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Session __3547__

Pathway to Higher Education: Bridging the Digital Divide

Hazem Said, Tom Wulf

College of Applied Science, University of Cincinnati

Abstract

As part of the effort to prepare future Information Technology (IT) workers, the Center for Information Technology and Community Development (CITCD) at the College of Applied Science at the University of Cincinnati established the Summer Academy of Information Technology (SAIT), a summer enrichment program that introduces high school students in under-served communities to IT. The first session of SAIT was scheduled for a two-week period. The development of the program faced several challenges in the area of recruiting students, administration, pedagogy and others. One of the main challenges in designing the program was in developing the curriculum, which had to address several focus areas of IT and be appropriate for the level of understanding of high school students from varied (and often unknown or unclear) backgrounds. Project-based learning was the pedagogical approach employed within the program. The curriculum had to be general enough to match the diverse backgrounds of the students and at the same time specific enough to enable them to finish a relevant, non-trivial IT project within the two-week time period in order for them to experience tangible proof of what they had learned and accomplished. This paper reports on the development of the SAIT and on the results of implementing it for the first SAIT session during summer 2002.

Background

The Center for Information Technology and Community Development (CITCD) at the University of Cincinnati is active in building bridges between higher education and the community along several dimensions which involve pre-college, college and post-college communities1. This paper is a description of one of the successful projects of CITCD, the Summer Academy of Information Technology (SAIT). The program provided an opportunity for high school students in under-served communities to learn about Information Technology (IT) and experience college life.

Proceedings of the 2003 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2003, American Society for Engineering Education

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Wulf, T., & Said, H. (2003, June), Pathway To Higher Education: Bridging The Digital Divide Paper presented at 2003 Annual Conference, Nashville, Tennessee. 10.18260/1-2--12276