STEM Bus Inspires Creativity, Curiosity and Innovation in Rural Oklahoma District

It started out as a simple idea. Staff at Durant Independent School District (DISD) in Oklahoma wanted to transform an old school bus into a mobile STEM lab. But that vision quickly grew into a groundbreaking initiative: a custom-built STEM bus that has sparked a passion for hands-on learning and revolutionized STEM education throughout the district.

The Challenge

A newspaper article caught the eye of Beth Bean, DISD’s Director of Curriculum and Instruction: A school in Alabama had partnered with PowerUpEdu on a STEM bus initiative to enrich learning and engage all students in high-quality, authentic STEM education. She’d seen similar projects in other districts and was eager to bring something like that to Durant.

Bean approached Duane Meredith, who was Superintendent at the time, with the idea of retrofitting an old school bus with STEM technology and learning tools to create an indoor/outdoor STEM lab for the students, but Meredith had another idea. “No, you can’t have an old bus,” he said, “But let’s do this right and build a bus from scratch.”

Designing a custom-built bus meant that the district would have to navigate a complex process:

• Securing additional resources to fund and support the project

• Planning, designing, and building the lab from the ground up

• Ensuring that it would meet the needs of students in all grades

With all of the resources in place, the collaborative effort was then underway. “We actually got to design a custom STEM bus, which we were able to outfit it to our needs,” said Bean.

Key Solutions

The plan was to outfit a brand-new bus with state-of-the-art STEM tools that would engage students at every level—from pre-K to high school—with activities tailored to all the different developmental stages and learning goals. This included:

• An interactive floor

• 3D printers

• Virtual reality technology

• Datalogging capabilities

• STEM furnishings

• Robotics equipment

• Coding stations

• Labdiscs

• MyStemKits.com STEM curriculum

It was an ambitious undertaking that required expertise and technology from outside sources, so the district partnered with Power Up Edu and Boxlight. The collaboration that took place between the district, the staff and the two companies was a resounding success, resulting in much more than just a mobile classroom—the district now has a fully immersive STEM learning environment.

See how the STEM Bus inspires the Durant Independent School students!