Coming October 2025
About
Jazz Lab™ 2.0 brings hands-on creativity and real-world skills into middle schools that need it most. Designed for rural and under-resourced districts, this mobile, one-day STEAM experience blends live jazz, science, and design to spark curiosity and show how classroom learning connects to future careers.
Building on the success of Jazz Lab™ Mobile, this next phase sharpens delivery, strengthens CTE partnerships, and expands access — with a stronger focus on career readiness and transferable skills.
Each 4-hour session engages up to 60 students (ages 11–14) through rotating, immersive stations where artistic expression meets STEM learning and workforce exploration.
All sessions are led by trained STEAM professionals who combine technical expertise with culturally responsive, student-centered instruction. Lunch is included, along with time for reflection, dialogue, and creative processing.
Jazz Lab™ 2.0 sparks early interest in CTE pathways by introducing students to real tools, real concepts, and real collaboration—mirroring the dynamics of creative industries. Its mobile format ensures equitable enrichment accessfor students in Licking and Fairfield counties—regions often left out of statewide STEM initiatives. It also enables data collection and storytelling to inform scalable models for middle school career exploration across Ohio.
By meeting students where they are—emotionally, academically, and geographically—Jazz Lab™ 2.0 delivers a joyful, high-energy approach to workforce readiness that builds creative confidence for the long haul.
Jazz Lab™ 2.0 Sessions
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Sciences of Sound
SCIENCE
Students step inside the music to explore the physics behind rhythm and harmony. With instruments like guitar, upright bass, drums, and even their own voices, they investigate vibration, energy, pitch, timbre, and resonance through hands-on demonstrations and interactive stations. This lab connects science to sound while showing how harmony isn’t just musical—it’s about collaboration and community.
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Improvisational Design
ENGINEERING
From cardboard and rubber bands to string and tape, students transform everyday materials into original sound-making devices. Working in small teams, they prototype, test, and refine their creations, discovering how rhythm provides structure and harmony emerges through collaboration. The lab ends with a noisy, joyful jam session — a middle school symphony of invention.
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Virtual Reality Musicmaking
TECHNOLOGY
Students jump into the future of music-making with the Virtuoso VR app. In this immersive lab, they use rhythm and harmony to design loops, layer sounds, and create virtual instruments made of light and code. Along the way, they learn how technology is shaping the music of tomorrow — and how teamwork and imagination drive innovation.
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Pixel Beats Lab
ENGINEERING + TECHNOLOGY
Video game soundtracks take center stage as students become the music team for a game level. Using beat pads, they compose and layer rhythms that change the energy of familiar gameplay. By syncing their creations to video clips, students see how rhythm and harmony shape emotion, action, and storytelling in games — and practice the same collaboration skills used by professional composers.
Stephanie Matthews, Executive Director, A Tribe for Jazz
“At a time when too many students in rural and under-resourced communities are left out of meaningful STEAM opportunities, our goal is simple: light the spark of curiosity, connect it to opportunity, and show students in every corner of Ohio that they belong in the future of innovation.”
Meet Our Partners
What Our Partners are Saying
Jennifer Blackstone, Assistant Superintendent, Eastland-Fairfield Career & Technical Schools
“Jazz Lab™ 2.0 gives middle school students a hands-on, creative way to see how their interests can connect to real opportunities in STEAM fields. By meeting students early with engaging, immersive experiences, we’re helping them build confidence and envision pathways that can carry them into high school, higher education, and beyond.”
Jayme Blackstone, Career Development Coordinator, C-TEC of Licking County
“For career tech educators, Jazz Lab™ 2.0 creates a positive, exploratory environment where middle school students can begin connecting creativity to career pathways. “By meeting them with music and imagination, we can ignite interest in design, technology, and engineering — and help students envision futures they hadn’t imagined."
Contact us.
Interested in bringing Jazz Lab™ 2.0 to your school or program, or want to learn more about collaboration opportunities? We’d be glad to connect. Please reach out, and a member of our team will follow up promptly.