Hooking them young: Demystifying computer science and technology among underprivileged high school students

This paper examines three different programs to engage refugee, immigrant and underrepresented high school students for a semester-long college campus experience in the field of science, technology and computing. The college is a liberal arts college that values service to the community and is situated in Manchester NH, a refugee resettlement area. The three STEM programs are part of the Access Academy run by the college's center for community engagement. The Access Academy aims to help refugee, immigrant, and underrepresented students graduate high school, and to help them with the college application process. The STEM component is one of the four focus areas of the academy. The goal of the STEM programs is to expose the participants to science, computing, and technology and to broaden their perspective on the importance of these fields in today's world. The paper discusses three different programs: (i) Biodiversity Mapping using GPS technologies; (ii) Computer Construction; and (iii) A Computational Approach to Problem Solving. Surveys, as well as in-depth interviews were used to measure student attitude toward STEM disciplines. Although these were only preliminary surveys, most students seemed to have increased their interest in the STEM fields as well as their interest in pursuing a college degree. These programs were easy to setup and could be replicated at other institution across the country.