Extreme Experience Lab

National Hispanic University, San Jose CA

Investigators

Abstract

The Extreme Experience Lab program of the National Hispanic University and its Latino College Preparatory Academy, is a youth-based project designed to give 60 under-represented Hispanic high school students a two-year experience with three weekly meetings: FAB (building); LAB (data collection/measurement); and GAB (analysis and communicating) during the school year. A partnership with Overfelt High School will also enable the project to include students with disabilities. Activities include defining a problem, reducing it to a measurable experiment, fabricating apparatus, selecting probes, creating computer-controlled data collection systems, running and documenting experiments, analyzing data and communicating results. Through this format participants develop quarterly projects and then participate in a 30-hour summer intensive experience at the IBM Lab that introduces them to machine techniques, supercomputers and scientific visualization. The culminating activity is an extreme experience that connects STEM and IT content learning and skills with an intensive physical, emotional, or mental challenge. The extreme aspect of the program is designed to change the affective response of young people to science learning by combining learning, competence, and an extreme experience into a highly memorable accomplishment. In the interdisciplinary projects, science and IT concepts of scale, units, and calculations are combined with the development of critical observation skills. Participants gather and analyze data on projects with sensors, use spreadsheet software to analyze data, and create electronic presentations. All of the projects reinforce the manner in which industry scientists approach problems and use instruments to solve them. The program's parent component focuses on supporting young people in attaining four-year degrees. Extreme Experience Lab's industry partner, IBM Almeden Research Center offers the summer lab experience, program content, and student mentors through IBM's MentorPlace program. The program evaluation measures growth in content knowledge, skills, STEM course enrollments, and STEM learning motivation. This comprehensive experience will provide students with 120 contact hours per year.