Engaging in Education #256

Talya Edlund:

Yeah, and I think it's also important to remember that there are a lot of things that a lot of skills that can't be measured by a standardized test. And those skills are really important. And you know, if we put too much pressure and too much stock in the standardized tests, I think kids start to hear those messages that they have to do well on this kind of exam to be worth something. And that simply is not the case. And I don't think a lot of

Jim Eickmann:

teachers think that they need to be prepared for a job or for a career. And there is a great need for those STEM skills. In industry, we're always looking for engineers. Now there's a lot of talk around just the scarceness of engineering resources in the US in general. I think schools recognized that they needed to help prepare and fill that void.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is Dr. Lisa Belisle and you are listening to Love Maine radio show number 256, engaging in education, airing for the first time on Sunday, August 14, 2016. How do we engage children so that they are motivated to learn for each child? This answer is different. Today's guests have been participating in the education on Main children both in and out of the classroom. Talia Edlin was named Main Teacher of the year in 2016. Jim Eichman and Keith Burkowski are community members who work with students in the first Lego Robotics and Odyssey of the Mind programs. Thank you for joining us.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

My next guest is is one of our 50 Mainers who we feature every year in Maine Magazine. This is Talia Edlund. She is a former third grade teacher at the Pond Cove Elementary School in Cape Elizabeth, who was named 2016 Maine Teacher of the Year. This year she will be teaching fifth grade at Cape Elizabeth Middle School. She lives in Cape Elizabeth with her husband and two sons. It's really great to see you today.

Talya Edlund:

Yeah, hi. Thanks for having me.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So we're interviewing you in the summer, which is probably one of the rare times you're actually able to be out in the middle of the day doing things.

Talya Edlund:

Yes, it feels really nice to be able to just move around and go where I want to go get a coffee.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, I often think about that with teaching. It's a very intense. I mean, it's intense, I think, throughout the year, but particularly when you're actually with students.

Talya Edlund:

It is, it's a really consuming job. I'm lucky because I love it and I'm very passionate about it, but it certainly is very consuming. And there are days that I go in about 7am and am there until about 5:30 or 6.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And it's very energy intense.

Talya Edlund:

It is. It takes a lot of energy. I'm moving on my feet all day. Sometimes I find myself surprised if I'm

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

sitting down when I talk to my mother, who has been teaching for, I don't know, a few decades now. She also has the long hours, especially during the wintertime, and she still seems to be continually energized in the summer. She's always studying new things to teach and how to teach and how to reach her. How to reach your students. I'm guessing you're probably the same way.

Talya Edlund:

Definitely. I think that one of the great things about teaching is that it offers the opportunity to continually be creative and to seek out new things to learn. And I think just that drive and ability to be curious all the time is what really keeps me energized. And I think it does the same for my colleagues.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So tell me about your background. Where are you from and why did you decide that teaching was what you wanted to do?

Talya Edlund:

So I'm originally from Chicago and in high school I actually read a book called Savage Inequalities by Jonathan Kozel. And it's kind of a narrative of a few kids that grow up in inner city Chicago. So just maybe 15, 20 miles away from where I grew up. And I've always been someone that's been very interested in differences and social inequalities and social justice. And so the book really resonated with me. I ended up co founding with an English teacher of mine in high school a chapter of the organization Future Educators of America. And what we did was go on some field trips and visit other schools. And at that time, I really didn't know I wanted to be a teacher. But one of the trips we went on was to a school that served kids that lived in the dusable Housing projects. I don't think those projects are there anymore. But the school was so vastly different from mine on many levels. And so when I went there, I really thought, my gosh, schools look so different depending on where you live. And that kind of launched me into kind of a pathway of figuring out how I could make an impact and how I could make some changes for systems like education. In college, I volunteered with an organization that worked with prisoners and prisoner rights. And through that I ended up. Through that, I ended up volunteering at a juvenile detention facility and I facilitated theater and writing workshops there. And just the individuals, the young men and individuals that I worked with taught me so much about resiliency and courage also really had me thinking a lot about again, where the systems, where schools and what systems failed them along the way. And so I think really that's kind of why I became a teacher.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What are some of the inequalities that you. Well, that you read about and then you eventually witnessed yourself that you hope to make a difference with as a teacher?

Talya Edlund:

Well, I think that what I noticed even when I was 18 in high school was just the culture and the climate of the schools. You know, I walked into that school and there was just high level security and just kind of everyone seemed on edge. I remember walking into sitting in the classroom and the students were shocked because the other student and I that were sitting, observing, were both white and we were the only white people in the school, which is truly a terrible, a terrible thing that schools like that still exist. So that was one thing. And then the students in the classroom were waiting for a teacher, so their teacher was not there. They were waiting for yet another substitute teacher. And there was just a lot of confusion, I think. And I remember that. And then I did teach in Brooklyn in bed Stuy for three years. And it was very similar, you know, 10, 15 years later. I mean, some of the same inequalities existed. And my students were incredible, but the things that they were facing in their lives were just really difficult. I mean, students that were living in shelters, students who had faced different kinds of trauma, students who didn't have any kind of acute trauma in their lives, but they just dealt with the day to day stresses of being poor and not sure where they were going to sleep. That night, it made things really difficult in the classroom at times.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

When I hear you talking, I think about my own situation as a doctor and how I'm trying to help people get to the next level of health. But sometimes there are things that they are dealing with that are so elemental that I have not that much control over. You know, if they're. Maybe they don't have enough food to eat, or they've lost their job or they are homeless and that it's tough to be in that place. Whether you're a teacher or a doctor or another sort of professional who's trying to be a part of this situation. How did you work with that?

