INDIANAPOLIS ( MIRROR INDY ) — Major changes are coming soon to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum .
Closed since November, the museum is undergoing a $64-million renovation that’s expected to bring a more interactive experience to race fans who plan to visit the attraction when it reopens this spring.
With the new experiences — which include racing simulators, a STEAM classroom and an innovation workshop — the museum is bringing on its first-ever director of education to design a STEAM-friendly curriculum and ensure visitors, especially field trip groups, make the connection between the world of racing and science and math lessons taught in school.
Jake Apollos began in the newly created position last month. The longtime educator has more than 15 years of experience in different classroom and school leadership roles and worked most recently in Decatur Township Schools where he led the district’s Decatur High Ability Academy . Before that, he was a science teacher and STEM facilitator in Plainfield Community Schools .
Apollos joined Mirror Indy for a Q&A discussing the role of STEM in education, what to expect in a newly renovated IMS Museum, and how he plans to work with his team to create a museum experience that’s equitable to all students. Responses have been edited for brevity and clarity.
Related: Indianapolis students explore engineering at Marion University STEM summer camp.
Explorations in STEM
Question: Tell me about your background and what attracted you to working with IMS.
Answer: I was a teacher for about 10 years and during that time, I also stepped into a STEM coordination role as a project-based learning facilitator at one of my schools. Most recently, for the last three years, I’ve been an administrator at the Decatur High Ability Academy. It was a high ability school we started from scratch about three years ago. We built that program up to become a STEM-based, experience-based learning conceptual education model for high ability students.
When I actually applied for this position, it was back in February and it was largely just out of curiosity. I had almost forgotten I applied when they called me to interview, but because of some changes in leadership at the district, I wasn’t as confident in the program I was participating in, so I ended up entertaining this idea a lot more thoroughly.
It ended up being a really, really good fit for me and for the experiences I’ve had in my field. I’ve been transitioning into the museum realm. It’s been nerve wracking, but super exciting because I get to do what I’ve always loved and what I’ve been good at in a new and different way.
Q: What makes a good STEM activity?
A: For me, it starts with a common definition for STEM. When I first kicked off my STEM focus at one of my previous schools, the first thing that was glaringly obvious is we don’t really have a unified definition of what STEM is. When you take it back to its roots, which is in the 1960s during the space race, at its essence, STEM is just problem solving.
A student that can problem solve in an authentic way and a really applicable way, they’re going to be 10 times more successful than someone who cannot, so I start there and I define STEM as just problem solving. We look at everything as a problem to be solved, and then we keep that growth mindset and work toward a solution.
We have an innovation workshop and it’s a STEAM room. That’s where a lot of our activities and exhibits are gonna be based around. It’s ‘alright, here’s a problem and this is the solution’ or ‘here’s a problem someone else faced and here’s the science behind their solution.’
Museum is about creating experiences
Q: You are the first director of education for the IMS, so in a lot of ways, you’ll get to shape something new. What are your goals for this position?
A: With my background, I’ve either started with a restart in a program — either like the whole department has restarted together — or it’s from building something from the ground up, so I’m pretty familiar with that concept of ‘Hey, here’s a blank slate. Make it what you will.’ It is nerve wracking because I’m still learning all the lingo and jargon that goes with the museum, and the channels that you have to go through are a little bit different.
I really want to focus this around experiences. There’s some studies that revealed the main difference between a truly high achieving, high ability student and someone who never reaches their potential is the experiences they’re exposed to and I think that connects well even down to our traditional students or even our special learners. Even well into adulthood, it just comes back to those experiences that you have and the connections you make while doing it.
For teachers, as they come into the space, I want to be able to give them experiences they would not be able to have in their traditional classroom. Sometimes, that might just be an experiment that (students) run with me in the space or with their teachers in a different scenario, but we’re largely aiming to give them an opportunity they may not have had at their schools.
Q: IMS Museum President Joe Hale spoke of the museum’s desire to “bring a robust STEAM education initiative to Indiana students of all ages and from all backgrounds, especially those from underrepresented populations.” How do you plan to do that?
A: The first step is to remove the barriers. There are schools around Indiana that can get to us pretty easily. They have the funding. They have the resources to come and see what we have and give their kids as many opportunities they want. Then, there are certain schools or certain areas or certain locations that’s not always accessible, so we’re currently looking at ways we might be able to remove some of those barriers through a variety of different avenues.
