Steam Beans is demystifying nature — and science — for Black girls

To the gaggle of first grade girls who hiked up Great Blue Hill with Sheila Johnson two years ago, getting to the top was a chore.

“All those girls, they looked at the mountain, and they said, ‘Oh, Ms. Johnson, we can’t do it,’ or ‘We’re tired.’ They complained like they were 103 years old… every five minutes, we stopped,” said Johnson, founder of Steam Beans. Steam Beans is a nature-based, academic enrichment program in Cambridge, Massachusetts for Black girls in grades one to five.

“And I said, ‘Oh, no. If I can get up this mountain, you all should be able to run up this mountain.’”

After two more treks up the mountain, what began as a chore morphed into a quest.

The quest was for the girls to find the lessons that the mountain held about how wind moves and how temperatures rise and fall; to learn lessons about which plants could be eaten, and about the girls’ own physical endurance. 

A weather station belonging to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) sits at the top of the mountain. So, on the second trip, an NOAA guide showed the girls the weather station, helped them identify edible mosses and explained why the leaves of certain trees turned colors.

By the third trip, Johnson said, the girls were walking faster, asking questions about certain rocks, and doing investigative work.

“This time, I saw my girls walking up the hill and none of them were breathing heavily. And when we left, they were running down the hill, and they were saying, ‘Yes! Yes!’” Johnson said.  

That experience is one of many that Steam Beans brings to Black girls in the Boston area. Through academic years and summer cohorts, the program, which Johnson founded in 2015, uses nature as a conduit to pique the girls’ interest in Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math — or “STEAM,” for short.

During the 2022 Inside-Out Conference in Atlanta, Georgia last May, Johnson led a breakout session about Steam Beans along with Dr. Susan Rauchwerk, Lesley University education professor and associate chair for STEAM in its Graduate School of Education.

Johnson and Rauchwerk explained that Black women comprise only 2 percent of the science and engineering workforce in the U.S. Their presentation then examined the underlying causes behind this disparity, zeroing in on what they believe is a key component: the persistent marginalization of Black girls and the pernicious lack of exposure to STEAM careers and nature-based education.

The presenters explained that girls and families of color, especially those from urban and under-resourced communities, continue to have limited access and exposure to nature. The impacts of  nature deficit can be far-reaching — studies show that time spent in nature supports the development of social skills, emotional well-being and academic growth. 

For example, Johnson and Rauchwerk explained that research indicates that teaching lessons in nature may rejuvenate students’ capacity for learning (1, 2). In addition, research on engaging Black girls and their families in nature education draws connections between students’ frequent, varied nature experiences in a variety of settings and the students’ continued persistence in STEAM and nature education and careers (1, 2, 3). 

Therefore, one of the most important things that Johnson says she can accomplish with their trips to Great Blue Hill is to help the girls, and ultimately their parents, understand that nature so close to them needn’t be a mystery.

Great Blue Hill is a short distance from the girls’ homes in the nearby towns of Canton and Milton, “but they don’t go there because of certain [cultural and racial] barriers,” Johnson said.

On another recent trip, Johnson invited the girls’ parents to join. “I wanted them to understand that this mountain is right in their neighborhood, and they should go see it,” she explained.

“Many of the parents came back from the trip vowing to walk some of the trails on the mountain with their children. They’d stop and talk about different aspects of nature on the trails. The children also began talking about nature with their parents.”

“Just imagine the connection that made!” Johnson remarked. She explained that she’s happy to be part of what she described as, “demystifying the unknown so that now, it is comfortable to them.” With Steam Beans, Johnson hopes that if nature can be demystified, so can STEAM careers.

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