FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 11, 2021
Black Girls Dive Foundation Launches a partnership with Infinite Scuba
BGDF and Infinite Scuba Team Up
Black Girls Dive Foundation (BGDF) has been expanding its strategic partnerships this past year to ensure that they are meeting mission critical goals and objectives by providing innovative STEM activities that empower young girls and cultivate their STEM identity. During these extraordinary times, more and more youth-based organizations are seeking to find their new normal as they navigate unchartered waters of quarantines, copious amounts of antibacterial hand wash, Clorox wipes, and social distancing. Youth service programs have been tremendously affected as face-to-face engagement has all but vanished. Yearning for strategic ways to maintain a connection with the youth to whom we provide services, necessity becomes the mother of invention to actively engage youth in mission-critical activities.
Today, Black Girls Dive Foundation announces its partnership with Cascade Game Foundry (CGF), a leader in the simulation gaming industry. This powerful collaboration enables CGF to raise awareness of ocean environmental issues to a broader and more diversified user base and BGDF to increase brand awareness to more people across the globe and provide access to innovative pedagogical tools that enable deeper learning and an opportunity for youth to explore the underwater world through Cascade Game Foundry’s diving simulation game, Infinite Scuba®. In Infinite Scuba, players do what real divers do – explore real-world locations, identify wildlife, search for sunken artifacts, take photos, clean up the reef, and manage their air and depth, while learning about dive science, local culture, and environmental issues.
About Black Girls Dive Foundation
BGDF is a non-profit entity under Section 50l (c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code that was founded in 2017. Its main office is located in Owings Mills, Maryland and has chapters in Trenton, New Jersey and Atlanta Georgia. BGDF provides education and outreach to girls who are from historically disenfranchised ethnic minority groups and/or live in communities that are underserved and under-resourced. BGDF’s mission objectives addresses three critical issues: (1) the racial and socioeconomic achievement gap that undermines our ideals of freedom, equality and opportunity; (2) limited or restricted sense of youth agency and voice; and (3) cultivating the next generation of scientists, conservationists and planetary stewards. Our work is conceptually grounded in STEM identity research that views Black women’s experience in science through a lens where one’s gender, and racial and ethnic identities affect one’s science identity.
About Cascade Game Foundry
Cascade Game Foundry (CGF™) is an independent software development team composed of experienced divers and veteran game makers who empower people to explore the world from home through video games and virtual-reality experiences for diverse audiences. CGF is a Washington-state Social Purpose Corporation (aka B Corp) whose social goals are environmental education and the promotion of STEM skills.
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Black Girls Dive Foundation and Cascade Game Foundry (CGF) are registered trademarks in the United States and/or other countries.
The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
For more information, press only:
Dr. Nevada Winrow
(443) 4BG-DIVE
president@blackgirlsdivefoundation.org
Kathie Flood, Cascade Game Foundry CEO
info@cascadegamefoundry.com
February 20, 2017
CHESAPEAKE BAY TRUST AWARDS BGDF A $6,000 GRANT FOR EDUCATION AND OUTREACH PROJECT: AFRICAN AMERICAN LIFESTYLE LIVING FOR THE ENVIRONMENT (ALL-EN Project)
OWINGS MILLS, MD – Chesapeake Bay Trust (CBT) recently awarded Black Girls Dive Foundation, Inc. (BGDF) a $6,000 grant to encourage outreach and community engagement activities that increase stewardship ethic of natural resources and on-the-ground restoration activities that demonstrate restoration techniques and engage Maryland citizens in the restoration and protection of the Chesapeake Bay and its rivers.
ALL-EN Project
African American Lifestyle Living for the Environment
The CBT grant, awarded in January, will be utilized to broaden participation of girls from underserved communities in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM), specifically E-STEM (Environmental STEM). Participants will learn about geocaching, have several Meaningful Watershed Education Experiences (MWEE), and explore marine and reef ecosystems.
“There are low participation rates of African American youth exploring what our environment has to offer and engaging in environmental science activities,” said Dr. C. Nevada Winrow, Ph.D., co-founder and BGDF president. “The ALL- EN Project (African-American Lifestyle Living for the Environment) is a major community-based initiative that exposes youth to a robust set of environmental science activities. With the support of the CBT grant, Black Girls Dive Foundation will be able to offer increased opportunities for youth to actively engage in environmental stewardship and learn about various threats to the environment through field trips and research.”
