Jim Thorpe Area School District kids got a chance to put a little science in their summer during Camp Invention at L.B. Morris Elementary School, filling their vacations with educational excitement.

"It's a STEM-based camp for science, technology, engineering and mathematics," Katherine Doll, coordinator of academic resources for JTASD, said. "It's our second year running the camp, and we've got about 50 kids, along with five high school and college volunteers helping the students. It's inquiry-based learning, it's all hands-on, investigative skills. They have to create projects, work collaboratively in teams, and they have to do a lot of science-based thinking."Campers from Jim Thorpe schools have five days to participate in the program, which was developed by the National Inventors Hall of Fame to inspire future innovators."A lot of the program is based on the engineering process, where they come up with an idea, test it, find the flaws, retest it, and then they create a final product that they get to use," STEM teacher Brandon Knapp said.Several stations ran specialized projects throughout the week, focused primarily on developing valuable STEM skills through conceiving, designing and building new products.Duct Tape Billionaire"For Duct Tape Billionaire, the idea is that they are working on creating an invention using duct tape," Camp Invention instructor and L.B. Morris teacher Joann Donati said. "They're going to learn to get the capital for the business, and they learn production, how to mass produce the item, and some of the strategies that go into it."On Thursday, the Duct Tape Billionaire station studied aspects of marketing a product, such as focusing on a target audience, developing a company name and slogan, and more."I'm working on a jet-pack," Brinn Harwood, 9, said. "I designed my company, the logo and a slogan so I can sell the product. I thought I could make a way to make people get to places even faster."Mission SpaceEngineering was elevated to a planetary scale at the Mission Space Makers station, where campers crafted their own little world."They were given the characteristics of their planet, and then they launched 'rockets,' so to speak, to land on the planet. The next day, we had a relay race to collect samples from the planet. That's how we planted trees and added crystals, things like that," Kim Zoba, Camp Invention instructor and JTASD math and reading coordinator, said.Careful analysis of the planet's condition provided a template for the campers to build on, and their imaginations brought out the interesting little details that made up the ecosystem."We had a ball here, we painted it, we put some clay on it, added some toothpicks and some Floam, made some tree and moons, and we sheltered our ship, the LED light," Ian Walck, 8, said. "The rotation of day and night takes 28 hours. Water content is 25 percent, and the water is liquid, not frozen, and the temperature is 204 degrees. It was mostly made out of sand at first, but we only left a little bit of sand."On Thursday, planets were bombarded with meteorites, and campers had to make adaptations to protect their new home, in addition to plotting out a defensive strategy for future disasters. On Friday, the campers will officially declared the planet a property of the United States by planting a flag and giving it a name.Have a BlastAt the Have a Blast station, campers employed physics to study how different launching mechanisms work."We're working on physics this week, so we're using the bubble blasters. They actually had to build the bubble blasters. They were working on engineering it, and how to figure out how the parts work, the physics behind it, and kinetic energy, and how their body makes it work," Kate Harleman, Camp Invention instructor and Pre-K Counts teacher.With a little finesse, the campers were able to assemble a functional bubble blaster, and carefully create bubbles of all sizes."I liked the bubble blaster, and learning how to make big bubbles," Madilyn Off, 7, said.Throughout the week, the recycling module in the cafeteria was the epicenter of excitement. Each camper had to bring in a recyclable electronic item, which would be repurposed into a new device of their choosing."They have to take it apart, and they're going to reconstruct it with different pieces, circuit boards and peg boards. They learn all about different tools, screwdrivers, wrenches, and wire cutters, too. They probably have the most fun with this activity," Doll said.Kyra Eilber, 9, was ahead of the game, and having already dismantled her item, volunteered to help a friend."I'm helping Justin take his radio apart right now. I brought in a speaker, and I'm going to make it into a brand-new speaker," Eilber said as she removed some screws from the unit.While the possibilities for new inventions are practically endless, Justin Harrison, 7, already knew what he was going to develop."I think I might make it into a robot," Harrison said.Volunteer Ryan McArdle said that he was thrilled to help the campers with their projects throughout the week, and looks forward to stimulating the minds of the next generation's engineers and scientists."I think it's a good program, especially since I'm going for engineering in college. I think it's a good start for children to learn about this kind of stuff. Where else are you going to take apart electronics and build different circuits?" McArdle, who is attending the University of Pittsburgh, said.While most people would assume kids would be adamantly against learning throughout their summer vacation, Camp Invention has planted the seeds for what could hopefully be a lifelong interest in the STEM fields for these exuberant students."They're excited, and they love coming," Doll said. "It's a different kind of learning, with them progressing from day one to the final product. They see it from the beginning to the end, and they created it."