December 22, 2020

“Times and conditions change so rapidly that we must keep our aim constantly focused on the future.” - Walt Disney

I am sure even Walt Disney could not have imagined this year when he spoke about change. This year has been crazy, but it has also given us a lot of opportunity to focus on the changes we need to make to create a better future for all.

At Spark 101, we have been reflecting on how the “times and conditions” have impacted us and what that means for our future. In many ways, 2020 has been a banner year for us. We launched our re-designed website, won an EdTech Cool Tool Award for Open Educational Resource, and we had record usage with more than 75,000 students utilizing Spark 101. We also created our new Snack Packs for at-home use and launched the Spark 101 Voices podcast.

As we reflected on the impact we made, we began looking ahead and planning for the future. We questioned how we could expand our offerings for teachers, parents, and students as schools have shifted to virtual and hybrid education. Our team decided that joining forces with another STEM education organization would help us achieve our goal of expanding our impact. With that being said, we are very excited to announce a new partnership with Learning Undefeated that will enable us to reach 1,000,000 students by the end of 2020, which was the ambitious goal we set 5 years ago!

This new hybrid STEM education ecosystem includes interactive digital lesson bundles, career snapshots, at-home learning, and our STEM skills videos. These scalable, digital resources are designed to increase engagement in STEM coursework and interest in high-opportunity careers. Beginning in January 2021, Spark 101 teachers and parents will be able to access expanded, standards-aligned content integrated directly into Learning Undefeated’s Anywhere Labs digital lesson bundles and Spark 101’s career video library.

We hope you all are as excited as we are about this new opportunity! All of our current STEM skills videos will remain available on spark101.org. We will be sure to keep you updated on our new, free resources in the New Year!