Girl Scouts of North East Ohio Announces Federal Appropriations for its STEM Center of Excellence at Camp Ledgewood
Girl Scouts of North East Ohio (GSNEO) announced funding included in the federal fiscal year 2024 spending bill passed by Congress in March in the amount of $850,000 for the GSNEO STEM Center of Excellence at Camp Ledgewood in Peninsula, Ohio. The funding was secured by U.S. Congresswoman Emilia Sykes (OH-13) and U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (OH) through the Congressional process to designate dollars for community projects.
Federal funding will be used for construction of GSNEO’s STEM Center of Excellence, which will provide a unique space for students throughout Northeast Ohio to experience STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) learning with hands-on activities using state-of-the-art equipment. The STEM Center of Excellence will help address the pipeline of the emerging workforce for jobs in high-demand STEM fields.
The facility is under construction at Camp Ledgewood, located between Cleveland and Akron in Peninsula, and surrounded by Cuyahoga Valley National Park. This location is within a half hour drive time of nearly 10,000 Girl Scout members and over 100,000 kindergarten through 5th-grade public school children, and will support students across the region—especially low-income students and girls—in developing their interests in STEM careers.
“The STEM Center of Excellence will be a unique asset for Girl Scouts and school children in Ohio’s 13th Congressional District,” said U.S. Congresswoman Emilia Sykes (OH-13). “I am very proud to deliver this funding to the region and to support the Girl Scouts’ commitment to encouraging girls to discover and excel in STEM fields.”
“Too often, our students don’t realize all the opportunities available to them in Ohio,” said U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH). “I was proud to secure this investment for the Girl Scouts of North East Ohio’s STEM Center of Excellence to empower young girls and students to prepare for the careers and future they can build. The technologies of the future will be invented in Ohio and manufactured in Ohio, and these girls are key to that future.”
“The STEM Center of Excellence will help girls and youth in the region develop their STEM identities at an early age, and we are so pleased that Congresswoman Sykes and Senator Brown secured the funding that will ensure that this transformational project will move forward to completion,” said Jane Christyson, CEO of GSNEO.
The STEM Center will be an 8,000 square foot building equipped with STEM equipment such as 3D printers, classroom space, an observatory, outdoor gardens, and more to inspire Girl Scouts, in addition to providing opportunities to collaborate with local educators, to impact a larger group of youth.
The STEM Center of Excellence is currently under construction and tentatively scheduled to open in Fall 2024. Video footage of the construction is available here.
May 02, 2024
