How A Red Wagon Full Of Soap Is Making The Neighborhood Greener

Also during this Club meeting, we will also receive a report and update on:

• Camp Neidig (Better known as "RYLA" or Rotary Youth Leadership Awards) Leadership Development Training for Student Leaders - Presented by Nicole McGalla
• STEM-YEA - Students for Science and Technolgy Experience - Presented by Gwenn Carr

======

About Red Wagon Soap

Red Wagon Soap, started by 12-year-old Hannah Laudermilch of South Whitehall Township, is a door-to-door company aiming to reduce plastic waste by filling up reusable containers with liquid hand soap, dish soap and Castille soap, a natural, multi-use concentrate that can be diluted according to your cleaning needs. The business also sells and delivers J.R. Liggett’s shampoo bars and Earth Breeze laundry detergent.  This business was started two years ago when Hannah was 10 years old.  

“It’s a green solution for items that we already purchase,” Laudermilch said. “So, we’re kind of like any other store except we buy in bulk, we don’t use plastic and we deliver the products right to your door. There’s also the vintage spin to it, where we are doing kind of like what the milkman used to do, except with soap.”

====

About Camp Neidig - Better known as "RYLA" or Rotary Youth Leadership Awards

Camp Neidig is a program sponsored by the Rotary Clubs in the Rotary District 7430 (Southeastern Pennsylvania). Its purpose is to provide exceptional leadership training experiences to students from various schools who have exhibited above average leadership abilities in various scholastic and/or community activities. The Camp Neidig experience offers students the opportunity to live, work, and socialize together in a dynamic leadership environment. The activities provided during the camp meeting are focused upon contemporary problems, ethical situations, and decision making that contributes to the leadership development of each student participant.​  

====

About STEM YEA

Research conducted at the University of Virginia concluded the following: “Our research has shown that the decline in science engagement among young people begins in late elementary school and bottoms out by the end of middle school or the beginning of high school,” said Robert H. Tai, associate professor of education at the University of Virginia School of Education and Human Development. “A lack of science engagement among young people can easily be carried forward into a lack of science engagement as adults. With scientific advances playing ever-growing roles in practically every aspect of our lives, ranging from the personal in terms of the food we eat to the global in terms of slowing climate change, engaging with science in order to make good decisions as adults is critical.” Efforts to maintain or improve students’ enthusiasm about science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM, subjects through middle school pay off. In his 2006 paper published in the journal Science, Tai showed kids who are interested in science when they are in the eighth grade are two to three times more likely to go into science as adults."
Since that study published, Tai and his team have been working to answer obvious next question: “How do we get and keep students engaged in STEM?” According to Tai, some studies have found that the way students are taught science, technology, engineering, and math can affect their levels of interest. But understanding how students are taught STEM lessons should not only include the learning experiences happening inside of formal classrooms. “Whether it is participating in a STEM summer camp, in the National Science Fair competition or the First Robotics Competition, there is evidence that participation in outside-of-school programs can have a positive impact on students’ STEM attitudes,” Tai said. “In this new study, we wanted to identify exactly what these different kinds of programs were doing to get these kids excited about science.”

Exerpted from an article in UVA Today, November 18, 2021 Audrey Breen, audreybreen@virginia.edu
Our program is based on the above findings and features an out of the classroom immersive experience.