SUMMER SCI-FUN

While some students in Volusia County might have spent their summer vacation camped out in front of the TV, the 150 students in the school district’s Step Up 2 STEM program have been a little busy.

They’re learning how to use solar power to power tiny cars, and how to purify dirty pond water by filtering it through charcoal. They’re experimenting with bottle rockets and testing banana DNA. And they’re getting a better understanding of their own interests through experimentation and trial and error.

The month-long program for middle school students at low-income schools started four years ago to enhance students’ critical thinking skills and knowledge in science, technology, engineering and math.

It’s funded with federal Title I dollars, meaning the students who get to participate are the ones whose schools may not have the funding to offer this type of experience normally.

Volusia County had 57 Title I schools last year, including eight of its 10 middle schools. And it’s a district that’s no stranger to tight financing, thanks to the state’s funding model that leaves local public schools almost always cash-strapped.

“This is why Title I is important,” said Amy Monahan, a STEM specialist for the district who helps oversee the program. “They don’t get many experiences like this.”

For their part, students like the challenge in the program that ends this week, leaving them another two weeks of vacation before classes resume Aug. 12.

“I just don’t like sitting at home and being bored and doing nothing,” said seventh-grader Isaac Rowe as he studied the water draining through his personal concoction of sand, charcoal and cotton balls.

Eighth-grader Mariah Gilbert, holding a rocket made of two two-liter bottles and some carefully positioned duct-tape fins, said the same: “It’s better than sitting on the couch.”

Teachers see the value in having extra time to devote to experimentation.

“Realistically, it’s hard to do some of the experiments because of time,” said Deltona Middle School teacher Sarah Banta. “This gives us ample time for them to experiment and explore.”

On top of cool experiments, students are all required to complete math coursework, learn computer coding and complete a “genius hour” presentation, where they pick something they want to learn more about to study.

Monahan explained that a lot of the students who enter the program don’t really know what their interests are when they get there.

“The whole idea is to give them a way to explore their interests,” she said.