Talya Edlund:

I think really the first and foremost avenue towards addressing those kinds of challenges really is building relationships. I think there's a lot of research that shows that building relationships is really what makes the strongest impact. And having these long term relationships with students certainly plays a part in changing their narrative or can play a part in changing their narrative. So I think that that really is the first place. And I think then the more you learn and the more research and well read you are on different strategies and approaches to helping kids and helping communities kind of overcome some of those challenges, the, the more capable you're going to be and the more equipped you're going to be to deal with those things. So really, at the end of the day though, it comes down to relationships.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

If you're from Chicago and you taught in New York City here, you're in Maine. How did that play out?

Talya Edlund:

So, you know, after college, I kind of took a roundabout course to teaching. I lived in Hawaii for a little bit, and then I led trail crews in New Hampshire. But always kind of my heart was being pulled towards the classroom. And so after living and teaching in New York City for a while, my husband and I decided to travel for a bit. And when we came back, we just wanted to find a community where we could maybe start a family and kind of feel like things were a little bit more manageable than they were in New York City. And we just liked what Portland had to offer. We liked the diversity that Portland had. We liked just the community feel that Portland had. We had some friends who lived here and encouraged us to move here. And so that's where we ended up and we just fell in love and stayed.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Your husband is also a teacher?

Talya Edlund:

He is.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Did that help bring you together in some way?

Talya Edlund:

Absolutely. I mean, something that I always admired in my husband before we were married was just his passion for education. And so a lot of our early Conversations were about really the impacts of teaching and classroom practices. And so I think through that we ended up finding kind of some common ground that we still have.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You live in Cape Elizabeth and you teach in Cape Elizabeth?

Talya Edlund:

Yes.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So your boys are how old?

Talya Edlund:

So I have a five year old about to start kindergarten and an eight year old that's about to start second grade.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So what has that been like for you to teach within the system that your children are part of?

Talya Edlund:

You know, I was nervous about it at first, but as it turns out, it's been really great because, I mean, I love the school that I teach at. I love the school that they, that they go to and the teachers just care so much for them. And so every day my son, who's in second grade now, he'll come home and he has some story about some individual just making him feel like a million dollars. And I mean, that's priceless.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It is funny as you're saying that, I think about my own children and more of the interactions that they describe are about their friends or about how someone made them feel. They're older now, but even so, they're not always coming home saying, well, guess what? We learned about World War II Germany. Yeah, it's not as much about the idea sometimes as it is about kind of the milieu.

Talya Edlund:

I think I heard someone say once that people tend to. They don't always remember what you say, but they almost always remember how you make them feel. And I think that's really true. And I've seen that with my kids.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you are moving up. You've taught second grade and third grade, at least in Cape Elizabeth, and you're moving up to fifth grade. As your son is getting older, as he's now he's going into second grade, do you feel like you're just continuing to move up the track a little ahead of him?

Talya Edlund:

There are times where I feel like what I've been doing all day during the summer school hours mirrors what's happening at home. And so moving on to older kids that are older than my son, I think will be a little bit of a break from that. So that's nice.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Tell me what, as a third grade teacher, just what does your day actually look like? What are you doing with the kids and how does that interaction play out?

Talya Edlund:

So, you know, the kids start rolling in at about 8 o' clock in the morning and some of them have breakfast and some of them don't. And they, in third grade at my school, they go right to an Allied art. So they either Go to art, music, gym. But then when they come back to the classroom, like we'll have a class meeting. And then really it's, as the year progresses, it really becomes kind of what we do during the day, becomes driven by what they are doing and how they interact with one another. So there's a lot of group work, a lot of building, a lot of creating in my classroom. And it's pretty noisy in there. There's a lot of group work. And so that's something that I've kind of had to let go of a little bit because, you know, it's different. When I first started teaching, I thought I was doing well if my kids and my students were sitting very quietly and being very productive with their pencils and their paper. And now I think that that for me is a sign that a lot of learning is not happening.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, my mom, when my kids were growing up, she would always say that the quiet children were the ones that she worried about. The noisy ones she didn't worry quite so much about. So that actually makes me feel a little bit better that you're talking about sort of the noise levels in the classroom and how that's kind of a. That's a germination of creativity and learning. Yeah. Do you think that. Well, I don't know. How long have you been teaching now?

Talya Edlund:

16 years now.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So have you noticed a shift with the learning results and all of the standardized testing that's taking place from a pretty early age?

Talya Edlund:

Yeah, I think that there's been a lot of pendulum swings back and forth in terms of testing. When I first came to Maine, we had. I walked into a system of local assessments. So what those were were curriculum based assessments that grade levels would come up with on their own.

