Bridgehampton Students Learning About Science, and Themselves, on 'STEAM Team'

Naomi Flores always knew she really liked science. But she’s discovered a new passion in the hour before the first bell rings at the Bridgehampton School on weekday mornings.

Flores, a fifth-grader, is one of several students who joined the school’s “STEAM Team,” a before-school club created by teachers Lou Liberatore and Mallory Dougherty that meets from 6:45 to 7:45 a.m. in the school’s STEAM lab. In September, as they ease into the school year, the team meets three mornings per week, and by October they are meeting every weekday morning before school.

The fifth grade co-teachers started the club in January 2023, with a mission of providing “an engaging and innovative before-school program designed to ignite young minds through the fusion of science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) disciplines,” according to Liberatore. Students regularly participated in hands-on, project-based activities that foster critical thinking, problem-solving and collaboration.

The team is funded through the 21st Century Learning Program grant, a federal program that supports the creation of community learning centers that operate programs for students, particularly those who attend high-poverty and low-performing schools, and their families. The members of the team range from third grade through seventh grade.

Students in the club have engaged in a wide range of fun and challenging activities, from building model bridges to certain specifications, creating aluminum foil boats that will float and hold the most weight possible, and more.

Students like Flores are learning a lot about the different disciplines included in the STEAM acronym — but they’re also learning a lot about themselves.

Flores spoke about what her experience has been like being part of the STEAM team, and why it’s worth getting out of bed before 7 a.m.

“I like it because we always get to use our imaginations,” she said. “I joined because I really like science, but then after I got into it, I realized I really like architecture.”

Arianna Verzosa, a sixth-grader, is part of the team and has also caught the architecture bug. “It helps us learn in a fun way,” she said of being part of the club. “My dad is an architect, so it helps me understand what his work is, and helps me understand better what he has to do.”

For Liberatore and Dougherty, the life lessons students are picking up, consciously or not, during the time the team meets are just as important if not more valuable than the science, technology, engineering, art and math skills they’re honing.

“I think the biggest thing you see when you come into the lab and see the kids work is that they’re leading the learning,” Liberatore said. “You won’t hear us saying, ‘Don’t do that’ and ‘Don’t do this.’ We kind of want them to fail. We want to give them the confidence to fail without fear. So many kids are afraid to fail, and that seems to be the biggest obstacle on their path to success.”

Liberatore added that in other classrooms, it’s not uncommon to walk in and be able to hear a pin drop. That’s not happening in the STEAM lab. There, students are constantly communicating, working through problems and challenges in real time, using trial and error, occasionally even arguing with each other about the best way to proceed.

In other words, figuring out how to figure things out on their own.

“Some of the biggest breakthroughs happen because of failure,” Dougherty said. “It’s important for the kids to recognize that. It’s a mindset that we’ve established in the morning, and it carries throughout the school day.”

Both teachers said they’ve noticed a positive difference in students who are part of the club, in the way they approach the rest of their academic pursuits.

The thrill of engaging in activities that are new and exciting, and outside the norm of what they typically do in the classroom has helped keep the students engaged, Dougherty said, even at a time of day when their peers are still sleeping.

“They get up early to be here, and they’re not dragging themselves into the room,” she said. “They’re ready to go and excited to go because it’s something different.”

The team has had a chance to get outside of the classroom as well, with several field trips. The team participated in the annual Brookhaven National Lab Maglev Competition, where they used math, science and technology principles to optimize the design of a maglev vehicle. Maglev is shorthand for magnetic levitation, where a car or train car can be made to float, or magnetically levitate, above a track, which has potential for reducing traffic problems in the future.

The team and everything they’re doing with it is in line with a teaching philosophy shared by Liberatore and Dougherty.

“Lou and I like to evolve with the times,” Dougherty said. “Times are changing and how kids learn is changing, and we have to adapt how we teach to accommodate new learning styles. We felt this would really be a great opportunity to expose kids to fields they maybe didn’t know about before, and for them to realize strengths they didn’t know they had before.”