We still don’t have definite answers yet. I can help work with teachers to either customize the experience based on their needs or provide them with a unique experience that they would not have. Beyond that, we’ve thrown out a lot of different ideas. We’ve talked about potentially starting robotics teams and doing a STEM summer camp.
I’m most excited with potentially reaching out, offering professional development opportunities for educators. We’re also tossing around the idea of potentially making a membership opportunity for teachers at special rates. We’re trying to find every avenue we can and then we’re going to start looking and seeing what is plausible and what is possible with just the community that we’re surrounded with and with the support that we have.
Working with teachers to meet their needs
Q: What types of activities do you hope students can experience in the new museum when it opens?
A: Everything is still very early. Depending on the numbers of students that come to our space at a time, I foresee breaking them into different groups that would interact with the museum in different ways.
Beyond just navigating through the space, I would like to create scavenger hunt opportunities that are digital where (students) take a picture of something or have to answer questions. That kind of helps them dive into the material a little bit deeper, but it also makes it a little bit more fun so that kids that may not be as interested in cars might now find a purpose in it.
We have our Qualifying Zone , which is entirely hands-on, interactive and is for all ages, but we know students are going to really gravitate toward that. And, the Innovation Workshop will also be a part of that, whether that’s some rotating exhibits that they can interact with or it could be a guided lesson either by myself or their teacher or chaperone.
Ideally, our goal is to come up with different types of plans that a teacher or school can reserve based on their need and then we will work together to meet the needs of them and their students.
Q: Your work will likely go beyond museum experiences. What do you envision that will look like?
A: I’ve already had a couple of schools reach out to me to discuss partnerships and to create STEM opportunities. We’re currently in the works with the (Indiana) State Fair to provide virtual field trip opportunities. They’re going to help construct something based around the world of racing for teachers to implement.
Beyond that, I just want to meet teachers where they’re at. Luckily, I have a background in science, in chemistry and biology and then a little bit of physics, so when they come to me and say, ‘Hey, I really want to cover this material.’ Hopefully, we can work together to get them what they need, whether that be science, ELA, social studies, whatever content area they want to focus on.
I always tell people that one of my strengths is coming up with ideas. Making sure that it gets implemented to meet their needs is our goal, even if it’s a teacher or it’s just a mom or a dad coming with their kids for the day. We want to make sure that everyone’s getting those experiences when ultimately they leave us.
Growing educational opportunities
Q: What does success look like for you in this work?
A: It starts with the students, whether that be part of a field trip or a family visit or new faces in general that come into the museum. I would like to see them walking out, talking about the experiences they’ve had and sharing it. I want to see posts on social media and opportunities for them to share not just what they learned, but what they’ve done in our space.
I want to see it go beyond the walls of the museum and potentially built into that virtual aspect, maybe setting up activities at different points or different places at libraries, fairgrounds or festivities to give people another opportunity to connect. But, ultimately, it’s just seeing our program continue to grow and expand.
The great thing about working with multiple people is they’re going to come to me with their own ideas, and then hopefully my job and my skill set is to develop those into something that we can turn into a program or activity in the long run. To answer the question, it would be growth, enjoyment, and then, continued improvement.
Q: You’re working for IMS now so I have to ask, who’s your favorite driver? Do you have any race day traditions?
A: Growing up in Indianapolis, and he’s been retired for a while, but my favorite racer was Jeff Gordon. Absolutely. 100%. It was largely because my family was all Dale Earnhardt fans so I was like, ‘I’m going to be the Gordon fan.’ But, now, my father-in-law is also a big fan of him, so I’m super excited because one of our rotating exhibits is going to be Jeff Gordon.
In terms of race day traditions, the one that I’ve always been connected to the most is the 500 festivities. I’ve had the opportunity to send students over the last few years to visit and experience that. When I was a kid, I remember my mom and dad taking me. Just that whole atmosphere that surrounds the Speedway in the month of May is just amazing to me. That’s not a specific tradition, but for me it was the feeling and the nostalgia that surrounds the event. That’s just awesome.
And, then being here and seeing all these people from around the United States and around the globe come and interact with our tours, it’s truly eye opening on how crucial it is. It’s really easy to live in Indianapolis and forget about the importance of it because it’s just always been a part of your life, but when you see it from another person’s perspective, you’re like, ‘Alright, this is really cool.’
Mirror Indy reporter Carley Lanich covers early childhood and K-12 education. Contact her at carley.lanich@mirrorindy.org or follow her on X @carleylanich .
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