STEM vs. STEAM

[Yo5hii]

Originally Posted by Ginger Power

I have a feeling this will be a hot topic throughout the year, so I'm curious to hear what people think about the inclusion of Art in STEM. With the release of the 2017 FRC game "FIRST STEAMworks", it's pretty clear where FIRST stands on the topic.

I'm personally of the opinion that adding Art to STEM waters things down*. At some point it makes sense to draw the line on the number of topics included or else there is just too much. If you asked people which of the following is not like the other, I'm pretty confident Art would be the most popular choice.

There are also very creative/artistic elements already built into Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. Design Engineering is basically using physical principles and creativity to build products to serve a need. The creativity needed to be a design engineer is much like the creativity needed to be an artist. The difference is the application of physics, and math. With that said, where does art fit into STEM?

I'd love to hear what everybody thinks!

*This doesn't mean I don't think there is value in the arts. I absolutely do.

Hey I believe that Art's inclusion in STEM comes from the fact that many modern applications of art are heavily invested and affected by technology, such as graphic design, 3D-Modeling, animation, game design, etc (all CTE classes as well). Art encompasses much more than that obviously, but in order to include the specific tech based art forms in STEM, which I believe that the ones I've mentioned definitely do deserve to be included, the word "art" as a descriptor is pretty much the only broad word that can be used to add to the STEM acronym. Now whether or not you even need the word art to encompass these things is a different argument than whether these things deserve to be under the STEM umbrella, which I believe they do. Now my last point with the meld of art and STEM is that they are an integral part of each other in many aspects: Architecture, CAD, Industrial Design, and in general Invention and Innovation, none of which function well without equal parts critical and creative thinking. Just think DaVinci, largely considered an artist, sculptor, inventor, and engineer, and with whatever he does, his creative and analytical talents are not mutually exclusive.