Weekly Media Roundup: April 26, 2017

After-School Programs Merit Support (Omaha World-Herald, Nebraska)

Jeff Cole, network lead for afterschool program Beyond the Bells, and Catherine Lang, director of the Nebraska Business Development Center at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, outline how afterschool programs are building the workforce of the future in the Omaha World-Herald: “Nebraska’s after-school and summer programs are helping grow a new kind of workforce: one that is STEM-literate, entrepreneurial and innovative. Through partnerships with community experts, kids in Nebraska’s after-school programs from Omaha to Sidney are learning how to extract DNA from strawberries, build and program robots, launch new businesses, develop coding skills – and much more…. Supporting after-school programs in general and after-school STEM programs in particular is a healthy, smart investment in our communities’ futures.”  

Blankets for Bogota (Klamath Falls Herald and News, Oregon)

Around 20 students in Ponderosa Middle School’s afterschool program are combining their math and art skills to help a suffering community. The students are making blankets to send to Bogota, Colombia, to help those who survived recent floods and landslides. “It’s fun making the blankets and I like that it’s going to go to somebody in need,” eighth-grader Serenity Best told the Klamath Falls Herald and News. Instructors will help the students research the city of Bogota and Colombia and study the impact of flooding on families in the country, and students will include photos of themselves along with the blankets to add a personal touch to the transfer.

Programs Benefit Kids (Deseret Morning News, Utah)

About 100 business leaders, educators and politicians came together last week to discuss the need for further investment in afterschool programs in Utah. “It’s really a low-cost way for kids to be able to stay engaged during those critical after-school hours, but also learn to be better citizens,” Utah Afterschool Network executive director Kelly Riding told the Deseret News. The meeting was partially in response to President Trump’s budget proposal, which would eliminate funding for the 21st Century Community Learning Center program. A loss of funding could impact about 57,000 Utah students.

Tiny Camdenton Is Home to One of Missouri’s Best High School Robotics Programs (St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Missouri)

Camdenton High School isn’t just known for football anymore – in the past few years, afterschool robotics have taken the school district by storm. The program is so popular that one in 14 students districtwide is somehow involved in afterschool robotics and the elementary schools hold a lottery to select participants. The program has inspired many of its graduates to pursue STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) after they leave high school – 92 percent of its students go on to either study STEM in college or go directly to working in a STEM field, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Afterschool Ambassador Sherry Comer is the afterschool director for the Camdenton district.