On Friday, October 19, the first ever Pop-Up STEAM Fair took place in the Wold Atrium from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.

The event, which was organized by Yu Chang Ou ’19, was meant to better integrate science, technology, engineering and medicine (STEM) clubs with the arts on campus.

Ou, who says that she is “passionate about art and engineering” believes that there is a need for a greater presence of art on campus.

She cited the complete lack of visual arts clubs, something she is trying to address by creating an Art Club.

Jacob Pessin ’19 attended the Pop-Up STEAM Fair as a representative of Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW). Pessin came with the intention of looking for new members in a “smaller setting,” believing that he could find potential members who “were specific to the demographic of people we are looking for.”

President of ESW Chris Bendix ’19 said, “Not every problem presented to an engineer is best solved by a purely engineering solution, if such a thing as ‘pure, engineering solution’ exists. Just as other majors sometimes encounter problems they know they need an engineer to solve, engineers often encounter problems they aren’t technically skilled to solve, but don’t admit it and try and solve it themselves.  It is important to be in an environment where you can brainstorm with people who think differently than you and it’s important to listen.”

Recently, ESW has taken on the project of highlighting the shortcomings of the new Science and Engineering (S&E) building.

In their project called “Missed Opportunities, the Lack of Sustainable Engineering in the New S&E Building,” the club has made attempts to reach out to students who study humanities.

“It’s challenging to bring in non-engineers onto projects due mostly to stereotypes.

ESW hasn’t run a single engineering event this term yet simply because we have engineer in our name. Non-engineers avoid us like the plague,” Bendix said.

Ou reached out to members of the 14 clubs in attendance and asked them to participate in the fair.

All of the clubs, with the exception of Anime Club, focus on STEM topics.

However, Ou believed that there is room for more overlap with the arts, especially in the MakerWeb Consortium, also known as MakerWeb.

MakerWeb is a group of Makerspaces, or labs and spaces on campus that are available to students to participate in Maker Activities across all disciplines.

Maker Activities are activities that are a part of the larger Maker Movement which, according to their website, promotes “hands on project based learning.”

These activities emphasize building as well as creative thinking.