Jim Eickmann:

And.

Talya Edlund:

And it was a bit unwieldy and confusing. I remember one of the assessments that I needed to give to my second graders had to do with melting chocolate bars. And so we would give each student a piece of chocolate bar and then we would all run out to the parking lot and put it on the roof of, or the inside dashboard of a car and then come back later in the day to see if it had melted or not. And then the students had to write down their observations, which to me seemed somewhat silly. And so eventually we got rid of those assessments and moved on to something a lot more standardized. And I think we're still trying to find kind of a happy ground for where assessments really measure learning and also guide instruction.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, not to mention the fact that how many cars would you need to

Talya Edlund:

actually have dashboards full of chocolate, it was pretty ridiculous. We were using, I think, two or three cars and teachers would leave their cars unlocked and it was short lived.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, that sounds strange, but I don't want to judge because we do weird things in the medical profession too. But there is an interesting question that is, what is it that we actually hope for a second grader to know? And how do we figure out whether they know that or not? And why is it important? I mean, and I don't know who even comes up with these things.

Talya Edlund:

Yeah, I think right now what we have, the system that we have, the Common Core, is a really good guiding map for where we want kids to get to and what kinds of thinking skills and depth of knowledge we want them to have. But I think it's important that we remember to honor that. Learning is a process, and all kids are going to learn at different paces. Someone gave me the example a few weeks ago of when kids learn how to walk. There isn't exactly exact set date and time where a child learns how to walk. And I think the same thing happens with reading, math and writing. I think it really is a process, and I think really an important part of that process is to make sure that students are highly engaged and feel ownership over their learning and frankly, feel excited about their learning.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, I want to go on record as saying I'm not trying to suggest that people who create standardized tests are doing silly things. I mean, I think that is important to be able to have some ideas to whether what you're doing actually is having an impact on the kids. But I think you're right. Especially in the younger grades, it seems like there's such a broad variation in what we can expect that kids will be able to do.

Talya Edlund:

Yeah. And I think it's also important to remember that there are a lot of things that a lot of skills that can't be measured by a standardized test. And those skills are really important. And you know, if we put too much pressure and too much stock in the standardized tests, I think kids start to hear those messages that they have to do well on this kind of exam to be worth something. And that simply is not the case. And I don't think a lot of teachers think that.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, I think about some of the more successful people that I've ever worked with, and they have a very high level of social and emotional awareness and intellect. And how do we measure that? How do you measure someone's social skills effectively? And if we were to measure them, then how do we Give that sort of feedback to a second grader?

Talya Edlund:

Yeah, I think that just giving them opportunities to use those strengths, to be social, to communicate in the way that works best for them, and to celebrate that with them as often as possible gives them the kind of feedback that I think they deserve.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You're excited to go into the fifth grade next year?

Talya Edlund:

I am.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And one of the things that you like is that the literature is just a different level.

Talya Edlund:

Yes.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Tell me about that. Tell me about the fifth grade years and what it is that is so appealing to you.

Talya Edlund:

So I think that what's neat about third graders, where I've been, who I've been with for the past few years, is that they're just starting to develop those critical thinking skills where they can really analyze the situation and form their own theories and judgments about them. But I think you have to be very mindful about the choices and content that you have third graders read or that you offer third graders, because I think that their understanding of the world is not as layered or complex as, you know, a fourth or fifth grader. So I don't know. I've always been someone who loves books and loves literature, and when I think about the books that I want my students to read and truly be able to have good conversations about and lots of theories and ideas about, I like the idea of some of the fifth. The things that fifth graders are able to read about, things like kids in the foster care system or love and loss. Those are things that are hard for third graders to really grasp with a level of sophistication that I think fifth graders can.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What are some of your favorite books from that era?

Talya Edlund:

Well, I love Talk Everlasting, of course, because of Winn Dixie. I'm reading a book right now called Counting by Sevens, which is fairly new, and it's just fabulous about kind of this. This little girl who is gifted but because of that is very misunderstood. And she also loses her family and she's adopted. And so there's all kinds of complexities in her life that reflect reality. And I'm really enjoying that.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It's true. As you're. As you're talking, I'm thinking about Tuck Everlasting, which I read a few years ago. And I'm thinking about the. A lot of the books that I read right in that time frame. And there was a lot. There was so many. Almost as if your world was opening up and it was mostly through story. Yes. So there's an excitement to that.

Talya Edlund:

Yeah. I think stories have this way of connecting us and reflecting our realities, but also have this way of opening our minds to what other people go through and what other people's lives might be like. And I think that's really important. I think that is a way to really build empathy in kids and help kids become, I think, conscientious citizens.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You were named the Teacher of the Year for Maine in 2016.

Talya Edlund:

Yes.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What are the qualifications for that, and why do you think that they afforded you this honor?

Talya Edlund:

Well, I think that, you know, certainly there are many incredible teachers at my school and throughout the state, and I think that I just happened to have the strengths and relationships with the right group of students at the right time. And so it ended up being kind of a long, almost a year long process of essay writing and interviews and discussions and getting to meet other people until I was finally named. But I think that the honor has just afforded me a new perspective, a broader perspective on what's going on in our educational landscape as well as what's going on nationally with teachers.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What have you learned?

