2.1

Dedicated outreach ownership and leadership

The first, and arguably most essential, step towards creating a company-sponsored outreach program is to establish dedicated ownership and leadership of the program. This could be one individual or a small committee of individuals. The optimal solution is to have outreach leadership built directly into an individual’s job description. Edmund Optics leadership fortunately provided the resources to bring on Rebecca Emerich, a part time employee whose sole responsibility was the management of the outreach program. Rebecca was a middle school science teacher before taking on this new role. Getting executive buy-in for these resources will be discussed in Subsection 2.2. Volunteer outreach leadership can also be effective as long as responsibilities are clearly defined for the individual or small leadership committee.

2.2

Getting executive buy-in

Securing company resources to dedicate to any non-volunteer outreach leadership and activities might appear difficult if the push for expanding the outreach program is not coming directly from executive leadership. The exact key “selling points” for securing executive buy-in for a given organization are dependent on the company culture and executives, but potential benefits to emphasize to company leadership beyond simply giving back to the surrounding community include:

2.3

First steps

With Rebecca as a dedicated outreach leader, Edmund Optics began laying the groundwork to grow the outreach program. The first step was establishing relationships with local schools ranging from elementary to high schools. Rebecca found contact information for local principals, teachers, museum directors, and educational non-profit leaders through Twitter and the organizations’ webpages and emailed them to see if they were interested in a complimentary outreach visit to teach optics concepts through hands on demonstrations. Only approximately 2% of recipients responded. Rebecca also reached out to Edmund Optics employees with children to see if their teachers were interested.

The small initial group of teachers and museum staff who partnered with the Edmund Optics outreach program grew organically through word-of-mouth. Example demonstrations and best practices for outreach events themselves will be covered in Subsections 2.6 and 2.7. There are many available resources with demonstration ideas and other materials useful for starting an outreach program including Optics4Kids.com², the 100 Educational Activities About Light and Photonics Quick Reference Guide by Leiden University³, and EdmundScientific.com, the online home of Edmund Optics’ outreach program⁴. The development of the Edmund Scientific digital presence will be covered in Subsections 3.1 and 3.2.

2.4

Growing local in-person outreach program

The Edmund Optics educational outreach program grew organically after establishing the initial relationships described in Subsection 2.3. Hosting an event for one teacher spread the word that complimentary educational visits from Edmund Optics were possible to other teachers in the same grade, school, and district. Establishing the first relationship was the most important step.

Rebecca then fostered these relationships by keeping conversations going with teachers a few times a semester. Best practices discovered by Edmund Optics include reaching out to teachers every September. Many schools, especially 5^th grade classes, tend to teach students about light in the Spring, at least in the state of New Jersey, USA. Touching base in September reminded teachers that Edmund Optics’ outreach visits were available as they planned the year’s curriculum

When touching base with teachers, Rebecca shared new educational videos and other educational resources. Creating a digital presence for outreach programs is described in Subsections 3.1 and 3.2. Photos from outreach events were shared on Edmund Optics social media channels, spreading awareness to other local schools and institutions.

Internal promotion of the program is critical for building a volunteer base of employees for participating in outreach events. Any internal communications such as newsletters, company-wide emails, and company-wide events are excellent ways to highlight the work of existing outreach participants and make it clear to others that they can also get involved. It is not necessary for employees to be engineers themselves in order to understand optical concepts to the level required to participate in educational optics outreach. The number of Edmund Optics employees participating in outreach events has grown to 45 as a result of internal promotions and word of mouth.

2.5

Types of in-person outreach events

Edmund Optics participates in a variety of in-person outreach events for local young people including:

2.6

Best practices for hosting in-person outreach events

Over the years, Edmund Optics has discovered best practices for keeping students engaged during outreach events and maximizing participation. The language used by employees is critical for retaining the audience’s attention and understanding. Technical vocabulary should be avoided and while optical concepts, such as polarization and total internal reflection, are being taught, they should be described in simple terms that are familiar to students.

To keep the audience engaged, any presentations should be as interactive as possible. While tools like PowerPoint can be helpful for framing a conversation, attention will be quickly lost if employees are simply talking to students from a slide deck for an extended period of time. Ask students lots of questions and tie concepts into things that excite them or relatable technologies that they interact with often in their lives. Ask if they have used virtual reality or augmented reality and explain that augmented reality is used in smartphone applications they are familiar with such as “filters” on social media that add virtual elements to the real images captured through their phone.

