Paving the Path – A Mentoring Program for Community College Transfer Students
The Silicon Valley ACS is piloting a mentoring program for prospective chemistry transfer students!
The main objective of the Paving the Path (PTP) program is to help students from underrepresented groups in STEM transition from community colleges to 4-year institutions. The program includes 1-on-1 mentoring as well as group forums involving all program participants to focus on financial literacy, building confidence and community, personal and career development, and professional networking.
Long term, the goal is to help build a system of support and resources for chemistry transfer students from community colleges in our region. For their participation, each student will be awarded $100 toward costs associated with their transfer applications.
Could you recommend prospective transfer students who would benefit from this program? Please send their names and email addresses to ptp@svacs.org. Feel free to reach out to us with any questions, comments, or suggestions so that we can better serve our chemistry community!
Tech Trek
Tech Trek is a one-week, residential science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) camp designed to develop interest, excitement, and self-confidence in young women who will enter eighth grade in the fall. It features hands-on activities in math, science, and related fields. All sleeping, eating, instructional, and recreational facilities are located on a university campus where camps are held. This is an American Association of University Women (AAUW) sponsored event that the ACS Silicon Valley Section helps support.
For the Tech Trek camp held at Stanford University, the girls do many different STEM-based activities including robotics, math, bay science cruises, biology and, of course, chemistry. There is a day-time chemistry lecture, and the ACS Silicon Valley Section provides a hands-on lab experience on Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 6-10pm. Each night, two lab sessions for 40 girls, for a total of 80 girls each week, are held. The latest experiment performed is a semi-quantitative titration of the vitamin C content in orange juice, lemonade, and Red Bull energy drink. Below are images from Tech Trek 2019.
