This research explores the design, implementation, and evaluation of a course aimed at reinforcing soft skills within the applied STEM field. The “STEMM Games” course, conducted at Collegio R. Einaudi and Collegio CAMPLUS, engaged students in diverse STEM disciplines through a series of meticulously designed games. The multifaceted evaluation approach, within two cohorts, integrated quantitative data from the Soft Skills Self-evaluation Questionnaire, game data analysis, and qualitative insights from post-course questionnaires and focus groups. The quantitative analysis of 3SQ data unveiled a diverse range of self-perceived soft skills among participants, emphasizing the course's success in fostering nuanced perceptions of individual strengths and weaknesses. Game data analysis provided insights into the impact of gamification on soft skills development, highlighting improvements in engagement, team-work, and problem-solving skills. Qualitative inputs enriched the understanding of students' experiences, revealing unexpected expectations in the second edition related to the course's name, “STEMM Games.” The results and subsequent discussion emphasized the course's success in enhancing self-awareness, collaboration, and student engagement in the applied STEM context. The study provides valuable insights for refining future editions, addressing specific feedback for continuous improvement. The iterative nature of the study allows for adaptability, ensuring relevance in evolving educational landscapes within the STEM domain. Overall, this research contributes to the growing body of literature on innovative pedagogies in STEM education and provides practical insights for educators seeking to nurture well-rounded STEM professionals equipped with essential soft skills.

The “Increasing Gender Diversity in STEM” project involved six different partner universities around Europe. The scope of the project was to investigate the gender difference in self-perception of students in relation to their career choice. This was done through a web-based app, ANNA tool, that allows high school students to match their own personality, views, and expectations to those of engineering students and professional engineers. In the meantime, the data collection gave the opportunity to take a look at how students perceive their university and undergraduate program. This pilot application is then been further studied in order to analyse its scalability in other countries with broader STEM content.

This project aims to implement a Remote European Asian Lab, an Automatic Control remote laboratory, in the joint academic cooperation framework between two universities located in Europe and Central Asia. Emphasis is given to the inclusive solution of a shared teaching facility and its learning achievements into a bachelor course (Uzbekistan) and a master course (Italy) to foresee a better education quality. The different cultural and social contexts allow (a) the evaluation of the effect obtained by introducing a remote laboratory experience in a course entirely theoretical, and (b) the shift from a physical laboratories experience to a remote one. Students are first introduced to this laboratory by the lecturer in dedicated classes. Then students can independently access it 24/7 by simply booking a specific station for a time slot. From the analysis comes out that remote laboratory experiences positively impact learning achievements. The benefits of the remote environment are perfectly comparable with the ones obtained from the physical laboratory activities.

The aims of this study were to investigate age-related changes in total body skeletal muscle mass (TBSMM) and the between-limb asymmetry in lean mass in a large sample of adults. Demographic, anthropometric, and DXA-derived data of National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey participants were considered. The sample included 10,014 participants of two ethnic groups (Caucasians and African Americans). The age-related decline of TBSMM absolute values was between 5% and 6% per decade in males and between 4.5% and 5.0% per decade in females. The adjustment of TBSMM for body surface area (TB-MAXI) showed that muscle mass peaked in the second decade and decreased progressively during the subsequent decades. The following thresholds were identified to distinguish between low and normal TB-MAXI: (i) 10.0 kg/m² and 11.0 kg/m² in Caucasian and African American females; and (ii) 12.5 kg/m² and 14.5 kg/m² in Caucasian and African American males. The lean asymmetry indices were higher for the lower limbs compared with the upper limbs and were higher for males compared with females. In conclusion, the present study proposes the TB-MAXI and lean asymmetry index, which can be used (and included in DXA reports) as clinically relevant markers for muscle amount and lean distribution.

This paper summarizes the design, the activities performed and the main results achieved by an innovative teaching program, set-up for the talented freshmen in Engineering Bachelor's courses at an Italian technical University, the Politecnico di Torino, Italy, starting from 2013. The project structure is here detailed, year-by-year, with a focus on both the reinforcement of an Engineering standard curriculum, and to the hybrid activities, also in non-technical areas, such as soft-skills, critical thinking, humanities, and creativity. The strategies and methods for the students' selection have been discussed, and the University human resource efforts and the costs involved are justified. The results achieved during a three-year experience, based on structured survey to collect students' feedback, are then critically analysed with the purpose to suggest implementation and further development.

Achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls are part of the ultimate global challenge (Goal 5 of SDGs). The gender balance in STEM education is a challenge that has both horizontal and vertical dimensions. This paper focuses only on the first one. Politecnico di Torino, an Italian technical university with Engineering and Architectural courses, has a long history of attraction campaigns aiming to reduce the gender gap in its engineering enrolment. Despite these efforts, more remains to be done for the student population and high-level academic positions. During the academic year 2018/19, considering the engineering first-year enrolled students (around 4500), 25% were female, and a new innovative project was set, “WeAreHERe”. This campaign aims to introduce a new vision to overcome both recruitment and retention: the female students become the main actors of the project by a guided training that let establish them as fresh role models. The use of social media and new technology support this storytelling and reach a variety of Italian girls. In this paper, the structure of “WeAreHERe” is described with some data analysis of its impact.