STEM Club

The STEM Club at St. Michael School is an after-school program held every Tuesday afternoon from 3 to 4 p.m. run by volunteers from the school and St. Michael Parish. The goal of the club is to instill an appreciation for science in students from TK through 8th grade. 

Every month, a different science field is featured, and speakers and local experts are invited to present on that particular field on the first Tuesday of the month. Science experiments are held on the other Tuesdays. Every 4th Saturday of the month, a field trip to a science exhibition or museum is also held. 

The St. Michael STEM Club proudly hosts approximately 70 students. 

September - Aviation

• Students heard from Dr. Hsun Chao, , an aerospace engineer who works at Joby Aviation, who gave a presentation on aviation in general and on his company, his employer Joby Aviation, a venture-backed aviation company developing an electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft that it intends to operate as an air taxi service. The company was founded by Mr. JoBen Bevirt, who holds an MS in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University and invented the Gorillapod flexible camera tripod. 
• Students participated in an egg drop contest, where they devised the best protection for an egg when dropped from the second floor of the administration building. A perpetual trophy was awarded to the first-place winners, Team Fluorine (a group of 4th graders).
• Members of the STEM Club visited the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) Chapter at the Livermore Municipal Airport. The EAA is a community of pilots, aircraft builders, and aviation enthusiasts who fly, build, and maintain aircraft at the Livermore Municipal Airport. 

October - Chemistry 

• Students heard from two scientists, Dr. Sarah Palmer, a biologist and director at Zone 7 Water District, and Livermore Mayor John Marchand, a retired water chemist at the Alameda County Water District. Dr. Palmer discussed the groundwater and other water sources in Zone 7. 
• Students conducted water experiments with Mayor Marchand. 

November - Physics 

• Students heard from Mr. Michael Finney, a retired engineer at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and one of the people who helped build the National Ignition Facility (NIF) and spent 18 years of his career working at NIF. The National Ignition Facility is the world’s largest and most energetic laser system at LLNL and is used for fusion research, stockpile stewardship, and scientific discovery. 
• Students conducted experiments on density using pennies on a boat. They tried to see how many pennies could be placed on an aluminum boat before it sank. They also did experiments on friction using different kinds of material to provide different rough surfaces for the car to travel. 
• Members of the STEM Club visited the Exploratorium in San Francisco. 
  
  

December - Computer Science 

• Members heard from Mr. Kevin Hulin, a computer scientist at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) on the history of computers. 
• Students participated in the St. Michael Escape Room. They had to decode a mystery created by Mr. and Mrs. Hulin in order to escape. 
• Members visited the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, where they enjoyed looking at old computers, including the first Apple I and the first Macintosh. They also played with retro video games like PacMan and Donkey Kong and talked to a robot named AMECA.