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Black Girls Dive Foundation, Inc. is a nonprofit science education organization, which exposes girls and young women to Science, Technology, Robotics, Engineering, the Arts, Mathematics and Scuba (STREAMS) through aquatic-based recreation, research and career opportunities. The foundation aims to increase African American female representation in STEM area.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 14, 2017
NONPROFIT RECEIVES RECOGNITION FROM THE SOCIETY FOR SCIENCE & THE PUBLIC FOR PROGRAM INNOVATION
Black Girls Dive Foundation, Inc. receives STEM Action grant to support girls in the aquatic sciences.
OWINGS MILLS, MD – Black Girls Dive Foundation, Inc. (BGDF) has received a STEM Action grant from the Society for Science & The Public. STEM Action Grants support organizations that aim to nurture the public’s understanding of STEM fields, spark a life-long interest in and appreciation for STEM fields through unique programming and increase participation in STEM fields of underrepresented populations.
Girls from Black Girls Dive Foundation building their Underwater Remotely Operated Vehicles
The STEM Action grant will be utilized to broaden participation of girls in STEM who are from underserved communities and are historically underrepresented in the aquatic sciences. “We are so enthusiastic about the possibilities that lay ahead for the organization and the community we serve.” said Dr. C. Nevada Winrow, Ph.D., Co-Founder and President of BGDF. “The STEM Action grant provides additional resources that allows us to broaden our impact in the community.”
Black Girls Dive Foundation has two signature programs, STREAMS (Science, Technology, Robotics, Engineering, the Arts, Mathematics and SCUBA and Scientific Diving) and CORAL (Children engaged in Ocean Research and Active Learning). These programs are designed to spark interest in the aquatic sciences and cultivate environmental stewardship. STEM learning facilitators are leading scientists and/or industry practitioners who bring cutting-edge knowledge to the learning environment.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 30, 2017
NEW NONPROFIT USES SCUBA AND AQUATIC RESEARCH TO EXPOSE BALTIMORE GIRLS & YOUNG WOMEN TO ‘STEM’ CAREERS
Black Girls Dive Foundation, Inc. receives federal grant for underwater Remote Operated Vehicles
OWINGS MILLS, MD – Black Girls Dive Foundation, Inc. (BGDF), a newly-founded, non-profit organization plans to expose Baltimore area girls and young women to aquatic-based recreation, research and career opportunities.
In June, the Office of Naval Research awarded BGDF a grant to build underwater Remote Operated Vehicles (ROV) for BGDF’s STREAMS Program. The federal grant covers the cost of ROV kits for STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) curriculum and programs in schools and through organizations across the country as part of its SeaPerch Program.
“We are grateful for the recognition of Black Girls Dive Foundation as a viable and innovative program for girls and young women and welcome the support of the Office of Naval Research for our STREAMS program, which is our first,” said C. Nevada Winrow, Ph.D., one of BGDF’s co-founders and president. “What makes us unique is that we not only embrace STEM, but recognize the importance of the Arts, Robotics and Scuba in aquatic-based sciences.”
The Foundation’s STREAMS program integrates Science, Technology, Robotics, Engineering, the Arts and Mathematics with Scuba diving by having program participants build Remote Operated Vehicles with video Recording (ROVR) capabilities to engage in introductory underwater exploration of diverse marine ecosystems and study reef behavior.
A collaborative partnership has also been established with Charm City Scuba to conduct dive checkouts and scuba certifications for all BGDF participants under the auspices of the Professional Association of Diving Instructors (PADI).
In addition to its STREAMS program, BGDF disburses scholarships for swimming classes and scuba certifications, engages in coral restoration and conservation activities, and provides mentoring and leadership in STEM. Program participants are not required to already be able to swim, but possess an interest in STEM and be local girls or young women, aged 9 years old to college-aged freshmen.
“With all our programs, our hope is to encourage African American girls to enter and excel in STEM and to provide opportunities and experiences to ultimately increase representation in aquatic-based STEM areas,” said Winrow, also a PADI-certified master diver and a John Hopkins School of Medicine-trained pediatric neuropsychologist, who founded the organization with her daughter, Taylor, a PADI- certified open water diver and Prion research associate at UC-San Diego, as well as Renita Ellis, Ph.D., a PADI-certified advanced open water diver, and retired U.S. Army veteran.
The organization is hosting its inaugural event at The National Aquarium, Saturday, September 2 at 11 a.m. Details to be determined.
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Black Girls Dive Foundation, Inc. is a nonprofit science education organization, which exposes girls and young women to Science, Technology, Robotics, Engineering, the Arts, Mathematics and Scuba (STREAMS) through aquatic-based recreation, research and career opportunities. The foundation aims to increase African American female representation in STEM area.
