The Brain Reach program is based out of the Centre for Neuroscience Studies at Queen’s University and has been running for the past 10 years. A pair of neuroscience graduate student volunteers are assigned to each participating classroom and teach 5th graders about neuroscience. This program is entirely free for all participating schools; we provide all the relevant materials.

Our program consists of up to 7 classroom sessions (depending on availability/timing) over the course of an academic school year. Presentations are approximately one-hour in length and consist of a PowerPoint presentation with lots of interactive components (activities, videos, Q&A, class participation, games, etc.) that are sure to wow students and consolidate their learning!

The program’s curriculum fits within the grade 5 Ontario Curriculum, so it is highly relevant for students and takes lesson plan pressure off Kingston’s overworked teachers. We are currently updating the program to add even more engaging activities and introduce new, fresh topics such as neurodiversity and technology. Once updated, we aim to publish all of our material online for free, so teachers across Ontario can use our curriculum.

We did a needs-based assessment to help us prioritize reaching out to schools that would most benefit from the program - that is, schools whose students are less likely to have access to STEM-based extra-curricular programs on their own. We plan to continue using this strategy.

Mostly importantly this allows students to have access to real neuroscientists to ask question. We specifically make sure each school has at least one woman on their neuroscientist volunteer team so that grade 5 girls can see themselves in a STEM career.