Learning continues on Princeton campus with summer outreach programs

Students of all ages and teachers from New Jersey and beyond will be engaged in a summer of learning on the Princeton campus, taking part in outreach programs on subjects ranging from entrepreneurship and leadership to public policy and journalism.

Princeton students, faculty and staff will lead various programs designed to help elementary, secondary and college students build their academic skills and to provide cutting-edge lessons that teachers can take back to their own classrooms.

The programs are part of a busy summer on campus. Princeton's Department of Athletics sponsors dozens of sports camps; the University runs a summer day camp; and the Office of Conference and Event Services works with numerous outside organizations that use campus facilities for educational programs and other activities.

The following list offers a look at some of the University's educational outreach programs taking place this summer. Deadlines for registering for this year's programs have passed, but anyone interested in participating in future programs should consult the links and contacts listed below; some programs are restricted to participants from particular schools, organizations or geographic areas. Reporters interested in covering any programs should contact Director of Media Relations and University Spokesperson Martin Mbugua in the Office of Communications at mmbugua@princeton.edu or 609-258-5733.

At the Well Young Women's Leadership Academy

Summer Leadership Camp, July 27-Aug. 8

Contact: Jacqueline Glass, 646-592-1488, info@atthewellconferences.org

At the Well Young Women's Leadership Academy is geared toward building leadership, critical thinking and problem-solving skills for minority high school-aged girls entering the 10th-12th grade. The academy offers dynamic speakers, standardized test-taking strategies, critical reading and essay writing classes, group activities, and field trips. Speakers include business leaders, entrepreneurs, and Princeton University faculty and staff. William Massey, the Edwin S. Wilsey Professor of Operations Research and Financial Engineering, will return as a guest lecturer for the 2014 session. 

The academy provides on-campus housing, which allows the students to learn, study and commune together while experiencing college life firsthand. The academy will host more than 70 students from across the country and, for the first time this year, Jamaica. The Jamaican students are sponsored by the U.S. Embassy in Jamaica.

Combustion Energy Frontier Research Center 

Princeton-CEFRC Summer School on Combustion, June 22-27

Contact: Lilian Tsang, 609-258-5041, ltsang@princeton.edu; Chung Law, 609-258-5271, cklaw@princeton.edu

Nearly 200 graduate students and researchers representing nine countries and 25 states will come from 66 academic institutions, as well as national and international laboratories and corporations, to attend a week of lectures designed to provide the next generation of combustion researchers with a comprehensive knowledge in the technical areas of combustion theory, experimentation, computation and applications.

The program, now in its fifth year, is organized by the Combustion Energy Frontier Research Center at Princeton with primary sponsorship by the U.S. Department of Energy. Additional funding is provided by the Army Research Office.

Computer Science

Center for Computational Intractability

Summer Program in Theoretical Computer Science, June 23-Aug. 1

Contact: Moses Charikar, 609-258-7477, moses@cs.princeton.edu

More than 50 high school students, mostly from New Jersey, and seven undergraduate students, will participate in this program aimed at introducing students to advanced topics in theoretical computer science. The program is partly sponsored in part by Princeton's Center for Computational Intractability and Rutgers University-Camden.

Graduate School

Princeton Summer Undergraduate Research Experience (PSURE), June 16-Aug. 8

Contact: Karen Jackson-Weaver, 609-258-3257, kjweaver@princeton.edu; Diana Mitchell, 609-258-1328, dmitch@princeton.edu

This program is designed for rising college seniors with a serious interest in pursuing a Ph.D., with plans to pursue a career in teaching and research. It is intended to prepare students to be competitive applicants to research-based doctoral programs. Students may work in any of Princeton's academic departments or programs. Undergraduates who are historically underrepresented, who are from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds or who are from liberal arts colleges are especially encouraged to apply. Students conduct independent research, attend a Graduate Record Examination preparation course and an intensive research methods seminar, and complete workshops on applying to competitive graduate school programs. In addition, students receive training on preparing academic oral presentations and complete a final paper, which serves as a writing sample for the graduate school application process.

Each PSURE student receives a stipend and travel allowance, and has an opportunity to present their research at the Leadership Alliance National Symposium from July 25-27 in Stamford, Connecticut.

School of Engineering and Applied Science

CCNY Undergraduate Research Experience, June-July

Contact: Brandi Jones, jonesb@princeton.edu

Six City College of New York undergraduates will spend the summer at Princeton developing research skills. The program includes research mentorship by a faculty member, full participation in research group activities, seminars on preparation for graduate study, and the opportunity to engage in a vibrant living-learning community with other undergraduate scholars. 

Keller Center 

Contact: Stephanie Landers, 609-258-3979, slanders@princeton.edu

International Research Exchange Program (REACH), June-July

The Keller Center has arranged for six undergraduate students from Hong Kong and three graduate students from Germany to work in Princeton research laboratories this summer. As part of the exchange program, Princeton students will conduct research abroad, with seven students at German universities and six students at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. 

