Vincennes University opens Design and Innovation Training Studio
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Vincennes University cut the ribbon Tuesday on a new facility designed to enhance access to STEM education in Indiana.
The VU Design and Innovation Training Studio, located inside the Summers Center on the VU campus, is part of a statewide network of studios meant to introduce K-12 students to available career opportunities and the skills they need in advanced manufacturing.
“This is a training studio that will work with the educators to help them be able to have the skills to be able to be the design and innovation studio teachers for their schools,” VU President Chuck Johnson said. “It’ll help us to bring new educators on board.”
There are currently 101 design and innovation studios at elementary and middle schools, in industry settings, and at VU and the Purdue University Indiana Next Generation Manufacturing Competitiveness Center, or IN-MaC.
Nearly half of those studios are located in the southwest Indiana region, which includes Knox, Gibson, Vanderburgh, Dubois, and Perry counties.
The training studio will provide professional development and training for teachers through access to technologies, activities, and lessons. The goal, the university said, is to prepare the future workforce for emerging careers in Industry 4.0, such as advanced manufacturing, robots, and AI.
Johnson said the university has known for some time the importance of a STEM education in the K-12 space.
“We know from research that STEM careers are going to be the future; they’re growing at a pace about twice that of non-STEM careers in the U.S., and Indiana is no exception,” he said. “We’re trying to develop a workforce for the future. We’re trying to strengthen education, provide our partners in K 12—and specifically in K-8—with resources and support that will help them develop the skills and the interest in students so they can see what these career paths might look like, and they can see perhaps what might be required to them for future education.”
Indianapolis-based Lilly Endowment Inc. provided funding for the training studio through its Charting the Future Initiative, with additional assistance from Toyota Motor Manufacturing Indiana in Princeton.
VU said the university, along with Toyota and Purdue IN-MaC, have supported the creation of more than 40 design and innovation studios in southwest Indiana schools.
“Toyota recognizes the importance of investing in STEM education across the educational spectrum,” Toyota Indiana President Tim Hollander said in written remarks. “As an employer and industry leader, Toyota Indiana appreciates VU’s efforts in addressing the need for skilled professionals and shares its innovative approach to establishing studios across the region.”
Additionally, Johnson said the training studio will serve as a catalyst for helping students in VU’s education bachelor’s degree programs become STEM educators as well.
“We think this will help prepare our graduates, especially those going into the elementary space, with a skill set that will allow them to be tremendously valuable to schools and to become better educators overall,” Johnson said. “This also fits neatly within our science and math BS in education as well. We’re getting our educators hands-on experience and helping them to develop a skill that will they will then take that design thinking into the classroom and into what they teach.”
Johnson said the training studio is part of an overall strategy at VU to invest in Industry 4.0 initiatives, which includes its Center for Applied Robotics and Technology that opened in 2022.
“Throughout the state, and particularly here in Vincennes and Jasper and Lebanon, and with some of our CTE partners, we’ve built out infrastructure in central Indiana to support advanced manufacturing and automation,” he said. “We have a lot of other things that are aligning to help make sure that we’re part of the solution for preparing the workforce for Indiana’s future.”