When describing optical concepts and components, explain how they connect to virtual and augmented reality, 3D movies, autonomous vehicles, and other interesting applications. Point out objects in the room containing optics or where optics were involved in manufacturing them, such as projectors, screens, and electronics like their cell phones.

The majority of Edmund Optics outreach events begin with a short presentation about optics and optical engineering and then stations of several demonstrations. Running multiple demonstrations at once with one employee per demonstration allows for the use of less materials, helps the presenter better control and engage with the students, and enables students to feel more comfortable asking questions since they are in a smaller, more intimate group.

2.7

Hands-on optics demonstration ideas

The resources shared in Subsection 2.3 including Optics4Kids.com², the 100 Educational Activities About Light and Photonics Quick Reference Guide by Leiden University³, and EdmundScientific.com, the online home of Edmund Optics’ outreach program⁴, are great sources of hands-on demonstration ideas. When creating demonstrations, the Edmund Optics outreach program has several guiding principles. They should be hands-on and keep students active to increase engagement. The more physical the better. Demonstrations should involve scientific exploration and problem solving while also being scalable.

Scalable demonstrations can be performed both in a single classroom or a festival or other community event where there may be hundreds of participants. This can be achieved by utilizing materials that can be re-used or by leading demonstrations where disposable materials are small and inexpensive.

Four of the demonstrations proven to be most successful during Edmund Optics outreach events are:

Figure 1.

The laser maze demonstration is simple but drives home the law of reflection for students.

Figure 2:

This depiction of total internal reflection (TIR) inside of an optical fiber can be used to introduce the concept to students if a fish tank is not available.

Figure 3:

Morse code sheet from the Radio Society of Great Britain⁵

3.1

Creating outreach videos

Videos explaining optical concepts in simple terms can be conveniently incorporated into teacher’s lesson plans, introducing optical concepts without the resource commitment of an in-person outreach visit. Edmund Optics was fortunate enough to have an in-house video production team, but even simple videos captured using a cell phone can now be more than sufficient quality.

Edmund Optics created several different types of videos to expand the audience reached through our outreach program. Our higher-production value videos include an introduction to optics and a series of others featuring Rebecca Emerich that introduce the concepts of refraction, reflection, lasers, and absorption⁴. These videos are shared through Edmund Optics’ outreach website and YouTube channel.

Edmund Optics also created a series of new, lower production quality videos to address the closure of schools due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Employees recorded themselves explaining an optical phenomenon such as why the sky looks blue and how cameras work. These videos were uploaded to a website called Flipgrid and shared with our outreach contacts and others in Edmund Optics’ database⁶.

Creating similar videos and a webpage to act as a home for your outreach program will help build a digital presence that expands your reachable audience.

3.2

Hosting virtual outreach events

The COVID-19 pandemic led to Edmund Optics developing completely virtual outreach events, as all in-person events were cancelled. Events were set up in Zoom Video Communications so that students could join a call with several Edmund Optics employees and a group of other students from their homes. First, students were shown the same PowerPoint presentation used during in-person events to introduce them to optics.

Next, the students were walked through hands-on demonstrations. Edmund Optics mailed kits of optical components and materials for demonstrations to all students that registered, but virtual outreach events can also be effective without dedicating the resources to ship supplies to students. Many activity ideas from the sources described in Subsection 2.7 can be performed with common household objects. Instructions can be sent to parents before the event so that the required materials can be gathered.

The demonstrations in the Edmund Optics virtual outreach events included the Fun with Filters demonstration described in Subsection 2.7, creating a rainbow by placing a mirror at an angle in a tin of water and shining a flashlight on it, and using a flashlight to observe transmission, reflection, and absorption in common materials. While not a direct substitute for in-person events, virtual outreach events allow you to expand your outreach audience beyond those geographically close to you. They also future proof your program from situations which make in-person visits impossible.

3.3

Spreading in-person outreach program across a global organization

Edmund Optics’ outreach program mainly stemmed from the Barrington, NJ headquarters. Several steps were followed to further scale up to a global outreach program which coordinated efforts across multiple locations across the globe. If you are creating a company-sponsored outreach program for a global organization, these steps will help greatly expand your outreach audience.

Following these steps has helped Edmund Optics transform their local outreach program to a global one that reaches students in the Americas, Asia, and Europe.