UTB-TSC Summer Ambassadors spend summer vacation (happily) in class

Some 13-year-olds would balk at the idea of spending summer vacation in class, but Karla Mendez and three of her friends had no regrets on Thursday, as they spent the second of three weeks learning about computer science at UTB-TSC.

"It's really interesting," Mendez said, as she programmed her computer to compute the area of a circle. "Every day we learn new things."

The Summer Ambassadors Academy at the University of Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College welcomed 35 high school students this summer for free classes in computer science, math and gravitational wave astronomy.

This is the sixth year the program has been offered in gravitational wave astronomy and the second it has been available in computer science and math. The program is free to students, thanks to a grant from the National Science Foundation.

The students spend each week day from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. learning some of the most exciting concepts in these fields.

Adrienne Zermeno, the director of education and outreach for the world-renowned Center for Gravitational Wave Astronomy at UTB-TSC, says teaching advanced concepts gives students a taste of the fascinating collegiate possibilities to come.

Students who participate in the summer program become some of UTB-TSC's strongest students, Zermeno said.

Even if students find that science or math isn't as interesting as they'd hoped, Zermeno says that can be a positive experience as well.

"If they decide it's not for them, at least they won't have wasted a year of college figuring that out," Zermeno said.

On Thursday, a UTB-TSC computer lab was filled with curious high school students learning to program computers to compute the area of a circle.

For some, taking a computer science course might seem intimidating. But for the members of the so-called "Internet Generation," gathered at UTB-TSC on Thursday, computers are virtually in their blood.

"I just thought, ‘I'm always on the computer. Why not take a computer class?' " said Mellisa Escovedo of Los Fresnos.

Zermeno said she was pleased to see that more of 2009's summer ambassadors were girls.

"It's certainly gratifying to see more gender parity in this classroom," Zermeno said.

The gravitational wave astronomy group left for a camping trip on Thursday, as part of the summer experience. The computer science group will leave for Austin on Saturday to visit the University of Texas at Austin campus and a video game company.

"We want them to bond," Zermeno said. "It will help them in class because they have someone to study with."

Students who participate in the program aren't graded, so the experience is purely about the fun of learning rather than the pressure of achievement.