Partnering with a promising future

So much of what we do is aimed at helping young people get a strong start in their careers. This includes several examples of activities and programs that occur on campus over the summer.

One of our newest summer programs is the Allentown Partnership, which offers rising high school juniors from the Allentown School District an opportunity to experience college through classes, student life activities and discussion groups.

Classes include lessons in the environmental, geographical and geological sciences, mathematics, computer science and statistics. This three-week residential program also enables Bloomsburg University students to develop leadership and mentoring skills while serving as counselors. In its first year, the partnership, which was hosted in July, featured a creatively designed curriculum that blended activities, workshops and experiential learning programs to excite and prepare these high school juniors for college. Several of our own students were key to this inaugural program’s success.

As counselors they were responsible for fostering a healthy environment for the Allentown students and led programs that addressed basic health and safety skills, university services and personal growth.

Part of our mission as a public university is service to our community, our region and the commonwealth. We were pleased to welcome this group of students this summer and open the doors of higher education for them.

STEM program targets local high achievers

Bloomsburg University recently welcomed a group of top high school sophomores from Bloomsburg, Central Columbia and Berwick Area school districts to campus for their first taste of our Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Magnet program. Eighteen academically talented students were admitted for the program’s first year.

Students in the STEM Magnet program have enrolled together in five courses — two each during fall 2013 and spring 2014 and one during January 2014 — and earn a total of 15 credits. They will earn 15 additional credits during their second year in the program.

This summer the students are going through a short orientation, meeting some of the faculty, talking with a few college mentors and getting to know each other better through a series of Quest team-building exercises. The STEM program heads to the classroom and lab this fall.

The two-year program will focus on engineering, but also will give students interested in math or other sciences the tools needed to be successful in college. Classes will include Computer Science, Coding, Engineering Sampler, Engineering Seminar, Calculus I or II, Physics I, Physics II, Technical Writing, Economics and Ethics.

College graduates with degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics are in great demand, but nearly half of students majoring in these fields fail to complete their degrees. Local superintendents have expressed a need for this type of program to help students prepare for the rigors of these majors and to meet the needs of local employers.

To be eligible, sophomores in Bloomsburg, Central Columbia and Berwick Area high schools must have taken Algebra I and II, Geometry and two years of science. They also must have a positive recommendation from their science or math teacher, at least a 95 percent attendance record and a commitment to enroll in the program for both their junior and senior years of high school. A panel reviewed all applications this past spring.