Talya Edlund:

So I've learned that teachers across the country face the same challenges. I've learned a lot about rural poverty and the realities of living and growing up in a rural school, because my experience has always been teaching and living in a more urban setting. And I've also learned that we do a really good job for our students, for the most part, in our country. And I think our biggest issue truly is poverty. Our biggest hurdle truly is addressing the challenges of poverty. And that's true nationwide.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I live in Yarmouth, and I know in Yarmouth, not everybody is exceedingly wealthy. We definitely have a broad range of people, and I think sometimes that's hard for people who maybe fall on the lower end of the income spectrum, because Yarmouth, like Cape Elizabeth, is. There is. There is more, there is more available to some, but not to all. Do you see that that impacts the children in your classroom?

Talya Edlund:

I do. I think the two communities are very similar, and I think it can be really difficult, especially as they get older and more aware of differences between, you know, their lifestyles. I think that can be really hard for some kids, and I think that it can be really hard to make sure that we have the right services that catch the needs, that capture the needs of kids that might not have as fortunate of a situation.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

My observation of Maine, having lived here many years, having nine younger brothers and sisters who went through Maine schools, having three kids of my own going through Maine schools, and having a mother who's a teacher, as well as cousins and uncles and aunts, we do A really nice job with our educational system. Maybe we're not perfect, but we're pretty good. And I think we really want to be good. We really want our children to learn. Has that been your observation?

Talya Edlund:

Absolutely. I think that there was such a difference when I came to Maine in terms of the culture and the attitudes that teachers had towards students. I think there's just a level of respect for students and a level of caring for students. That for me was very impressive. You know, that wasn't my experience in New York City. The other piece that I think we do a really good job with is having small class sizes so that there really are opportunities for individualized attention and meeting kids needs on a one to one basis. So that's been really impressive. And I think we also have some pretty cutting edge ideas here. We have a strong network of very innovative teachers across the state. Teachers who are really committing to committing to integrating technology and using technology not just for kind of skill and drill experiences, but really using technology to launch kids into 21st century learning. There's a lot of movement towards connecting classrooms across the state and across the country and even globally. And I think we have a very strong teacher leadership movement here as well. So of a lot of teachers that are understanding that their voices matter and that they can speak to legislators and that they can speak on behalf of their students and their profession. And I think that that's something that is fairly unique in Maine because we do have that small town feeling. So people feel like they can know each other and talk to each other here.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Talia, it's been a pleasure to have you in today and I hope that people will take the time to read about you in Maine Magazine is one of our 50 Mainers and maybe get to, I don't know, stop in and say hello when you're back in the classroom again in the fall. We've been speaking with Talia Edlund who is the 2016 Maine Teacher of the Year. And I appreciate your coming in and taking the time to talk about this very important subject with me.

Talya Edlund:

Yeah, thank you so much.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

interesting in that they are not teachers, but that they work closely with the school systems in the areas of first, lego, Robotics, and also Odyssey of the Mind. Jim Eichman is the Engineering Manager at the Corning Incorporated Life Sciences plant in Kennebunk. He started working for Corning in 1999 after earning his BA in Physics and PhD in Optical Sciences. Since moving to Maine in 2009, Jim has been involved with science and technology in the community. In particular, he has enjoyed the opportunity to both increase interest among middle school students in STEM or science, technology, engineering and math, and help build their skills through programs such as First Lego Robotics. Jim and his wife, Liz, live with their two sons in Kennebung. Thanks for coming in today.

Jim Eickmann:

Thank you.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

We also have with us Keith Borkowski, who is the plant controller at the Corning Incorporated Life Sciences plant in Kennemunk. He joined Corning in 2012. Keith has been involved with Odyssey of the Mine for nine years in the town of Wells. His Odyssey of the Mind involvement started as a parent. He has been coaching for the past seven years and the coordinator at the elementary school for the past five. To Keith, Odyssey of the Mind is a great way for kids to learn and discover, display their STEAM skills or science, technology, engineering, arts and math skills. Keith and his wife, Margaret, live with their two daughters in Wills and thank you for coming in.

Keith Borkowski:

Thank you.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So one of you is interested in STEM and one's in steam? I'm just fascinated. So are we now calling all things stem Steam, or is there still a kind of a divergence of thought?

Jim Eickmann:

So I think it's more of an evolution from STEM to steam. It started as STEM and there was a lot of interest in the math and the sciences. But then as people got interested in programs like robotics and Odyssey of the Mind, they saw that there was this creative element to things as well, not just the technical side of the things. And that's where the A got got added in. So you do hear steam coming in a lot more now. You still hear stem, but steam coming in a lot more now too.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So what I wonder is, so what's Left out if you now have steam, is it just like reading and language arts or history or liberal arts? Maybe this isn't even a question that you guys can answer. I don't know.

