|
HSTA
General Information - FAQ's
- West
Virginia University has established a seamless approach to
health sciences education which shepherds talented minority
and underrepresented students through pre-college, college,
and graduate training in health sciences programs. The Health
Sciences and Technology Academy of West Virginia University
(WVU) is a 9th-12th grade math and science program which encourages
aspirations, opens doors, and empowers minority and underrepresented
students and rural communities. This partnership among the
numerous units of the state's land grant university and many
Appalachian communities brings minority and underrepresented
students and teachers to campus each summer for clinic, laboratory,
and classroom training and activities. The partnership then
provides the infrastructure and support for community-based
science projects mentored by teachers, health professions,
students and volunteer community leaders during the school
year.
- Faculty
from the Robert C. Byrd Health Sciences Center and cooperating
university departments provide a teacher professional development
component which includes state-of-the-art math and science
material, techniques and projects appropriate for 9th through
12th grade students. In addition, the workshop covers multicultural
sensitivity and diversity training, self-esteem building,
motivation enhancement, leadership development skills, and
study skills in a multidisciplinary context with an emphasis
on how to incorporate these skills in teaching math and
science. These ideas are the foundation for projects in
the Student Enrichment Program as well as in the Community-Based
Programming.
- The
one to two-week campus-based program provides intensive
academic enrichment emphasizing science and math for each
grade from 9th through 12th as well as laboratory experiences
where students work with scientists/clinical practitioners.
The students work on projects emphasizing science in ways
to develop their knowledge and skills to observe, hypothesize,
and develop methods to answer questions which generate knowledge.
The hands-on project experiences promote the concept of
biology as an experimental science. The students learn to
collect, analyze and interpret data as well as communicate
their results. Self-esteem building, motivation enhancement,
leadership development skills, and study skills are incorporated
into the experience. More information about individual HSTA
club projects can be found at the HSTA Club Home Pages.
- Students
matriculating from the summer programs progress into community-based
programs which consist of academic enrichment projects further
developing their cognitive skills emphasizing observation,
hypothesis formation, experimentation, analysis and communication.
These projects promote self-paced individualized learning.
More information about individual HSTA club projects can be
found at the HSTA Club Home Pages. As in the campus-based
programs, the leaders of the community-based programs weave
leadership skills training, goal identification, and self-esteem
promotion into each student's project experience. These projects
supplement each student's in-school learning. The goal is
to bring knowledge and skills up to or beyond chronological
grade level. The program is developed and carried out in partnership
with other WVU units, higher education, West Virginia public
schools, community leaders, parents, health care providers
and students. The program relies heavily on WVU county extension
faculty, and West Virginia Rural Health Education Partnerships
faculty and staff to facilitate live instruction, organization
and support. Both parents and teachers are involved in the
process of teaching-learning as part of the development of
a community based after school enrichment program. In the
situation when a parent cannot assist with their child's learning
experience, mentors such as physicians, pharmacists, dentists
and nurses are recruited to be a project leader. Experts in
fields of health and science are now available online as part
of our Ask the Experts program to answer questions via email
from the students. This process of utilizing adult volunteer
leaders to support youth learning and experiences has been
extremely successful in West Virginia and the United States.
Biology, math and experimental science projects are developed
in collaboration with the West Virginia State Department of
Education to maintain congruency with the public school curriculum.
|
|
