Olympian Katie Ledecky has inspired a generation of swimmers after winning nine Olympic gold medals during her athletic career. Now, she’s encouraging students in Johnson County and across the country to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, arts and math.
The most decorated American woman in Olympic history visited the Cedar Trails Exploration Center in Lenexa on Tuesday as part of her collaboration with Panasonic to promote STEAM education.
Ledecky said education has always been important to her — she earned her psychology degree at Stanford University while competing. She said she loved STEAM subjects when she first started school, and developed a love of math while swimming.
“I'm a distance swimmer, so I was always calculating pace times and running all the numbers in my head,” Ledecky said. “I also had some really great science teachers growing up that really inspired me.”
Ledecky toured the center’s design, automation, manufacturing, engineering and robotics programs before joining high school students in the biomedical program in the laboratory. She also met with the De Soto school district’s Women in STEM team and with Mill Creek Middle School Pathway students.
She said everyone has school subjects that they like more than others, but STEAM skills will benefit students no matter what career they pursue.
“If you find something that you really, really love, try to be the very best you can be at it, whether that's in the science lab or in the pool or on the field or in some other subject or activity,” Ledecky said.
Sam Ruff, the school district’s director of postsecondary success, said they’ve been expanding opportunities for students to get hands-on experiences and figure out what they're interested in doing in the future.
He said it's exciting for students to find out someone well-known has the same passion as them.
“Listening to and being able to interact with an Olympian, someone who has been an exemplar of excellence for us, is going to then interact with our students, and there's just an opportunity for it to spark something for our students,” Ruff said.
Panasonic opened a $4 billion battery plant in De Soto in July and aims to hire 4,000 workers when the facility reaches full production. Officials there said they look forward to working more with USD 232 to increase STEAM education in the future.
“Having educated kids in this school district and other school districts that we're working with around the county and around the state helps all of us,” said Julie Sailors, Panasonic’s senior manager of government and community affairs.