Keith Borkowski:

Yeah, STEM actually does cover those topics also because you need to be able to read the problems, understand them and be able to take that and put it into your solution.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, I won't ask you to kind of understand the educational mind because I know that's not exactly what you do. You both actually work for Corning Incorporated Life Sciences. So explain to me what that is.

Jim Eickmann:

So we're a division of Corning Incorporated and our division is focused on making products that help the life sciences or medical or pharmaceutical industries. So a lot of our products are used at universities to do research and they're also used to produce a lot of things like vaccines and medicines. So while we don't make those types of vaccines or medicines, we make products that help companies make them.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Keith, what does a plant controller do?

Keith Borkowski:

So I'm responsible for the financial reporting of the plant, also making sure that we follow all the legal aspects of finance and accounting.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And I'm interested, Jim, because you pointed out that it's not a BS or a Bachelor's of Science in physics. You actually have a Bachelor of Arts. Is that unusual?

Jim Eickmann:

Yes, it. Most physics undergraduate degrees are a science degree. I attended a liberal arts college and there was a lot of emphasis on not just your major, but making sure that you got a broad exposure to a lot of different areas. Science, arts, humanity. So they weren't calling it steam back then, but it's more of a steam type of approach.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What does it mean to have a PhD in optical sciences?

Jim Eickmann:

So that was my furthering my education, trying to narrow down and focus after having this broad exposure. I was really interested in how can I apply it. And so that's where I looked to further get a further degree. And optics was just an area that was very interesting to me and so that's what I pursued.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Keith, as the plant controller, what type of a educational background do you have?

Keith Borkowski:

Yeah, I have a BS in accounting and I've also passed the CPA exam.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So it's interesting you kind of. You guys cover all of the different fields. We've got finances and business and we've got the B.A. the liberal arts. It seems like, it seems like Corning is really needing to bring in a lot of different pieces to do the work that they do.

Jim Eickmann:

Yeah, there is a lot of cross functional efforts. Keith and I, even though I'm in engineering and he's in finance. We work quite a bit together, both collaboratively and trying to help each other understand what's going on in the different functions in our plant.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I guess the reason I'm so interested in this is because we talk a lot about STEM and STEAM and eventually kids get out of the educational system and they need to have jobs. So wondering how each of you got to the place where you now are employed in essentially a science related field.

Jim Eickmann:

Well, so for me, I was always interested in science or the way things worked, from getting a microscope when I was little to just reading books about how things worked and things like that. So I knew I wanted to somehow end up in sciences. And after getting my PhD, I knew I wanted to be in an applied science or engineering. And Corning was a great fit for that career interest for me.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And Keith, how about you? Is there something about working within the scientific field even though what you do is financial?

Keith Borkowski:

Yeah. For the life sciences industry, it's really interesting to me to see what the products can do now and all the changes and evolution that's going on in the industry. And currently my daughter is at Brown University and she's getting firsthand knowledge of all the changes and she's right at that point, forefront of what's going on. So it was great for me to get into the life sciences industry to see what was going into the industry at this point in time.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Both of you are doing things that I think are somewhat new to the educational scene, at least in Maine. I believe Odyssey of the Mind has been around longer than the first LEGO Robotics program, but this type of in the school effort to encourage kids to do things with science, technology, arts, engineering and math. This is somewhat new within the last few decades, I would say. Why do we care? Why do we want to get kids doing things that are not just classroom oriented to help get them interested?

Jim Eickmann:

I think there are several reasons. And so one is, I think, as you said, they need to be prepared for a job or for a career. And there is a great need for those STEM skills in industry. We're always looking for engineers now and there's a lot of talk around just the scarceness of engineering resources in the US in general. I think schools recognize that they needed to help prepare and fill that void. And so the programs like the robotics or Odyssey of the Mind really helped develop those kind of practical skills outside of just the classroom teaching.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Keith, tell me about Odyssey of the Mind. What does that actually involve?

Keith Borkowski:

Yeah, Odyssey of the Mind is a creative program where the kids are Responsible for understanding the problems that they will solve and coming up with their own solutions. 100%. There's no interaction with the parents. We can teach them skills like how to sew or how to use a drill, but they have to come up with all of the aspects themselves. So they actually have to take the problem. There's five different types of problems. They'll take one problem and that'll be what they'll work on for the full year. And that's their long term problem. This year my team is working on the vehicle problem. So they had to build a vehicle that can hold two kids, be propelled without cycling, so no pedaling by a human and travel course, and pick up several different adapted items to be adapted. What's great for me is that it starts with the kids have to do it all themselves. So I also coach soccer. At that point in time, you're telling the kids what to do in this. The kids have to actually go out and do the program themselves.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how about you? What about the first LEGO Robotics program?

Jim Eickmann:

First? It has very similar kind of core values to Odyssey of the Mind in the respect that the kids should be doing the work. They come up with the solutions to the problems. The coaches are there to help or teach basic skills, but it's really reliant on the kids to define the problem and come up with some creative solution to it. In the case of first, the problem is a little bit more defined in terms of there's one problem, a robotic competition or a robotic challenge that all of the teams work on the same problem. The creativity, the variety of solutions is pretty amazing when you see how one team solves it compared to another team. But it's always the kids working to come and figure out how to solve the problem.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Heidi Kern is our art director for Maine Home Design. And from what I understand, you brought her daughter along with an entire team of kids to St. Louis because you are, for the second time in a row, your team was the state champions in the first LEGO Robotics Competition. That's kind of big deal there.

