HR: 1340h
AN: ED23B-1290    [Abstracts]
TI: Young Engineers and Scientists (YES) - A Science Education Partnership
AU: * Boice, D C
EM: DBoice@swri.edu
AF: Southwest Research Institute, 6220 Culebra Road P.O. Drawer 28510, San Antonio, TX 78238-5166, United States
AU: Asbell, H E
EM: ElaineAsbell@nisd.net
AF: J. Jay High School Science and Engineering Academy, 7611 Marbach Road, San Antonio, TX 78227, United States
AU: Reiff, P H
EM: Reiff@rice. edu
AF: Rice University, Physics and Astronomy Department 6100 Main Street, Houston, TX 77005,
AB: Young Engineers and Scientists (YES) is a community partnership between Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), and local high schools in San Antonio, Texas (USA). YES has been highly successful during the past 15 years and YES 2K7 continued this trend. The YES program provides talented high school juniors and seniors a bridge between classroom instruction and real world, research experiences in physical sciences (including space science and astronomy) and engineering. YES consists of two parts: 1) an intensive three-week summer workshop held at SwRI where students experience the research environment first-hand; develop skills and acquire tools for solving scientific problems, attend mini-courses and seminars on electronics, computers and the Internet, careers, science ethics, and other topics; and select individual research projects to be completed during the academic year; and 2) a collegial mentorship where students complete individual research projects under the guidance of their mentors during the academic year and earn honors credit. At the end of the school year, students publicly present and display their work, acknowledging their accomplishments and spreading career awareness to other students and teachers. YES 2K7 developed a website for the Magnetospheric Multiscale Mission (MMS) from the perspective of 20 high school students (yesserver.space.swri.edu). Over the past 15 years, all YES graduates have entered college, several have worked for SwRI, and three scientific publications have resulted. Student evaluations indicate the effectiveness of YES on their academic preparation and choice of college majors. Acknowledgements: We acknowledge funding and support from the NASA MMS Mission, SwRI, Northside Independent School District, and local charitable foundations.
UR: http://yesserver.space.swri.edu
DE: 0800 EDUCATION
DE: 0805 Elementary and secondary education
DE: 0855 Diversity
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting