Take Five graphic for Hilltopics readership survey

Take five minutes
for the Bradley Hilltopics
readership survey!
Take the survey >

New! Read the print version online or post it in your social network

Winter 2009 • Volume 15, Issue 1

Launching interest in engineering

By ABBY WILSON ’10

Student-built rockets flew through the air one evening last June as aspiring engineers — area high school students — watched, hoping their rockets matched the flight patterns they’d spent the week predicting. Rockets have sparked interest in engineering for local students for the past six summers at the Engineering Department’s STEPS Camp (Science Technology Engineering Preview Summer Camp). Many of the students are part of Project Lead the Way (PLTW), a program in high schools nationwide that introduces students to engineering classes so they can explore the field as a possible career choice. The camp’s primary goal is to expose under-represented groups, such as females and minorities, to engineering. Mechanical Engineering professors DR. MARTY MORRIS ’77 MSME ’79, Dr. Julie Reyer, and Dr. Scott Post facilitate the academics that also include Dr. Arnold Ness and Dr. Alexy Sverdlin from the Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering and Technology Department.

STEPS offers students a week-long learning experience as they build rockets and predict their flight pattern. The week culminates in a rocket launch at Richwoods High School’s football field, where the students launch their rockets from a yard line they have calculated throughout the week at Bradley. The goal is to fly the rocket through the goalposts and have it land in a designated area. “It follows a mechanical engineering junior-level course that we have adjusted to high school students,” says RICHARD L. GREENE, MA ’71, director of Bradley’s Engineers for Tomorrow (EFT) program, a scholarship program that partners with Caterpillar to identify potential employees who receive a tuition reduction to come to Bradley, obtain their engineering degree, and then work at Caterpillar.

Greene hopes to see all of the engineering-related high school programs continue to expand in the future, particularly PLTW. Currently the program is in 87 schools in 57 Illinois cities. Greene anticipates another dozen being added in 2009, particularly in the Chicago area and southern Illinois.

View a slideshow of classes. Go >

For more information, visit pltw.org.

Launching interest in engineering

Write to the Editor