Jim Eickmann:

Yeah, it was. It was a very big deal and a very exciting trip. We had 10 kids that this was their second year together on a team, which is also unusual, and their second year winning the state championship, which I think is unusual too. The trip was to the World Festival in St. Louis. The FIRST organization, which does first Lego robotics and a couple of other programs for high school and elementary students has this World Festival each year. It's the largest convention in St. Louis. 40,000 people and close to a thousand different teams of kids there. So the kids had a great time and it was very exciting to get to see all the other teams from 40 different countries around the world.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And these kids that you brought were seventh and eighth grade?

Jim Eickmann:

Yes. Yep, they were. The age group for Lego robotics runs from 8 to 14. So this was their last year of eligibility. They were all in the 13 to 14 years.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how about Odyssey of the Mind? What's the age breakdown on that?

Keith Borkowski:

So the bracket that we're in this year is Division two, and it's sixth through eighth graders. The seven kids on my team are all in sixth grade grade. So as a first year Division two team, they ended up winning the state title.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And is there some sort of a national festival or competition that you are going to as well?

Keith Borkowski:

Yes, I will be going out May 24th through the 29th to Iowa State University where we'll be competing in the World Finals. There'll be approximately 820 teams from, I believe it's 25 different countries will be out there. So we'll be competing against teams like Poland and China, Mexico.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So why is it that the Kennebunk Wells area seems to be doing so well in these competitions for the state?

Jim Eickmann:

So I know in Kennebunk, I think what I've seen over the last five years is really a, a rapid increase in interest in the first LEGO program. And I think that interest by not just the students, but the parents and the rest of the community to support it, because it does take a lot of work to do. These programs really has helped with the success. The first year, five years ago that I did the program, I believe there were about 20 or 25 kids in the district that were in the program. And this past year there were over 100. So it's really grown dramatically and just it takes a lot of support to do that. And the community has really gotten behind it as well as the school district.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

How about Wells?

Keith Borkowski:

Yeah, Wells has had a long tradition with Odyssey of the Mind, including a couple of the board members for Odyssey of the Mind actually still reside in Wells and did the program with their kids. I don't want to date them, but 20 or 30 years ago. So we've had some fairly good success in Wells over the last 10 years.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I think when I was growing up, science wasn't as, I'll use the word, sexy. Let's just put that out there. It wasn't as appealing that we didn't have as many kids. I mean, we had a math team, we had a Literary magazine. But there wasn't the same sort of interest in science and technology. Why has that changed?

Jim Eickmann:

I know one reason is the technology itself makes it more accessible. So the LEGO robotics kits, for example, are completely different from any legos I ever played with growing up. And the technology that's a part of those is pretty amazing. And to make it accessible and usable by students that are 8 to 14 year olds, without that, it would be hard to get them as interested.

Keith Borkowski:

And I believe a lot of the careers these days are actually tied into the sciences and technology, especially with the evolution of the computers and the chips. I think there's just that need where kids have to have that going into a lot of the careers these days.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So why does LEGO care about robotics? Why the connection between those two things?

Jim Eickmann:

So I think the robotics competition came out of the first organization, which was founded by Dean Kamen. He's an innovator, invented things like the Segway and several other medical devices, actually. And I'm not sure of the history, but I think he partnered with Lego because again, it makes it accessible. It helps make the technology accessible to kids that may have already been used to playing with Legos. And LEGO itself has always been a toy that's geared towards creativity and getting children to design and invent on their own. The boxes come with instructions, but you don't have to follow them in order to play with the toy.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Yeah, I think that's true. I don't know how many times I would step on legos as they were like scattered across the floor. And the children didn't spend all that much time making them. I think the first time was the time that they made them into what they were supposed to make them into. And then after that, it was all they just did their own thing, which was actually pretty great.

Jim Eickmann:

Yeah, and it fits well with the kind of the mission of first and the whole trying to get kids involved in the problem solving and creativity and technology.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how about Odyssey of the Mind? How did that come to be?

Keith Borkowski:

Odyssey of the Mind was started back in 1978, I believe, by a Professor Nicholas down in New Jersey. And he had actually given his college course kids a problem to try to solve, which was to build a device that would walk across water without falling into the water. And from there he started the organization and it's been going on since then.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Each of you have children. Jim, you have two sons, and Keith, you have two daughters. How has your interest in science trickled down? I guess. Keith, you said your daughter is at Brown now, Correct?

Keith Borkowski:

My daughter went through the Odyssey of the Mind program, started in fifth grade and went through eighth grade. She went out to World Finals and actually won World Finals in eighth grade and then decided with her high school workload she wanted to not do the program as a participant anymore, but actually was on the board of directors for Odyssey of the Mind as a student representative and helped out in all the events and the tournaments all through high school.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how about your other daughter?

Keith Borkowski:

She started in second grade, this is her fifth year and this will be her fourth year going out to World Finals.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What does your wife think about all this?

