NSBE’s Summer Engineering Experience For Kids Expands To 15 Cities IN 2017: $2-Million NSF Grant Supports Efforts to Boost Minority Representation in STEM

NSBE

May 15, 2017

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) has announced the dates and locations of its 2017 Summer Engineering Experience for Kids (SEEK) programs. SEEK, now in its 11th year, is the nation’s largest summer engineering program geared toward African-American pre-college students. The program is in the midst of a large, three-year expansion funded by a $2-million grant from the National Science Foundation to NSBE and its project partners, Purdue University and Virginia Tech. SEEK, NSBE’s free, signature out-of-school-time program, will take place in June, July and August this year, at 15 sites in 14 cities across the U.S.

“The SEEK expansion will allow NSBE to make a resounding impact on the nation as we move toward our 10-year strategic goal,” said NSBE National Chair Matthew C. Nelson. NSBE is leading the concerted effort to graduate 10,000 African-American engineers with bachelor’s degrees annually by 2025, a nearly threefold increase over the 2014 total. “Thanks to our dedicated partners, we can expose many more black children to STEM careers, providing the U.S. more of the engineering talent it sorely needs while simultaneously strengthening African-American communities across the country.”

SEEK participants engage in team-based, competitive engineering design activities and learn science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) concepts, under the guidance of mentor-instructors, many of whom are collegiate members of NSBE. More than 18,000 students in grades 3–12, more than 20,000 parents and more than 2,800 mentors have participated in SEEK since its launch in Washington, D.C., in 2007. The engineering design activities for the children and teens are provided by SAE International (formerly the Society of Automotive Engineers) — NSBE’s curriculum partner in SEEK since 2007 — and by numerous other organizations. The program enjoys the support of a broad base of corporate, government and nonprofit partners.

NSBE Executive Director Karl W. Reid, Ed.D. is the principal investigator of the NSBE-Purdue-Virginia Tech project, which is titled “Strengthening the STEM Pipeline for Elementary School African Americans, Hispanics, and Girls by Scaling Up Summer Engineering Experiences.” The NSF grant will be used to expand the SEEK program to 31 sites and 27,000 African-American, Hispanic and female third through fifth graders across the U.S., by 2019. The project will measure: the effectiveness of SEEK in improving the students’ STEM-related skills, attitudes and knowledge; the relationship of those qualities to the students’ academic motivation; and the effect of organizational context factors on the students’ STEM experiences and outcomes.

“We look forward to the knowledge that will be gained from this project and to the positive results we will see for aspiring engineers,” said Dr. Reid.

A listing of the SEEK programs for 2017 follows. More information about SEEK is available at www.nsbe.org/seek.

2017 SUMMER ENGINEERING EXPERIENCE FOR KIDS

Current Cities                                    Start Date                   End Date
Ascension Parish, La.                         June 19                       July 7
Atlanta, Ga. (All-Female)                    June 12                       June 30
Birmingham, Ala.                                June 12                       June 30
Chicago, Ill.                                         July 17                        August 4
Detroit, Mich.                                       July 24                        August 11
Houston, Texas                                   June 12                       June 30
Jackson, Miss. (All-Female)                June 26                       July 14
Kansas City, Mo.                                 June 5                         June 23
Los Angeles, Calif.                              June 26                       July 14
New Orleans, La.                                June 12                       June 30
Oakland, Calif.                                    June 19                       July 7
Pittsburgh, Pa.                                    July 3                          July 21
Sacramento, Calif. (Twin Rivers)        June 19                       July 7                        
Sacramento, Calif. (Sac City)             July 17                         August 4
Saginaw, Mich.                                   July 24                         August 11
Washington, D.C.                                July 24                         August 11

ABOUT NSBE
With more than 500 chapters and nearly 16,000 active members in the U.S. and abroad, the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) is one of the largest student-governed organizations based in the United States. NSBE, founded in 1975, supports and promotes the aspirations of collegiate and pre-collegiate students and technical professionals in engineering and technology. NSBE’s mission is “to increase the number of culturally responsible black engineers who excel academically, succeed professionally and positively impact the community.” For more information, visit www.nsbe.org.

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