Quester Supports Hoover’s STEM Quests
Quester is an award-winning market research firm based in Windsor Heights that boasts a portfolio of national clients like Samsung and Frito-Lay. It’s also got potential as something of a satellite campus for Hoover High’s STEM Academy.
“Since the start of second semester, we have had about a dozen kids from the STEM academy meeting at Quester for pizza and conversations about employee stories, App development, market research and innovation and creativity in the workplace,” said Maureen Griffin, who directs the academy at Hoover. “It is just another great example of how business and schools can work together to create unique learning for our kids – kind of an extension of our STEM BEST award.”
That’s a grant that Hoover was awarded last fall, the second one bestowed upon it by Iowa’s STEM Advisory Council.
Bob Lewis is the baby-boomer owner of Quester and he reached out to Griffin because he is passionate about creating incubators for budding millennial minds.
“I’ve done a lot of research about boomers and millennials,” he said from his office Wednesday afternoon, “and I’m convinced that we have a lot in common.”
So the old school guy with the new school approach opened up his offices to give students a good look at how a forward-thinking 21st century workplace conducts its business. There aren’t any time-clocks for Quester’s 32 employees (23 of them are millennials) to punch and there aren’t too many rules either, according to Lewis. That policy has extended to the Hoover students when they visit. Sometimes they bake cookies, a metaphoric exercise that’s about mixing ingredients and creating something good. They have the run of the place while they’re there.
Wednesday was their last get together of this get-to-know-each-other year and it was both emotional and surprising. Lewis choked up a little when he thanked the students for accepting his invitation and announced that Quester is awarding $1,000 scholarships to James Munoz, Seherzada Salkonovic and Jonathan Le; three seniors who’ve been regulars in the free-wheeling weekly spitball sessions that sound like the sort of thing that goes on at the corporate campuses of cutting edge firms like Google and Apple. In addition, James will work a paid internship at Quester this summer.
Things have gone so well this semester that Lewis and Griffin won’t wait until midyear to rev the relationship back up next year. Plans are already underway to hit the ground running when school starts in the fall. And Lewis wants to challenge other area businesses to open themselves up to students like Quester has. “I’m not sure what I expected from this,” he said, “but this experience has exceeded it.”
At Quester artificial intelligence, or AI, is a key component in the toolkit. But there’s a human element at work in the company’s headquarters that feels homey to Griffin and her protégés. The weekly sessions will be suspended over the summer but an open house policy will remain in effect for inquiring Husky minds that want to stay in touch. That sounds like an intelligent idea – for real.