When your hypothesis is chocolate, marshmallow, and graham cracker, suddenly everyone wants to be a scientist.
Event Recap: Make S’mores with the Sun!
A Fun STEM Lab for Kids — June 13, 2026 · Collingswood Community Center
On a perfect South Jersey Saturday — clear skies, low 80s — Sustainable South Jersey and Future Leaders STEM Lab welcomed a group of curious young scientists to the Collingswood Community Center for Make S’mores with the Sun!, a free hands-on STEM workshop for kids in grades 3–6.
The event grew out of a natural partnership — Future Leaders STEM Lab founder Rob O’Flaherty was a 2025 Caren Kaufman Memorial Fund grant recipient, and when the opportunity came to bring him back for this one-off workshop, it was an easy yes.
Kids kicked things off with big questions — what’s the closest star to Earth? How does sunlight become energy? True to his teaching style, Rob gave the kids something rare: creative freedom. Before anyone touched a material, every child drafted their own solar oven design, leading with imagination before craft.
With designs in hand, the group gathered their materials — tinfoil, plastic wrap, pizza boxes — and got to work building. After a focused construction session, they headed out to the Community Center’s back patio to put their ovens to the test under a brilliant June sun.
Back inside, Jenna Dune, Sales Engineer at Exact Solar, took the energy in the room and scaled it up — sharing what makes the sun so remarkable, how solar power works, and what a career in the solar industry actually looks like. For a room full of kids who had just harnessed sunlight with a pizza box, the timing couldn’t have been better.
Then came the payoff. Kids buzzed with excitement as they cracked open their ovens and discovered that the science had done its job — perfectly melted s’mores, earned by their own hands and a little help from 93 million miles away. Who doesn’t love eating their homework?
The day carried special meaning with Caren Kaufman’s parents in attendance, there to witness exactly the kind of moment her legacy was built to create — young people discovering that environmental education can be hands-on, joyful, and yes, pretty delicious.