Past Participants are Now the Leaders of MIT’s dynaMIT Club

Full circle: How the program’s biggest fans became its leaders

Every summer for the past 13 years, students in MIT’s club dynaMIT have taught STEM principles to Boston-area middle school students at no cost, all in an effort to inspire the next generation of innovators.

In August, dynaMIT welcomes two cohorts of budding scientists and engineers to campus. First, 40 middle schoolers in grades 6–7 dive into hands-on STEM learning through creative activities like solar s’mores and paper rockets. The following week, another 40 students in grades 8–9 join in, exploring innovative experiments that spark curiosity and creative problem-solving. Each day, a new topic is covered, exposing attendees to chemistry, machine learning, physics, math, biology, and earth and space science.

Several of the program’s attendees have gone on to apply and be accepted to MIT, including the club’s Co-director, Dominique Dang. When the Quincy, MA, native saw the club’s table at the Midway Fair, she knew she wanted to join to give back.

“I didn’t receive a lot of STEM exposure in middle school, but then I saw online about the STEM program offered by dynaMIT, and I was really interested. I had so much fun, and it introduced me to creating things and not just reading about them in a textbook. I knew I wanted to be a scientist, but I didn’t know what type of science I wanted to study, so having dynaMIT expose me to a different STEM topic each day was a transformative experience,” says Dang, who is now studying computer science and molecular biology.

Megan Zhu, the club’s other co-director, was immediately drawn to the organization’s educational mission. A biology major with plans to pursue an MD/PhD program, Zhu is passionate about advancing science education and aspires to teach at the university level upon completing her degree.

“I happened to stop by the dynaMIT table at the club fair, and it seemed really cool. I spoke to a couple of the club leaders, and they talked about how they help support education in the Boston area. Education has always been something that I was passionate about in my hometown in Rapid City, South Dakota, and I wanted to emphasize giving back to the community,” says Zhu.

Lukeman Nouri, who grew up in Saugus, MA, attended dynaMIT as a sixth grader. “I barely knew what MIT was or even what STEM meant, so I wasn’t particularly excited to go. However, that changed after the very first day of the program! I remember extracting DNA from a strawberry, making elephant toothpaste, and gathering fingerprints from various surfaces. However, my biggest highlight was learning Scratch and creating my very first game,” says Nouri, who is majoring in computer science and engineering.

Erick Liang, who grew up in Boston’s Chinatown and Roslindale neighborhoods and is now majoring in nuclear science and engineering and physics, had a similar experience after attending dynaMIT. “As a first-generation, low-income student, having a meaningful and engaging program like dynaMIT to participate in over the summer was really important for me. dynaMIT exposed me to different fields of science I had not encountered yet in elementary or middle school and helped spark my interest in STEM,” says Liang.

Zhu says this year they are adding a new activity related to climate change and clean water that they hope will create an interest in these two important areas. “This summer, one of our activities is called Sponge City. It’s about runoff water and clean, reusable water. We’ll have the students build a city that can withstand a storm. They will be given a budget and have to decide how to spend the resources after we pour water all over the tray containing their city − all in an effort to show them how important climate change and clean drinking water are.”

The club is also partnering with the Koch Institute at MIT and will tour lab space and work on a fun experiment about cell heterogeneity and cancer tumor formation. Attendees will then be able to talk to scientists and ask them questions.

“I’m looking forward to giving this cohort the same great experience that I had six summers ago. dynaMIT was so much fun, and I learned so much from it that I feel a responsibility to help make it just as impactful for future students,” says Nouri.

Liang adds, “I am excited to return and help set up the plasma demo kits for the program’s physics day!”

“It’s a great full circle moment,” says Dang. “That’s just one of the reasons why I joined the club.”

“Watching the students work on the activities is always the most rewarding part of the two weeks, and that makes the entire year of planning worth it,” says Zhu, adding, “The club is also an excellent community at MIT.”

Students interested in joining dynaMIT or volunteering for this summer’s program can find more information on the club’s website.