By Andrea Nelson, Associate Editor, Partnerships and Foreign Product Management

STEM, with its four branches—science, technology, engineering, and mathematics—has been a mainstay topic at Lerner for decades. Our customers and readers can’t get enough, so it was a no-brainer for us to add more STEM-related books to our Spring 2020 season.

But for some students, STEM can seem stuffy. It takes itself too seriously, what with its big fancy acronym. So, how do you present important STEM topics in a way that gets at the heart of the matter with a bit more, well, heart?

With an irreverent, orange cat. And a few of his friends.

Garfield’s Fat Cat Guide to STEM Breakthroughs

Do you know why an hour is made up of 60 minutes? Or how many ships pass through the Panama Canal each year? How about who the first scientist was? In this series, Garfield and friends take a deep dive into the four branches of STEM. Each title breaks down noteworthy discoveries, breakthroughs, and inventions and highlights some of the key figures that moved these fields forward. Garfield provides witty asides for each breakthrough, so readers can laugh as they learn.

Garfield’s Guide to Digital Citizenship

From video games to social media, people are constantly interacting with the digital world. Navigating the ins and outs of internet safety is something that everyone, especially young users, should know how to do.

In Garfield’s Guide to Digital Citizenship, Nermal is just one such user. At the start of each comic, the world’s cutest kitten is using the internet in a different way—he’s posting about his upcoming pizza party on Catbook, or trying to download a newly-released movie to watch while he’s sick. Garfield and Arlene, with the help of their online security expert, Dr. Cybrina, teach Nermal about the potential dangers involved in being part of the digital world while also providing tips, tricks, and solutions to being safe and secure online. Activities at the end of each book challenge readers to think critically about what they have read and to practice making safe choices online.