Keith Borkowski:

When it's not the season? It's okay. During the season it is a lot of time trying to coordinate. Especially the kids have such busy schedules these days. Kids on my team do track, baseball, football, dance, math club. So there's a lot of things that you're trying to juggle and make it so that all seven kids can meet at the same time.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

How about you? What does your family think of this whole situation?

Jim Eickmann:

So it is, it's not just from. For my wife or my family, it's a big time commitment. As Keith said, it's. I know for us we practice five or six hours a week, pretty much September through April and that's as much or more of a commitment than a lot of other activities or sports. So it's a busy time for sure. And it makes you appreciate the times when you're not busy doing those activities.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how do your sons experience science?

Jim Eickmann:

So they're both very interesting in it. They're both, I appreciate that. They're both very well rounded. My older son, unfortunately, when we moved to Maine, the robotics program hadn't really gotten up to steam yet or up to speed yet. So he wasn't able to participate at the same level as my younger son. But they both enjoy science and are very curious by nature. Fits well with them.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

The way you're describing it, it sounds like a sport. It sounds like you're right. You're practicing even more than your average, say swim team. And the season is probably longer than your average swim season, which as a swim parent I know that's, that's a long season. So how do you keep your interest and energy up and especially where you both have a full to have full time jobs at corn

Keith Borkowski:

for me, keeping the energy up is when you see the rewards of what the kids come out with it. I've had parents come up to me afterwards and say that from the beginning of the year to the end of the year, they've seen such a change in their child, whether it be the interaction with other kids or their desire to go off and learn something. So it's really about where the kids grow and what you're doing for the kids, and not just telling them how to learn it, but watching as they learn how to learn. And that's what they're going to need as they grow up and go to college.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And how about you, Jim?

Jim Eickmann:

Yeah, I think, as Keith mentioned, the rewards to me really make it an energy gain. Right. It's not something that drains the energy. It really. It's easy to keep the energy up because seeing them work through problems, seeing light bulbs go off or seeing them have fun working together. These kids aren't always friends before they get on a team and new friendships form. So all those types of things really just fuel the energy and make it easy to keep going.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What does Corning think of the work that you're doing in these schools?

Jim Eickmann:

So Corning has been great. They've been a great supporter, both in allowing Keith and I, or at least I know from my standpoint, allowing us to take the time to do it because it is some time commitment and we can't wait necessarily till the end of the workday. Sometimes it cuts into the workday even to do the work. So from a time perspective and understanding that we have other things to do, they've been great. But also financially, Corning and the Corning foundation has made several donations to the robotics program, to our team in particular. Obviously, it costs a lot of money to transport 14 or 15 people halfway across the country, and they've really helped make all that possible.

Keith Borkowski:

Yeah, Both Corning Corporation and the plant have been very good for my experience in Odyssey of the Mind, a combination of a giving me the time and allowing me the time to go off and do the teaching that I need to do and have the meetings during the week. But they've also been very supportive with shipping props out, whether it be Iowa or Michigan State, and also for the financial donations to help us defray the cost of going out to the competition.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Do you feel this type of support from a corporation or a company? Do you feel like this is unusual, this sort of interaction and support with the school system?

Jim Eickmann:

I don't know how unusual it is, but I think it's something that more and more companies are looking at and are doing both from a standpoint of kind of being good members of their community, but also from a somewhat selfish standpoint of Corning is a technology company. So Corning kind of has an interest in fueling the growth and the development of the next generation of technology people.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Jim, how can people find out about the first LEGO Robotics program?

Jim Eickmann:

So on the web, you can go to first usfirst.org there's also a main robotics organization that's run out of Augusta. I believe they do a lot with LEGO Robotics. They coordinate the state and regional tournaments in Maine, and they also offer things like summer camps with LEGO Robotics.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And Keith, how can people find out about Odyssey of the Mind?

Keith Borkowski:

Yeah, there's a couple of different things in the state of Maine. There's actually a Maine Odyssey of the mind website. It's me, odysseyofthemind.com and for the national organization, it's odysseyofthemind.com well, I appreciate all

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

the work that you're doing in your communities. I think that it's really makes me feel happy that you've dedicated so much time and energy to helping kids get excited about science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. And I hope that people take the time to learn more about these programs, whether just in a general sense or for their own children. We've been speaking with Jim Eichmann, who is the engineering manager at the Corning Incorporated Life Sciences plant in Kennebunk and also who works with the first LEGO Robotics program in his town, Kennebunk. We've also been speaking with Keith Borkowski, who is the plant controller at the Corning Incorporated Life Sciences plant. Keith is also a coach with the Odyssey of the Mind team in Wells. I appreciate all the work you're doing in the community, and I also appreciate, I think, specifically bringing Heidi Kern's daughter out there two years in a row. Jim, I know she's gotten a lot out of it, and I hope many more good things will come out of Odyssey of the Mind and also the first LEGO Robotics program in your area.

