, on average 

• 76k robot resources downloaded/saved

  • Robot resources include EKGAR, other open source projects like our robot Twenty, and our “biobot” recipe guidebook

  • This data measures individual downloads of resources, including instructions on how to build robots, design files, videos, and code, on average.

Curriculum & Apps

• 350k Beta users of Super Sisters

  • This refers to users of the Super Sisters app, an augmented reality learning platform in its beta testing phase. Over a one-month period in 2023, the app was released to a global audience for metric evaluation. We were able to reach this metric through a partnership with Snap, Inc and promotion on their platforms and events.

    • 88% of users were girls

    • 76% of users were youth aged 20 and under

    • The app is currently in its pilot testing phase in schools after a public activation at Solve at MIT in Spring 2024.

• 370,000 Disseminated Materials & Videos

  • This includes educational content shared in various formats, excluding robots. These materials are distributed through three main channels:

    • 1) Free downloads and saves of educational resources e.g., worksheets, lesson plans, books, videos) 

    • 2) Printed copies of curriculum, resources, and books

    • 3) Hard copies of books and mental health kits

  • Types of content included:

    • Indigenous women in STEM comic book series

    • STEAM Cultural Connection mini-book series

    • Video educational content

    • Indigenous language STEM glossary

    • Flashcards, coloring sheets, lesson plans, curriculum, and worksheets

    • 3D design files

    • STEM career pathway posters with Native role models

    • Indigenous leaders in STEM directory

    • Community-based STEM project templates

    • Indigenous technologies timeline and history

    • AI ethics framework guide

    • Diversity sticker designs

    • The 4 Voices Project (mental health kits for Indigenous youth by The STEAM Connection x Nii’iini Project). 500 kits distributed.

    • Through our Books for Diné Bikèyah Initiative, a program dedicated to promoting literacy and cultural preservation, we have distributed a total of 2,301 Indigenous books by Navajo authors in 2020 and 2022 with Little Moccasin Educational Services.

  • These resources were previously available publicly online to a global audience and on various platforms since 2018, but are now hosted on the Make-A-Robot Virtual Learning Platform to allow for better tracking through intake surveys and user engagement metrics. 

• 43k Active Users on the Make-A-Robot Virtual Learning Platform 

  • This refers to users who have requested access to the Make-A-Robot Virtual Learning Platform and passed our vetting process, where we host our curriculum, robot kits, and educational resources. The platform is designed for both educators and youth, with a primary focus on Indigenous issues, but it is intended for a wide, diverse audience.