The program, administered by Princeton's Keller Center, aims to expose engineering students to international approaches to technology, research and leadership, while giving them hands-on research experience in their field of study. It is a partnership between Princeton, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute, and ConRuhr, a consortium of three universities in Germany's Ruhr region. 

eLab, June 10-Aug. 16

The Keller Center's eLab is a launch pad for student startups, a creative co-working space open — by application only — to some of Princeton's student entrepreneurs. Students will spend 10 weeks learning from innovators and investors to fine-tune their nascent startup ideas to develop them into viable and scalable ventures. At the end of the summer program, the students will participate in Demo Day, when they will share their plans with investors, inventors, experts and others from the entrepreneurial community.

Mid-Infrared Technologies for Health and the Environment (MIRTHE)

Summer Research Opportunities, June-August 

Contact: Roxanne Zellin, 609-258-7922, rzellin@princeton.edu

MIRTHE, the Mid-Infrared Technologies for Health and the Environment Center, will host 38 undergraduate students at Princeton and its partner institutions for nine weeks of research and education. The students will participate in original, hands-on research projects and attend short courses and lectures that explore the challenges of hardware, software and systems engineering of trace chemical sensors. The center's research could yield important new technology related to health, homeland security and especially the environment. Students also visit nearby government and industrial labs. The undergraduate students hail from 25 colleges and universities across the nation, including Princeton. In addition to the college students, 10 high school students (rising seniors age 16 and older) and four high school teachers will work in MIRTHE labs at Princeton and other universities. The other participating MIRTHE institutions are Rice University, City College of New York and  the University of Maryland-Baltimore County. The students at the sites in Maryland, Texas and New York will meet with the entire MIRTHE community in the final week for the annual MIRTHE Summer Workshop, which will be held this year from Aug. 4 to 8 at Princeton's Frick Chemistry Laboratory.

Molecular Biology

Summer Undergraduate Research Program, June 10-Aug. 9

Contact: Alison Gammie, 609-258-6380, agammie@princeton.edu

Each summer, the Department of Molecular Biology, the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Genentech Foundation provide intensive laboratory research experiences to a select group of undergraduates chosen from a nationwide pool. Each student joins a world-class research group headed by a Princeton faculty member and carries out an original research project. Participants are immersed in a culture of close collaboration with other undergraduates, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and faculty, and thereby experience firsthand what it is like to be a scientist. More than 77 percent of former participants have since pursued degrees in Ph.D., M.D. or combined M.D./Ph.D. programs.

Outreach Program Summer Workshop for Secondary School Science Teachers Molecular Biology Hands-On: Cool Genes, Colorful Proteins, July 14-26

Contact: Ann Sliski, 609-258-2075, asliski@princeton.edu

The 2014 Department of Molecular Biology Outreach Program Summer Workshop for secondary school science teachers will consist of a two-week summer workshop for 18 teachers, where every day features a mix of laboratory projects and discussions with colleagues and Princeton faculty. The goal is to help prepare teachers to bring cutting-edge biotechnology into their classrooms.

The workshop will feature an experiment using a rainbow of fluorescent proteins from Roger Tsien's BioBridge program at the University of California-San Diego. Tsien was a co-winner of the 2008 Nobel Prize in chemistry. 

In the program, teachers also will: isolate their own DNA and perform DNA fingerprinting analyses; test snack foods for evidence of genetic modification; use bioinformatics to analyze their mitochondrial DNA; participate in lunchtime research seminars and discussions led by Princeton faculty; and develop curricula for their classrooms. The program is funded by a grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Molecular Biophysics

Undergraduate Summer Research in Molecular Biophysics, June 8-Aug. 9

Contact: Jean Bausmith, 609-258-7061, jb6@princeton.edu

Now in its 10th year, this program offers interdisciplinary research experience in leading laboratories to students majoring in the physical or mathematical science or engineering at colleges with limited research opportunities. The program is open only to non-Princeton students. Each student serves as a research assistant in the laboratory of a Princeton faculty member who serves as a mentor and research adviser. The program directors, in consultation with training faculty, match student interests to available projects. Regular meetings with the faculty mentor and members of the laboratory team provide guidance for experimental design, methods and progress. By the end of the program, students prepare a formal written report on their research and present an oral summary. Students also are integrated with other summer students to share educational and social activities.

Music

So Percussion Summer Institute, July 20–Aug. 3 

Contact: Yumi Tamashiro, 646-926-2330, yumi@sopercussion.com

The So Percussion Summer Institute is an intensive two-week chamber music seminar for college-age percussionists and composers. The four members of So Percussion, the Edward T. Cone Performers-in-Residence at Princeton, serve as faculty in rehearsal, performance and discussion of contemporary music. The 2014 institute will focus on the intersection between percussion and electronics, a relationship that goes back to many of the masters of the art form such as John Cage, Edgard Varése and Steve Reich.

