BWF Student Science Enrichment Program Directors

1999 ANNUAL MEETING

The Burroughs Wellcome Fund convened program directors of the Student Science Enrichment Program on Tuesday, January 12, 1999, at the Fearrington House in Pittsboro, North Carolina. Members of the Science Education Advisory Committee, BWF staff, and Board liaisons also attended.

Martha Peck, Vice President for Programs, welcomed the group, after which Carr Agyapong, Senior Program Officer for the Student Science Enrichment Program outlined the purpose of the meeting and its objectives. Each program director described their program and provided an overview of their program accomplishments for the past year. Open discussions of issues identified by program directors at last year's meeting were lead by the 1996 award recipients and assigned advisory committee members. John Burris, chair of the committee, served as moderator of this session. The following issues were discussed at the meeting. Included are the group's input and suggestions for "best practices."

Recruitment of Students

• Jennifer Howard, Cumberland County Schools
• Karen Shafer, University of North Carolina-Wilmington
• Alice Toth, American Heart Association
• Trish Whiting, Durham Academy

Concerns with recruiting students include identifying quality participants, particularly minorities, underrepresented, or home school students who may be eligible for programs but were not readily reached with current strategies; identifying quality advisors and staff members to guide these students in the hands-on activities developed for programs; and encouraging regular attendance by student participants. The following are practices identified:

• Utilize the media to better market programs such as broadcasting information on community channels through local television stations and placing videos on these channels.
• Develop flyers and distribute them widely.
• Utilize e-mail and other electronic communications. Electronic application submission is one way to reduce paper and make applying easier for children with computers.
• Have face-to-face meetings with parents through Parent Teacher Association (PTA) or Parent Teacher Student Association (PTSA) meetings. Parents were identified as a major resource. If you have parents who are pleased with the results of your program and with their student's experience, they can be your best advocates in spreading the word about your program, encouraging other parents to enroll their students into your programs, and enrolling other siblings into the program.
• Attend and get on the agenda for meetings of professional organizations such as N.C. Biology Teachers Association.
• Understand that word-of-mouth is still one of the largest mediums to get the word out about programs.
• Have each student bring another student; keep in mind that students who enjoy the experience will likely recommend the program to their friends.
• Establish a connection with statewide programs. State level
recruitment makes it easier to locate students. For those programs not connected with a statewide program, it may be necessary to identify other resources, such as the Department for Public Instruction, the Ministerial Alliance, especially if you are interested in recruiting minority students, and other social organizations that may reach middle school and high school students.
• Provide financial incentives for students especially at the high school level if you are interested in having these students participate. Many high school students take on summer jobs, which prevent them from participating.
• Visit schools with outreach programs, and coordinate with them and other organizations to recruit students.

Program Structure: Maximizing Hands-On Activities

• Dean Briere, NC Museum of Life and Science
• Duke Johnson, SciWorks, Margaret Kepner, Grey Culbreth Middle School

Concerns in this area involve securing new and challenging mentorship opportunities for students, involving mentors in science on a more regular basis, and determining how much lecturing is too much. Some suggestions that were generated include:

• Establish relationships with mentors. This can be done by identifying the expertise of parents of students involved in your programs, and reaching out into the local community to academia and industry to seek volunteers willing to share their time and expertise.
• Identify existing programs that may have similar goals as your programs and make connections with those programs.
• Contact groups or organizations that the program director is familiar with to network and gain insight on programs they offer. Many activities can be developed as a result of these collaborations--for example business partners can come on-sight and share with students information about their career paths and what students should know about succeeding in the world of work.
• Utilize electronic mentors if your students have access to computers. The Centers for Disease Control, NASA, and other organizations have interactive websites that your students can visit.
• Consider the age of students to determine the type of activities and the curriculum of programs being offered. Studies show that people with science related careers reported that visits to museums were their most memorable informal science experiences as children. If your program is reaching middle school students, then providing hands-on activities through museum environments can be a good way to stimulate their interest in science. Also, if there is a way to reinforce what students are learning in school by offering exciting hands-on activities after school or during the summer, you will find that students will be much more receptive to the information you are trying to share.
• Involve students in all aspects of program development. In order to get students to be enthusiastic about science, it is necessary to have their buy-in. Students can identify the areas of science that are of particular interest to them, and receive research and laboratory assignments under the direction of mentors.
• Solicit and listen to student feedback concerning your program. Incorporate their suggestions as a means of "continuous quality improvements."

Program Sustainability

• Barbara Beamon, NC State Museum of Natural Sciences
• Sharon Carter, Science STARS Universe
• Jonathan Shectman, UNC Mathematics and Science Education Network
• Vicki Stocking, Duke University TIP

Concerns in this area include identifying strategies for sustaining programs, finding sources for continuation of funds, expanding programs, expanding non-school activities into school-based integrated programs, and developing a continuum of learning for SSEP students from one program to another program. To sustain any program, it was noted that advertising is a critical factor in getting the word out to keep the number of participants up. Human advertisements by students who wear tee-shirts with a program's name has proven to be effective. Discussions generated the following ideas:

• Identify resources to endow programs. This was determined to be the ideal situation for any ongoing program.
• Utilize local funds from professional societies.
• Identify federal dollars, such as the Eisenhower Funds.
• Apply for the Twenty-First Century Community Learning Center Program offered by the Department of Education.
• Tap into state funding with the Smart Start Program.
• Consider tuition-based programs.
• Utilize college students through work-study programs to garner support from local colleges and universities.
• Refine programs to adapt to students' needs to keep them coming back. This could include redesigning the curriculum to challenge students.
• Work with students to identify their peak interests.
• Show a genuine interest in the students' development by moving them from one program to another hands-on science enrichment program.
• Have interested parents request information about your programs from school officials. This will bring publicity to your programs, and will inform schools about programs that parents feel are working. This may encourage school administrators to add your program to the school curriculum.
• Partner with other organizations, such as professional societies, fraternities and sororities, ministerial alliances, welfare to work programs, and Ameri-Corp.
• Contact individuals who may have an interest in including your program into their estate planning.

• Evaluation is a key component of BWF's program and may influence grant renewal.
• Project directors must give the exact number of participants, which is essential to determine the proper response rate. If the actual student enrollment changes from the projected enrollment, this must be noted in correspondence with Horizon and BWF.
• Students should complete their evaluations, on-site. The response rates are lower for those returned by mail.
• Horizons has developed a new Project Director's survey; Iris assured the group that BWF would receive their responses on question 5 anonymously (not connected to a particular program) in order to encourage greater candor.

• Enthusiasm for science
• Understanding an appreciation of the scientific process
• Competence in science
• Career aspirations

Bob Panoff of the Shodor Foundation introduced the new website for SSEP directors, students, parents, and educators. The web address is www.shodor.org/ssep/ . We encourage all to utilize this wonderful tool. Karen Hoffman of the North Carolina Association for Biomedical Research gave an overview of her organization and the services that they can provide to SSEP directors, educators and students through the web site and through direct contact.

The meeting was adjourned around 4:15 p.m.

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