ASM materials camp helps teachers build up next generation

Educators want the next generation of students to know they could find a future to be excited about in materials science and engineering. Just ask Sherri Rukes, a high school teacher whose infectious enthusiasm for the subject keeps bringing her back to the American Society for Metals (ASM) Materials Education Foundation's Materials Camp for Teachers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

"I have kids that say I like chemistry, but I really like physics," she said. "It is so nice to sit down with them and say, hey, there's materials science, and it uses all of those sciences together to explore and figure out how to solve real-life problems."

Rukes teaches both chemistry and physics at Libertyville High School in the Chicagoland area. She first came to the Illinois ASM camp about 20 years ago and has been invited back to teach ever since. In the 2026 camp, she served as a master teacher, leading instructional sessions and handling behind-the-scenes logistics. This year’s cohort, which convened June 8-12, enjoyed a week of hands-on experiments in lab settings and classroom sessions, all designed to give them knowledge they can take back and apply toward a richer STEM education experience.

Lab sessions put teachers in groups to tackle experiments related to ceramics, composites, metals, and polymers. They donned safety glasses and lab coats and worked collaboratively for hours in sessions at the Ceramics Kiln House.

"There's a lot of new information — your brain fills up," said Carol Ochsner, a veteran of the ASM materials camp program. "You're so full of new ideas and new things to do with your students that you've got to go again so you can learn the rest of it."

Ochsner attended her first camp in 2015 and has been traveling to materials science education camps across the country and Canada ever since. She is preparing to launch a materials science course at Monroe High School in Monroe, Wis., with 15 students already enrolled.

"I'm a little bit nervous, but I'm getting a lot of support from people willing to share resources," she said. "It's just a really great environment to start something like this."

Jane Daniels is another returning attendee. She first came to the Illinois camp in 2025 and returned in 2026 to deepen her understanding of materials concepts. A middle school math and science teacher from Armstrong, Ill., Daniels keeps her focus squarely on her students — and on what it takes to make science feel relevant to kids who don't see themselves as scientists.

"In middle school, you are dealing with children going through a lot of physiological changes, where they just want to be on the basketball court," she said. "But when you can get them excited about doing an experiment, that is exciting. It ignited their understanding that they're just as good in the lab as they are on the court — and that, to me, is the fuel that got me back here."

Camp organizers arranged an afternoon tour of the Materials Research Laboratory to give teachers a direct look at the kind of high-level science their students could one day be part of. Led by Director of Research Facilities Mauro Sardela, the tour took educators through spaces housing everything from industry-grade microscopes to advanced characterization equipment. Teachers snapped photos throughout, building a visual library they could bring back to their classrooms.

"Being able to tell students, this is what's coming, this is the kind of equipment you're going to be working with — that's so powerful,” said Ochsner.

"I loved how Sardela really wanted to have a connection with local high schools and middle schools in the area, to show kids what these things do, because they are fascinating," said Rukes. "We could see the atom in everything, and that is just jaw-dropping."

That sense of wonder is what teachers hope resonates with students. Whether it's a middle schooler in a small Illinois farm town discovering they belong in a lab, or a Wisconsin high schooler seeing for the first time what a career in materials science actually looks like, the camp's ultimate experiment is a simple one: expose a teacher to something extraordinary, and watch what happens when they walk back into their classroom.