Engineering Summer Camp for Minority Kids Offers Them a Valuable Indoor Experience
The Summer Engineering Experience for Kids (SEEK) program was begun last summer by the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) to provide a hands-on showcase of science, technology, engineering and math to students as young as third grade. “We had to go deeper into the K-12 pipeline,” says Carl B. Mack, NSBE executive director. “Trends showed that students were turned off to STEM fields by middle school.”
The tuition-free program was funded with million-dollar grants from think tank Battelle and from equipment maker Caterpillar Inc., which also provided some of the curriculum. Last summer’s SEEK, held at a public charter school in the city’s northeast section, had about 300 participants, with another 100 on the waiting list. This year, NSBE will repeat the program for grades 3-5 and create a new one for grades 6-8 in another Washington location, and in Columbus, Ohio, where Battelle is based. It seeks to recruit more minorities for a planned high-tech corridor in central Ohio. Last year’s SEEK graduates were guaranteed a spot this summer, and about 150 are returning, says NSBE. There are plans to expand it to grades 9-12 in 2009.