Infinitely flexible, Learning Undefeated’s Drop Anywhere Labs offer secure and professional space for mobile health initiatives including COVID testing and vaccinations. The compact shipping container framework allows for easy deployment to urban environments. All units are fully self-sufficient, with power, heating/cooling, and HEPA filtration, and space for specialty refrigeration units. Laboratories can be deployed in as little as two weeks.
In 2021, when school closures halted delivery of in-person STEM programing, Learning Undefeated sprang into action to modify our Drop Anywhere Labs to serve as mobile vaccination clinics for vulnerable populations. This groundbreaking initiative was part of Washington, DC Department of Health’s Faith in the Vaccine program.
Designed to bring COVID-19 vaccinations to medically underserved parts of the city (specifically Wards 5, 7, and 8), the Faith in the Vaccine program leveraged houses of worship across the city and mobilized Black faith leaders as credible messengers, to help spread the word about the vaccine’s safety and efficacy. In this high-touch pilot program, churches personally reached out to qualified parishioners and community members, assisting seniors 65 and over in making their appointments and addressing concerns prior to their vaccine appointment. By managing appointments in this way, the program supported equitable distribution of vaccines to populations most in need and those left out of open online scheduling mechanisms.
The program was a collaboration between Learning Undefeated and DC Health, Mary’s Center, the Leadership Council for Healthy Communities, FiveMedicine, and the Black Coalition Against COVID-19.
More than 6,000 Washington, DC residents received their COVID-19 vaccine onboard Learning Undefeated’s Drop Anywhere Lab. The mobile laboratory – normally used to provide STEM education for K12 students – is a compact shipping container featuring onboard power, heating and cooling, extra HEPA filtration, vaccine refrigeration units and advanced immersive technology, such as touch-screen walls and movie-theater quality projection, light and sound.
Learning Undefeated is a non-profit organization that provides life-changing STEM experiences for nearly 50,000 students per year. Our mobile laboratory fleet includes trailers, buses, and shipping containers. All of our labs are designed to immerse and engage people with science and health.
With more than 20 years of proven STEM education experience, Learning Undefeated and the Drop Anywhere Labs can provide culturally relevant, community-based public health programs to distribute information about vaccine safety and efficacy. Onboard immersive technology makes even a short interaction very impactful, using touch-screen walls and movie-theater quality projection, light, and sound. Projectors and television monitors controlled by an on-board computer also allow for interactive presentations to be brought outdoors.
With laboratory grade equipment and adaptable presentation technology, Drop Anywhere Labs are a scalable solution for vaccine delivery, testing, and community health education.
Our very own Jennifer Colvin sat down with the #IamBIO podcast to discuss the important work of our mobile labs and how our students conquered COVID and adapted to a new STEM education environment.
In a typical school year, Maryland-based nonprofit Learning Undefeated serves over 50,000 K-12 students with immersive STEM learning onboard its fleet of mobile laboratories: tricked out trucks, shipping containers and busses that bring life-changing STEM experiences right to the school parking lot. But when the organization had to park its mobile labs due to COVID-19, Learning Undefeated quickly pivoted to developing hands-on digital experiences that would keep students and teachers connected with STEM subjects while learning at home.
WUSA-9 (DC) | More than two weeks after D.C. announced a pilot program to partner with churches to better distribute vaccines to underserved communities in the city, a second church has been added to join the initiative. So far, 321 people have been vaccinated during the program’s three clinics, according to DC Health. Outreach is done by church volunteers and community partners to congregants and residents in the community to sign them up for vaccine appointments.
USA Today | Churches have often been a cornerstone in the fight against inequities and a trusted source of information and guidance during troubled times.During the pandemic, vaccinations have become the latest public service in a health and economic crisis that has seen places of worship offer canned food, clothing, housing and other assistance. Outside, a teal mobile unit was parked near the fellowship hall. The unit provided by Learning Undefeated is usually a science lab offering students STEM lessons in underserved communities.
Sojourners | Churches are part of communities; neighbors are familiar with them. They go to services there, they’ve gotten married there, they’ve buried their elders there. It’s critical we have community pillars like this that are safe places, safe havens where people can get vaccinated. That’s what congregations are now helping to do.
WTTG (Fox-5, DC) | DC Health’s plan is to give out a hundred additional doses on Saturday to residents who have pre-registered to get the vaccine. Dr. LaQuandra Nesbitt “It’s extremely important to me that our residents in Wards 5, 7, and 8 takes the same advantage to get the vaccine as everyone else. And if that means that we partner with members of the faith community to bring the vaccine to their places of worship, and that they have the opportunity to be ambassadors for the vaccine, we’re willing to make those partnerships happen.”
WJLA (ABC-7, WJLA) | Learning Undefeated’s Drop Anywhere Labs are making a big impact in the COVID-19 vaccination effort, as part of DC Health’s “Faith in the Vaccine” program. This community-based effort to vaccinate vulnerable senior populations in Wards 5, 7, and 8 is profiled on ABC-7 news.
NBC-4 (DC) | Outside the Pennsylvania Avenue Baptist Church, a small shipping container having a big impact. It’s being used as a vaccine site for senior citizens, like Eddie and Ernestine Hamilton, as part of DC Health’s partnership with Learning Undefeated and other community groups called “Faith in the Vaccine.”
“Our Drop Anywhere Labs will provide a secure, professional laboratory space for the ‘Faith in the Vaccine’ mobile health initiative, which supports the District of Columbia in equitably distributing the COVID-19 vaccine across multiple sites in the city,” said Brian Gaines, CEO of Learning Undefeated. “As part of this wide-reaching coalition of community leaders, we’re committed to ensuring that every community in the District has access to the COVID-19 vaccine, starting with Wards 5, 7 and 8.”
Washington Post | Holding clinics on church grounds can make getting the vaccine easier for people who do not have the ability to drive to a mass vaccination clinic or who have trouble getting online to check and recheck websites, hoping for an appointment. And seeing pastors getting vaccinated can help ease people’s concerns about getting the shots. “We know the faith community has the ear of their people and are a trusted voice. For people who might be a little hesitant, to see their pastor get vaccinated builds that trust immediately.”
It’s not unusual to see a bright blue shipping container traveling around the streets of Washington, DC, but this Saturday the Drop Anywhere Lab operated by nonprofit Learning Undefeated was…