Thanksgiving Point Institute

We focus on transformative experiences that engage youth, students, families, and the community in hands-on discovery. We encourage people to learn by doing in all of our immersive cultural venues.

At each venue: Farm Country, Museum of Ancient Life, Museum of Natural Curiosity, and the Ashton Gardens, we offer a variety of educational programs designed to ignite curiosity and playful learning.

For Love Utah Give Utah 2017, we have a goal to raise $5,000 for our much needed, teen afterschool “maker” program, Operation Inquiry.

Operation Inquiry is a multi-year afterschool program for teens ages 13-18 in Utah County that fosters inquiry, innovation, and problem-solving through a MakerSpace with a service learning focus.

Teens choose to participate in activities any day of the week, Monday through Saturday, in a variety of disciplines including Robotics, Art and Design, Maker, eTextiles, and Electronics that engage them in hands-on problem-based learning. Operation Inquiry fosters innovation, critical thinking, community building, and problem solving as youth work to design and prototype solutions to interesting problems like how to build an underwater robot that can monitor water quality in the Jordan River. Their efforts, failures, and successes in Operation Inquiry spark students’ desire to seek further education and consider careers that require innovative problem solving.

Youth in Operation Inquiry visit local colleges, universities, and businesses to learn about potential career paths that their interests can lead them to. This helps them understand the real-world applications of the skills that they are learning each day in the program, and allows them to see role models working in interesting career fields. Additionally, youth who show commitment to the program have the opportunity to attend the San Mateo Maker Faire each spring with TPI staff to present their work and lead workshops for other attendees.

This program has real impact, and outcomes include:

• 50% of the youth participating are female, to ensure equal gender representation in STEM, Art and Design topics and activities.
• Youth have at least 5 or more work/career based learning activities through guest speakers, career fairs, job shadowing and other opportunities to explore real-world STEM, Art and Design careers.
• 100% of the youth involved earn a 3.0 GPA or higher in their academic studies.
• Youth have 25 hours or more of community service and will have leadership training with the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
• 100% of youth in the program engage in STEM courses in their academic studies.
• 100% of youth in the program will graduate high school.
• Where applicable, many of students will be the first in their family to attend college.

A few student comments:

“Operation Inquiry has changed my life in so many ways! It has helped me realize many passions that I never knew I had. It has helped me find what I am going to do with my life. I am so grateful for this program!”

“Operation Inquiry has been very great. It has taught me a lot of life experiences. It has made me a much more productive person. At the end of the week, I love taking a break from life and doing awesome things with friends at the Makerspace. This is a place where I feel like I really belong. I think the Operation Inquiry program is great!”

How Your Donation Helps:

Your support on Love Utah Give Utah allows us to continue to provide the Operation Inquiry program to teens in our community at no-cost, continues to allow us to improve the program with more innovative technology year after year, and will enable us to expand our programming to satellite locations throughout the state of Utah. Your donation has a real impact, allowing all teens to have access to quality, hands-on STEM, Art and Design programs.