YSA Initiative Description
This will be year four of the Young Scientist of America outreach initiative, where members of engineering undergraduate organizations assist area middle and high school Science Olympiad coaches with Science Olympiad events. Van Valaskey and Gary Graper, special assistants to the engineering dean for Young Scientists of America outreach coordination, are responsible for connecting the area schools with engineering organizations.
Our Engineering School Dean, Paul Peercy, is very supportive of this outreach. He is again willing to help in the following way:
- The Engineering College will provide vans for engineering student groups to use to travel to the area schools. The dates for meeting will be a joint decision between the area coaches and the student engineering groups assigned to their school.
- The Engineering College will give an organization $10 per hour per person for either advising or mentoring events prior to the Wisconsin Science Olympiad competition on April 12. Travel time is also included in the hourly rate.
- The maximum contribution to any engineering organization working at an assigned school is $1000.
Engineering organization members can help by either serving as an advisor or a mentor to the students. An advisor is primarily responsible for coaching a particular event, which includes being the primary resource person, acquiring needed materials and helping the students stay on task and set goals for future meetings. A mentor is not the primary coach, but helps students stay on task and set goals for future meetings. The number of engineering students from an organization needed at a school will vary, but groups can volunteer with as few as two people; however, groups of approximately six are ideal. Eight visits are required between October and April 12, so there is plenty of time to get the minimum number of visits in. Many groups exceed the minimum, but it is not necessary.
If you are a member of an engineering organization and are interested in getting your group involved, then arrange for a contact person in your organization and have that person communicate with Van Valaskey and Gary Graper by sending an email with your intent to participate to: veval@tds.net. Either Van or Gary will be in touch with you about how to proceed with your involvement.