Most ISEs found this field by accident — a chance conversation, a professor, a relative in the business. This is the toolkit for changing that: ready-to-run activities, age-specific guidance and the places to connect with classrooms near you.
The ISE Day K-12 task force is assembling four things. Each one removes a reason volunteers hesitate before walking into a classroom.
One place ISE professionals can pull vetted materials for K-12 outreach — instead of building a presentation from scratch the night before.
Schools, non-profits and community programs actively looking for engineering volunteers — so the hardest step, finding a room full of students, is already done.
What lands with a second-grader does not land with a junior weighing college majors. Materials are tailored to K-5, 6-8 and 9-12.
We're naming what doesn't exist yet, so the community can build it rather than rediscover the same holes independently.
Match the message to the grade band. The goal shifts from curiosity, to relevance, to a concrete next step.
Both run with materials you can buy at any store, and both make an abstract profession immediately obvious to a room of students.
Two tables run side by side: one artisan craft, one five-station assembly line. Students make cards both ways, against a stopwatch, with times posted on a leader board. The debate that follows — which was faster, which was better, and whether those are the same question — is the whole lesson.
Teams assemble aircraft following engineered work instructions. Poorly written instructions produce chaos; good ones produce identical planes. That contrast is process design, standardization and efficiency in about twenty minutes.
The full facilitator guide, the printable station signs and a blank template for writing up your own. No login, no form — take them and go.
The complete activity: materials list, table setup for both stations, run instructions and the seven discussion questions that turn the exercise into a lesson.
A printable poster showing all five stations in order — card, stamp, stickers, handwritten greeting, stuffed envelope — with a photo of each task. Post it at the table and students self-direct.
Got an activity that works? Write it up in this format so the next volunteer can run it without calling you first. Standardized write-ups are how the resource bank grows.
Video does work a guest speaker can't — especially when the person on screen looks like the students watching.
Nine established channels that welcome engineering volunteers. Start with whichever one you already have a foot in.
Council of Engineering Societies, universities and SWE.
Visit a classroom as an ISE professional role model.
Partner directly with STEM and engineering courses.
Badge programs and STEM activity collaborations.
Merit badge outreach and STEM programming.
After-school programming and enrichment.
Upward Bound, SWE and campus outreach initiatives.
Judging, mentoring and presenting at events.
Natural ISE tie-ins: design, optimization, process engineering.
If you belong to any of them, you already have a way to help — and a network that multiplies it.
The Commission on Inclusive Excellence champions underrepresented groups and drives outreach to diverse K-12 audiences.
The Industry Advisory Board connects working professionals with educational initiatives as resource providers and brand ambassadors.
Coordinates outreach across IISE's regional chapters, multiplying K-12 reach geographically.
Technical societies and divisions that champion outreach within their own specialized networks.
Four ways to move this work forward — whether you have an afternoon or an activity you've been running for years.
If you've run something that worked, write it up in the blank template and send it in — then anyone can run it without calling you first. Email the task force →
Commit to visiting one K-12 classroom this year. One conversation is genuinely enough to change a student's direction.
Know a STEM/ISE resource already in use — the ISE GAME, a chapter program, a university module? Tell us so we don't rebuild it.
What would a fully developed ISE outreach toolkit include that this one doesn't yet? The gap list is open.
ISE Day is September 14, but a school visit counts any day of the year. Start with an activity above, or tell us what you're planning and we'll help you fill it out.
Questions, activity submissions and resource tips: iseday@iise.org