The Design & Pitch Challenges in STEM: A Theoretical Framework for Centering Mathematics Learning in Entrepreneurial Pitch Competitions
Solving many of the pressing issues facing the world today will require a deep and integrated understanding of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). To prepare today’s K-12 students to tackle these challenges, STEM education must create opportunities to learn disciplinary content...
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
MDPI AG
2025-05-01
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| Series: | Education Sciences |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7102/15/6/651 |
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| Summary: | Solving many of the pressing issues facing the world today will require a deep and integrated understanding of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). To prepare today’s K-12 students to tackle these challenges, STEM education must create opportunities to learn disciplinary content while inventing actionable solutions to messy, interdisciplinary problems. Learning frameworks, such as Project-Based Learning (PBL), Design-Based Learning (DBL), and Entrepreneurial-Based Learning (EBL), could support this reconceptualization of STEM education. New approaches are needed that leverage and integrate what works from these frameworks to better prepare students for success post-schooling. This means leveraging frameworks that emphasize practices and ways of thinking that support students to build and justify solutions that create value for users, while also creating a need for disciplinary content knowledge. This is especially necessary for mathematics, a discipline that is often treated insufficiently in interdisciplinary STEM activities. This paper introduces the Design & Pitch (D&P) Challenges in STEM Learning Framework, a novel learning framework that leverages features of PBL, DBL, and EBL, situating math learning within entrepreneurial pitch competitions. It describes the D&P Learning Framework and explores how each contributing learning framework combines to enhance students’ work, focusing their mathematical reasoning, while also empowering them to invent relevant solutions to authentic problems. |
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| ISSN: | 2227-7102 |