About
STEM Venturing Crew 111 is a Scouting America Venturing crew with a science, technology, engineering, and math focus. Our goal is simple: be a third space for young adults in Newburgh, NY, where they can dig into STEM topics at their own level, with friends, in a way that lines up with the values of Scouting.
Venturing is co-ed and open to young people ages 14 (or 13 and finished with eighth grade) through 20. You don’t need any Scouting experience to join.
Our chartered organization
The crew is chartered by Newburgh Creates, a nonprofit STEM and art studio in Newburgh. Our program meetings and most of our adventures happen at the Newburgh Creates studio at 113 Liberty St, and the crew has access to the studio’s robots, 3D printers, and tools.
How the crew works
Venturing crews are run by their youth officers. Our officers plan each month’s topic, lead the meetings, and decide where the adventures go. Adult advisors support them, handle safety and paperwork, and help with logistics.
Each month follows the same rhythm:
- Officer meeting on the first or second Thursday, 6 to 8 PM, online. The officers plan the month’s topic.
- Program meeting on the third or fourth Thursday, 6 to 8 PM, at Newburgh Creates. Everyone gets an introduction to the topic and starts building.
- Tier I adventure on the first Sunday afternoon of the following month, 2 to 5 PM, at Newburgh Creates or wherever the topic takes us.
As the crew grows, we’ll add longer Tier II and Tier III adventures, like campouts and overnight trips.
What we’ve done
Our first season ran from February through June 2026:
- Geocaching: a planning meeting and then a Sunday hunt.
- Engineering, marble runs, and Rube Goldberg machines: a build night at the studio, then a trip to the Engineering Expo in White Plains, NY, which hosts a Rube Goldberg competition every year.
- Robotics with XRP: a build night with the studio’s XRP robots, a trip to watch the Norwalk Havoc Robot League, and a Tier “1.5” adventure at the Digital Rally.
- 3D printing and a summer planning session.
- Rank ceremony at LEGOLAND and an end-of-year party at the studio.
What’s next
Topics on the list for future months, subject to what the crew wants to do: mBots and XGO robot dogs, video game design, Raspberry Pi computing, building retro game consoles, RC cars and obstacle course racing, Pybricks, Minecraft mods, a trip to a data center, a renewable energy campout, and competing in the Norwalk Havoc Robot League ourselves. Service project ideas include setting up a geocaching event and building trackables and puzzle caches for the community.
Adult leadership
- Institutional head: Jason Otero, Newburgh Creates
- Chartered organization representative: Dave Long
- Committee chair: Sandy Owens
- Advisor: James Amodio
- Associate advisor: Nicole Parisi-Amodio
All adult leaders are registered with Scouting America and complete Youth Protection Training.