History
STEAM-a-Palooza is hosted by the Discovery Center and serves as the official kick-off for the Tennessee STEAM Festival. The event brings together 30+ exhibitors from around Middle Tennessee to a central location, where they offer hands-on demonstrations and activities that show how STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, and music) exists all around us everyday.
Key Responsibilities
As the Community Engagement and STEAM Festival Coordinator, my key responsibilities for this event included:
- Filing/obtaining the appropriate permits and agreements with the city
- Creating digital and print signage to communicate the change of museum operating hours on the date of the festival
- Revising the registration form for exhibitors
- Communicating with new and returning exhibitors
- Monitoring exhibitor sign-ups
- Communicating event details with participating exhibitors
- Coordinating volunteers before and during the event
- Determining the placement of exhibitors around the festival space
- Creating the guest-facing Palooza Program
- Renting additional tables and chairs
- Hiring food trucks and a photographer for the event
- Updating exhibitor and directional signage
- Communicating expectations and directions for set-up and tear-down with museum staff and volunteers
- Assisting with event set-up and tear-down
- Monitoring, tracking, and recording event attendance
- Maintaining financial records and staying on budget
Specific Contributions
Beyond my key responsibilities, I took actions to specifically solve challenges and elevate the event, such as:
- Creating an evergreen document to map out exhibitor placement in accordance with city ordinances (pictured above)
- Streamlining the registration process by revising the registration forms
- Increasing the variety of activities offered by strategically inviting organizations to participate
- Restructuring the volunteer opportunities by limiting the number of volunteers and creating specific shifts and assignments
- Drastically reducing the time spent on set-up and tear down by creating clear expectations and instructions for staff and assigning them specific tasks
- Increasing the quantity and quality of communication with exhibitors to ensure they were well informed about the details of the event
- Painting a super cute and fun mural to act as a photo backdrop
