STEM Guitar, a project led in part by Purdue Polytechnic’s Mark French, was honored with the Gerhard Salinger award by the International Technology and Engineering Educators Association.

Purdue Polytechnic’s Davin Huston and Mark French, along with Kathryn Smith, a former graduate student in Huston’s lab, have created a flexible, printed circuit board that makes electric guitars better for both players and manufacturers.

February 11 is National Get Out Your Guitar Day. If you’re a Purdue student who doesn’t own a guitar, don’t fret! Purdue Polytechnic’s Mark French teaches a course in which you get to build one. He also leads a national program that teaches teachers how to lead guitar-building courses at their own schools.

With grants from the National Science Foundation’s Advanced Technological Education project, Mark French, along with two dozen other college professors and high school teachers, integrated the building of guitars with lessons in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).

Researchers are betting that high school courses in guitar making are an effective way to encourage 19,000 students to continue studying STEM subjects.

The National Science Foundation agrees, and it has awarded the same group a three-year grant to take their curriculum to technology teachers across the country. The project is titled “LEAD Guitars in STEM.”