Program connects young minds with learning at Boys & Girls Club (Lowell Sun, Massachusetts)
At a STEAM makerspace in Billerica, Mass., hands-on experiences with cutting-edge technology stimulate students’ love of learning. Created by the local Boys & Girls Club and supported by corporate technology donations, the STEAM Center gets its name from a popular acronym for curricula that combine science, technology, engineering, arts and math. Students discover these subjects by building everything from self-sustaining aquariums to analog analyzers. “It’s almost like they’re learning things, without knowing they’re learning,” program teacher Bobby Ackroyd told the Lowell Sun. “If a kid is doing something and then gaining an experience, then they’ll remember the scientific [principles] behind it.”
Grassroots program helps low-income, high-achieving Delaware students blossom (WHYY, Delaware)
In Wilmington, Del., a middle school teacher created an afterschool program to help his low-income, high-achieving students access top-quality high schools. Leading Youth through Empowerment, or LYTE, now aids 95 students across Wilmington schools with guidance on everything from preparing to take entrance exams to filling out financial aid forms. Ankur Arya was inspired to create the program because securing a scholarship to a top-tier high school made a big difference in his own life. The pathways to high school turn into pathways to college: A recent ceremony attended by Wilmington’s mayor celebrated the nearly $1 million in college scholarships and aid the program’s first high school graduates have qualified for. “We are so proud of those students,’’ Arya told WHYY.
At harbor island camp, teens train to be civic leaders (Boston Globe, Massachusetts)
In Boston, nearly 100 teens are spending their summers learning how to create change in their communities. Camp Harbor View added a civics course for its high schoolers who are training to mentor the camp’s 900 younger students. Students benefit from open discussion of social issues that affect their lives, including racism, classism, gun violence, and housing. Mayor Martin Walsh recently visited and led a discussion. “I know that how I was raised, and how a lot of these kids around camp are raised, they’re meant for greater things, and they’re meant for these types of movements,” 15-year-old trainee Laisha Pichardo told The Boston Globe.
Enabling young leaders: Waco's Freedom School grows, shows progress (Waco Tribune-Herald, Texas)
When Waco Mayor Kyle Deaver read a book about desegregation to more than 50 students attending Baylor’s Freedom School, he joined a national summer learning effort that emphasizes the connection between literacy and civic engagement. An initiative of the Children’s Defense Fund, summer “Freedom Schools” serve 160,000 students nationwide. By emphasizing culturally relevant literature and civic education, the programs aim to combat summer learning loss and inspire student confidence. It pays off: last year 97 percent of Baylor Freedom School students maintained or increased their reading abilities. Freedom School Executive Director Lakia Scott told The Waco Tribune she hopes students see “they’re not just children but they are change agents because of how smart they are and how much power they hold within themselves.”