STEM Fellowship

STEM Fellowship is a Canadian non-profit organisation founded in 2015. The organisation aims to use mentorship and experiential learning to equip youth with skills in data science and scholarly writing. Founded in 2015 by a teacher and a group of undergraduate student, the organisation has expanded to high schools and 22 universities across 10 provinces in Canada alongside a range of international partners.

Fellowship

Individual fellowship costs $15 per year. Fellows receive discounts on admission to STEM Fellowship events, a subscription to the STEM Fellowship Journal, and are invited to networking opportunities with other STEM fellows. Institutional fellowship costs $180, and is open to universities across Canada. Institutional fellowship allows the university to become an official STEM Fellowship branch, and participate in events including the Big Data Challenge, Canadian Youth Physicists’ Tournament, and Scholarly Writing Challenge.

Organisation

STEM Fellowship is managed by more than a dozen committees mostly consisiting of high school and undergraduate student volunteers that run each of the organizations programs. There are more than 300 people serving the organization in different capacities.

The Steering Committee consisting of the Executive Director, Dr Sacha Nohkovich, the Managing Director, Mohammad Asadi Lari and the Directors for half a dozen committees, oversee the overall activity and strategic direction of SF. The Board of Directors oversees the corporate affairs of the SF and consists of representatives from the organziations primary sponsors: Canadian Science Publishing (Mr Mile Borozki), SciNet (Dr Daniel Gruner), SAS (Dr Mark Morreale), Digital Science (Mr Adrian Stanley) and the Hon. Jean Yip, MP for Scarborrough-Agincourt, alongside Dr Sacha Noukhovich.

Current university branches include:

• Carleton University
• Dalhousie University
• McGill University
• McMaster University
• Queen’s University
• University of Alberta
• University of British Columbia
• University of Calgary
• University of Guelph
• University of New Brunswick
• University of Ontario Institute of Technology
• University of Ottawa
• University of Toronto
• University of Victoria
• University of Waterloo
• University of Western Ontario
• Wilfrid Laurier University
• York University

STEM Fellowship is currently affiliated with:

• Altmetric
• Arianian Young Innovative Minds Institute
• Cogntive Class
• enScholar
• Figshare
• Greater Vancouver High School Science Association
• International Young Physicists’ Tournament
• Nano Club-Iran
• National Student Network
• New York Academy of Sciences
• Operation Med School
• ORCID
• Overleaf
• Partners in Research
• Peer Buds
• Project Pulse
• TRIUMF
• Undergraduate Engineering Research Day (UnERD), hosted by the University of Toronto

The Big Data Challenge

The Big Data Challenge (BDC) is a competition hosted by STEM Fellowship, with the aim of developing data science skills, inquiry-based learning, and problem solving skills in high school students. BDC participants investigate different themes each year.

BDC 2014-2015

Big Innovation - Students were provided data sets relating to transactions carried out by grocery shoppers and were asked to address one or more of the following tasks:

• Predict next week’s shopping list for each consumer
• Attempt to classify the consumers by household size, income, and demographic
• Classify consumers by lifestyle and political preferences

BDC 2015-2016

Big Data Day in the City - Students were encouraged to develop analyse data surrounding:

• City transportation
• Safety
• Healthy living
• Entertainment

BDC 2016-2017

Big Data Meets Scholarly Impact - Students were provided Altmetric Data reflecting the Internet’s effect on scientific publications, and were asked to follow the growth and evolution of research ideas.

BDC 2017-2018

Think Global and Act Local with Big Data - The theme centres around the United Nation’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Students are encouraged to solve the world’s leading issues through the use of open source climatological data.

Competitors are regularly invited to participate in informative workshops on R programming, Python, SAS and the IBM Data Science Experience, hosted by competition sponsors and the STEM Fellowship Data Science Education Team. During the preliminary round of competition, groups of up to 4 students choose a dataset, analyse the data, and present their findings in a scholarly report, which is submitted online. Students who win the preliminary round attend Big Data Day, hosted by the event’s primary sponsor, SAS Canada, and present their findings to a panel of industry experts. This year’s Big Data Day is set to take place on February 22, 2018. Winning teams will have their project papers presented in the STEM Fellowship Journal, published by NRC Research.

The Big Data Challenge is monetarily sponsored by the IBM Big Data University, which also sponsors the IBM student prize, and Digital Science. It is academically sponsored by the University of Toronto's SciNet. The challenge was recognised by the Parliament of Canada through the late Member of Parliament, Arnold Chan.

STEM Fellowship Journal

The STEM Fellowship Journal (SFJ) is an open-access, peer-reviewed journal published by Canadian Science Publishing. The Journal is dedicated to showcasing research from first-time high school and undergraduate authors. Each submission is reviewed by a Student Editorial Board, which consists of high school and undergraduate students with strong backgrounds in scientific writing, editing and communication from Canada, Iran, Russia and Pakistan. Under the leadership of Dr. Sacha Noukhovitch, editor-in-chief of the SFJ and Executive Director of STEM Fellowship, the editorial board submits accepted submissions for peer review by professionals in relevant disciplines.

Canadian Young Physicists’ Tournament

During the 29th International Young Physicists’ Tournament (IYPT) held in 2016, STEM Fellowship became the IYPT Member Organization (IMO) for Canada. In response, STEM Fellowship created the Canadian Young Physicists’ Tournament (CaYPT) to select a team of high school students to represent Canada at the IYPT. The CaYPT is sponsored by TRIMF, Partners in Research, and the Premier Institute, which also hosts the event. The registration fee is $100 CAD per team.

Teams must prepare solutions to a set of physics problems chosen from the IYPT problem list, and present their solutions to judges in a series of “Physics Fights”. Unlike the IYPT, the CaYPT only requires that teams present from 5 of the 17 IYPT problems. The CaYPT follows a similar structure to the IYPT. Within a fight, teams assume one of three roles: reporter, opponent and reviewer. When more than four teams compete in the same room, two teams assume an observational role.

The reporting team is challenged to present their solutions to one of the questions within a limited timeframe. The opponent then highlights perceived flaws in the presentation to the jury, and the two teams debate each other. The reviewing team weighs in and provides their opinion on both presentations. The jury awards up to 10 points for each team, which is then multiplied by 3 for the reporting team, 2 for the opponents, and 1 for the reviewing team. The teams then switch positions until each team has fulfilled every role. Teams are allowed to reject 1 problem per physics fight.

Students must succeed at a regional qualifier to be eligible for the CaYPT. The regional qualifier is held in Ontario and British Columbia, with events held in other regions depending on the level of demand. Competitors from Ontario are required to present in person for the national event, while competitors from other provinces may participate online. In addition to the 5 problems in the CaYPT, teams seeking to participate in the IYPT will need to prepare solutions for all 17 IYPT problems.

STEMpowerment Mentorship Program

The STEMpowerment mentorship program cultivates student talent and innovation by providing free academic support and peer counselling for youth in communities traditionally underrepresented in STEM. Based on mutual interests, mentees are paired with undergraduate or high school mentors, who communicate and mentor them through online or in-person communication. Depending on the mentee’s individual needs, mentors cover a variety of topics, which may include career, academic, or life advice.