Jim Eickmann:

Thank you, Lisa, very much.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You've been listening to Love Maine radio show number 256, engaging in education. Our guests have included Jim Eichman, Keith Borkowski, and Talia Edlin. For a preview of each week's show, sign up for our E. We love to hear from you, so please let us know what you think of Love Maine Radio. We welcome your suggestions for future shows. Also let our sponsors know that you have heard about them here. We are privileged that they enable us to bring Love Maine Radio to you each week. This is Dr. Lisa Belisle. I hope that you have enjoyed our Engaging in Education show. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your day. May you have a bountiful life.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Having spent quite a bit of time in northern Maine and driving back and forth to northern Maine and having been to Millinocket and Katahdin, it takes a while to get there. I mean it, it's a hike.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah. I mean I went there yesterday morning and I spent the whole day on the East Branch, the Penobscot. I drove the loop road in the proposed park, did a small hike and then drove home and I was back by 8:30.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you don't think that being that far north should be any sort of impediment?

Jim Eickmann:

No.

[Unidentified voice]:

I mean, national parks by nature are in rural places, but it's, you know, to drive to Acadia from here takes the same amount of time that it would take to drive to the proposed park. And when you think about where we are situated in the country, there are 90 million people within a day's drive of the Katahdin region. So that's a quarter of the population in the United States. And then you think about where people come into the United States from Europe, especially Boston, New York, Washington, D.C. those are points. And so to have national parks very close to those areas I think would really draw people to northern Maine. The park service gets about 20 million visitors a year from Europe alone. And so that's if they fly to the east coast, they would very likely come to northern Maine. And when you look at a map of where national parks are, there's Acadia and there isn't another one until it's Shenandoah's. So all the way down in Virginia and this very dense part of The United States States. So while it feels like a long day drive to shoot up there for the day, if someone's on vacation, a family's on vacation, they decide to go to Acadia, they're likely to go to Bangor, then an hour to Acadia, and then an hour to the North Woods. Seems like a trip. You know, that's. So that's going to keep people in Maine longer, in Penobscot county longer. So I think that people will certainly go.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It seems like there's. There's an actual process that I guess communities go through when you're proposing a national park and getting to the place where the community buys in. But there's also a process that you have to go through that's very logistical.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It has to do with the federal government. Describe that for me and what that's been like for you.

[Unidentified voice]:

So there are two ways to create units of the National Park Service, and there are, I think, almost 30 different units of the Park Service. There's the national parks, but those are national seashores. There's national monuments. There are national historic parks, battlefields, reserves, preserves, and they all have various different areas that they protect. There's two ways to create those units. One, the President can do it or the Congress can do it. So for a long time, we worked on a bill, a piece of legislation that would be introduced by our congressional delegation and passed through Congress. And we worked on that for several years. We drafted a piece of legislation, we worked with our congressional delegation, and we worked with people in the Katahdin region to say, are we addressing your needs within this piece of legislation? And as we addressed more and more of the concerns and the needs, more. More and more support grew, and our congressional delegation became more interested and intrigued by the idea. In the end, we wanted to do something to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service, which is here this year, 2016. So we were putting pressure on our delegation, saying, 2016 is the year we really want to have the introduction of legislation then. And they weren't ready. They weren't. They weren't willing. So, you know, we. We worked on that last fall, in the fall of 2015 with them. And when we got signals that they weren't going to introduce the legislation, we started to have conversations with the White House and said, okay, well, if we can't do it this way, we'll go. We'll go to the, to the President and see if he will do it. And in order to have the President do it, that he can use the 1906 Antiquities act, which creates a national monument, and it can be administered by the Park Service. And so that's what our goal is now. And about half of the national parks that were created were initially created as a national monument. So Acadia was done. Woodrow Wilson, President Wilson in 1916, used the Antiquities act to create Acadia, or it was called Sirlomont Monument, National Monument. The Grand Canyon, Zion, the Olympic Mountains, all of the big parks in Alaska, they're all created by being a monument first. And oftentimes then it's followed up with a piece of legislation that creates the national park. So that's the path that we're on now, hoping that the President will use the 1906 Antiquities act, create a national monument. We will transfer the land that we own to the National Park Service, and we'll also provide a 40 million dollar endowment for operations and maintenance of the park. You oftentimes hear about a backlog of maintenance and the parks can't pay for themselves. And it's a challenge that we saw that needed to be addressed. And so the foundation will donate that $40 million to take care of the operations and maintenance. So it'll essentially pay for itself. So we are hoping that support continues to grow. Senator King has had a public meeting, and almost 1,300 people came to it. There was about 12 or about 1100 people in support of it. It was a great showing of support. Congressman Poliquin had a congressional field hearing in east Millinocket. About 60 people spoke at that, and 47 of them were in support, including elected officials in the local towns. So both King and Congressman Poliquin have heard that there is support, more support than opposition in the region. And so they're sort of moving into a more comfortable space. But in the end, it will be the President's decision. And we're getting signals from people that work for him that this is. That it's positive and we're moving in the right direction, but we don't know anything definitively yet.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Is there a bit of a time crunch given that he's an outgoing president?

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah, yeah. I mean, when we have a new president, there will be a new Secretary of Interior and a new director of the Park Service and all the people at the Council for Environmental Quality.