STEM Merit Badges

thingiverse

STEM Merit Badges are ideal for acknowledging student involvement in STEM camps, workshops, and demonstrations. These activities pique students' interest in careers in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. A tangible reminder of their achievements, a 3D printed STEM badge, can serve as a motivational tool for students to envision themselves pursuing STEM-related professions. In the summer of 2013, these badges were awarded to numerous students, each themed according to different grade level programs. The badges were printed in distinct colors for each team within a specific program. For instance, the hurricane badges represented natural disasters, fish badges symbolized biological adaptations, and rocket badges signified robotics/rockets. Feel free to connect with me on Twitter @DesignMakeTeach or Facebook at Facebook.com/DesignMakeTeach for discussions about 3D printing, STEM education, and Learning by Making as a teacher, designer, or maker. The process of creating these badges involved opening vector clipart images in Inkscape, rotating and resizing the STEM letters over the image, converting the text to path using Path-->Objects to Path command, combining the clipart and letters with Path-->Union, saving the file as an SVG, importing it into Tinkercad, and printing on a Printbot in PLA with a 0.2mm layer height.