The U.S. workforce landscape is changing as technologies advance and Artificial Intelligence continues to impact job and education territories. The education technology company, YouScience, is keeping up with the times, guiding students on how to prepare for college and advanced careers, while re-skilling and up-skilling a workforce for industries needing to fill jobs. On this episode, YouScience Co-founder Edson Barton and Joseph Watt, Vice President of ECMC Group, discuss how the two organizations are building on the education to workforce movement.

Edson Barton, Founder and CEO of YouScience and founder of Industry Certifications

As a 25-year EdTech veteran, he leads YouScience as it revolutionizes the personalization of career education—bridging the edtech and talent tech markets and solving critical education-to-workforce issues such as the skills gap and program equity and diversity. By providing students a more direct and tangible way to connect their education to their future careers, YouScience improves academic outcomes including high school graduation rates and postsecondary enrollment and completion rates.

As a leader in the education technology industry, Edson has been quoted in numerous reports and media articles, most notably in Forbes, US World & News Report, MSN, and eSchool News.

Prior to leading YouScience, Edson was the CEO and co-owner of ProCert Labs, a standards alignment and validation organization, and served as a senior director with Certiport where he oversaw client activities for Adobe, Autodesk, Intuit, and Microsoft, including worldwide publisher channels. Additionally, he was a sales vice president for Imergent and the executive director for Kids Voting Utah.

Joseph Watt, Vice President at ECMC Group and Managing Director of EIF

Joe grew up in the rural Midwest, where he was inspired daily by his mother’s commitment to educating others, going above and beyond to reach her students, especially those who came from difficult family circumstances. After graduating high school with a class of 40 students, then joining a student body of more than 40,000 at the University of Illinois, and finally completing graduate school at Duke University, he has experienced firsthand the wide variations, challenges and ultimately, the transformative impact of education across a multitude of learning environments.

Shortly after joining ECMC Group, Joe co-led the creation of the Education Impact Fund, driven by the opportunity to utilize patient, impact-aligned capital to propel transformative educational outcomes. By investing in scalable ventures that are addressing educational inequities and empowering underserved and overlooked groups, Joe aims to further demonstrate the strong correlation between long-term impact and outsized financial returns, thereby, inspiring increased investment in impactful educational change.

Before ECMC Group, Joe’s experience spans corporate strategy, M&A, private equity and investments within the technology and education sectors. He is a graduate of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, where he was an Impact Investing Fellow, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He lives outside of Durham, North Carolina, with his wife, son and dog.

Utah is entering a new era of battery powered air travel with electric air taxis expected to take to the skies in the next few years. In this episode, we join the launch of Project Alta, known as Air Logistics Transportation Alliance, a partnership between Utah aerospace industry organization 47G and aircraft manufacturer Beta Technologies. Guests Emma Davis, a flight test engineer with Beta Technologies and Utah Senator Chris Wilson discuss the new aircraft and the future of electric aviation in Utah.

Emma Davis is a flight test engineer at Beta Technologies based in Burlington, Vermont. She is a Utah State University graduate in mechanical engineering and for fun she flies helicopters. Davis has loved planes since she was a child and says the coolest thing about flying in the new electric aircraft, Alia, is the view. Chris Wilson (Republican Party) is a member of the Utah State Senate representing District 2 since 2023. Sen. Wilson grew up in Logan and worked at his family car dealership, Wilson Motors, and purchased the dealership in 2009

Hydrogen energy systems can provide clean, efficient and reliable power with the potential to reshape the U.S. power generation structure. On this episode, guest Joseph Hartvigsen, founder of OxEon Energy, tells his story of how he got his start from driving a tractor on his family’s farm and flying a crop plane to becoming a leader in the hydrogen energy industry while also contributing to outer space missions.

1. Joseph Hartvigsen, founder and Chief Executive Officer of OxEon Energy, grew up in northern Utah and spent his summers working on a family heritage farm in Idaho. He earned his B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Brigham Young University and his M.S. in Chemical Engineering from Iowa State University of Science and Technology.

He has produced hundreds of micro-hydro and small-hydro turbines which are currently generating megawatts of clean power for customers around the world.

Sophia Zhang and Dalia Habib want to make the world a better place and they are already being recognized for their work. On this episode they discuss their Thermo Fisher JIC, a program of Society for Science, projects that tackle water conservation and biofuels.

Sophia Yuxin Zhang is a competitive chess player and has been listed in the top 100 Women and Girls Player lists by the US Chess Federation. She’s also a competitive swimmer. “I love the feeling of challenging myself by pursuing my best time and the sense of belonging when competing for my team and cheering for or being cheered for by my teammates,” she says. She was selected as a Kid Reporter for Time for Kids in 2023 and wants to be an aeronautical engineer.

Dalia Habib loves to dance, especially hip hop and jazz. “I find delight in learning numerous choreographies and practicing them in my room, often dedicating hours to practice dance,” she says. Dalia also loves languages and is trying to become fluent in both Arabic and Japanese. She recently took up pottery and finds it both relaxing and challenging. Dalia would like to become an environmental engineer. “I aspire to… enhanc[e] human well-being on a global scale,” she says.

In this special episode of How'd You Think of That, Temple Grandin talks with two winners of the 2023 Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair - Natasha Kulviwat (Jericho High School, NY) and Saathvik Kannan (Hickman High School, MO) about their projects and the experience that lead them to STEM.

Natasha and Saathvik both took unconventional paths that ultimately led them to their dream research projects. In this episode they share their novel approaches towards a career in STEM.

Matthew Wappett is executive director of the Utah State University Institute for Disability, Research, Policy, and Practice. Grandin and Wappett discuss the institute's accomplishments and ongoing efforts to create a more inclusive society and education system.

Dr. Tess Guy recently moved from Salt Lake City and is excited to be back near the ocean. She did her undergraduate degree at the University of California, San Diego, and has spent the last 18 years in Utah waiting for a chance to get back to sea level. Tess graduated with her DVM from Washington State University/Utah State University in 2021. This is her second career after spending 10+ years as an environmental research chemist. Her special interests include radiology, sports medicine and orthopedics, preventative medicine, dermatology, behavior issues, and nutrition. Tess enjoys hiking, riding her horse, paddle boarding, painting, and conservation/environmental efforts. With her wife, Angela, she has two Great Danes, Leia and Max, a herd mix breed, named Piper, two Maine Coon mixes, Hurley and Willow, and two horses, Vader and Jen.

In this episode of How’d You of That, Grandin and Streb illuminate the process of machinery design and how it inspires dreams and brings out skills and innovations. They also share their insights on how to open doors to careers and opportunities.

MacArthur “Genius” Award-winner, Elizabeth Streb has dived through glass, allowed a ton of dirt to fall on her head, walked down (the outside of) London’s City Hall, and set herself on fire, among other feats of extreme action. Her popular book, STREB: How to Become an Extreme Action Hero (Feminist Press), was made into a hit documentary, Born to Fly directed by Catherine Gund (Aubin Pictures), which premiered at SXSW and received an extended run at The Film Forum in New York City in 2014. Streb founded the STREB Extreme Action Company in 1979. In 2003, she established SLAM, the STREB Lab for Action Mechanics, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. SLAM’s garage doors are always open: anyone and everyone can come in, watch rehearsals, take classes, and learn to fly.