Golandsky Institute Summer Symposium, July 12–20

Contact: Adrienne Sirken, executive director, 609-306-1237, admin@golandskyinstitute.org

This symposium for pianists, teachers and musicians of all ages features lectures, master classes, technique clinics, private lessons, supervised practice time and other presentations related to the Taubman Approach, as well as an international piano festival featuring performances by renowned pianists, open to the public. Scott Burnham, the Scheide Professor of Music History, will speak on "Concerto Principals and Principles" before the Scheide Concerto Concert, featuring the New Jersey Symphony Chamber Orchestra with piano soloists presented by the institute. Five additional recitals will take place as part of the piano festival. For festival tickets, call University Ticketing at 609-258-9220.

Office of the Dean for Research

Laboratory Learning Program, June-August

Contact: Karla Ewalt, 609-258-9410, kewalt@princeton.edu

The Laboratory Learning Program is a supervised educational program that allows a limited number of high school students, with the support of their schools, to conduct research in Princeton science and engineering laboratories. These educational research opportunities are normally limited to students 16 years of age and older who have not yet graduated from high school. This selective program is designed to offer students an opportunity to participate actively in state-of-the-art research projects, under the mentorship and supervision of a Princeton faculty member. Students selected for the program will be integrated into the daily research experience of the laboratory, participating in meetings, seminars, research discussions and other appropriate educational activities.

Research opportunities for high school students normally take place over a summer, though the faculty mentor will define exact terms. 

Pace Center for Civic Engagement

Camp PALS Princeton, July 27-Aug. 2

Contact: Jenni Newbury Ross, jenni@palsprograms.org

Sponsored by the Pace Center for Civic Engagement, Camp PALS Princeton hosts a weeklong sleep-away camp for young adults with Down syndrome at Princeton University. Camp PALS Princeton provides an opportunity for 25 campers age 18-25 to live on campus, while being able to easily walk into town. The week includes climbing rock walls, playing laser tag and visiting the Jersey Shore. The PALS program provides a place for young adults with Down syndrome and their peers to have fun, grow as individuals and build transformative friendships.

Community House 

STEM Summer Camp, June 30-Aug. 1 

Contact: Charlotte Collins, 609-258-0164, cec1@princeton.edu

The Community House STEM Summer Camp, hosted by the Pace Center for Civic Engagement, offers middle school students from the Princeton area a fun foray into science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). Organized and run by a team of Princeton student camp associates, the camp focuses on making learning the STEM subjects fun and educational. With a curriculum developed by Princeton graduate students in molecular biology, ecology and evolutionary biology, and civil and environmental engineering (as well as alumni in the field and some undergraduates), each week of the camp will focus on lessons in materials science, biology, technology applications and chemistry. STEM summer campers will also take field trips to the University bee hives, solar field and the Forbes garden. In addition, one week will be devoted to understanding solar technology with hands-on work building solar suitcases.

Princeton University Summer Journalism Program, Aug. 1-11

Contact: Michelle Kim, 609-258-6651, kiyeonk@princeton.edu

Princeton alumni will lead journalism workshops for 25 students who are entering their senior years of high school and come from low-income backgrounds. The students will practice reporting and writing articles, including covering a professional sports event, and produce a 12-page newspaper and a television documentary. They will visit The New York Times, Newsweek and CNN offices and receive advice from guest speakers from a number of major media outlets. They also will receive guidance on applying to college during the summer program and throughout the academic year. This is the 13th summer the program is being offered.

Princeton Center for Complex Materials (PCCM)

Contact: Dan Steinberg, 609-258-5598, dsteinbe@princeton.edu

Research Experience for Undergraduates, June 9-Aug. 8

About 22 college students from around the country will conduct research in the labs of Princeton faculty members, working on cutting-edge problems related to energy production, the environment, human health and other societal issues. Their work will be funded primarily by the NSF through major projects, including the PCCM and NSF's Partnership for Research and Education in Materials at California State University-Northridge.

Partners in Science, June-August

In collaboration with the Jersey City-based Liberty Science Center, faculty members and graduate students in the Princeton Institute for the Science and Technology of Materials will serve as mentors to high school students working as researchers in their labs. The program will culminate in a symposium during which the students will present their work.

Research Experience for Teachers, June-August

Two teachers from New Jersey will work in the labs of Princeton to gain insight into current research. They will study new materials for alternative energy and ways to enhance materials science and engineering education in K-12 schools. In the next academic year, they will share their experiences, incorporating these concepts into their curricula.

Princeton University Materials Academy, July 14-25 

Sixteen high school students from Trenton, New Jersey, will be on campus to interact with Princeton faculty and students and learn about materials science, nanoscience, clean energy research and sustainable homes. Among other projects, the students will work on polymers involved in atmospheric measurements.

Princeton University Materials Academy for Middle School, July 7-10

Ten middle school students from the Princeton area will participate in a program that focuses on materials science. The program is dedicated to narrowing the academic achievement gap across racial and ethnic groups, and is supported by the NSF through the PCCM and the University's Community House service organization.

Summer School for Condensed Matter Physics, July 28-31

More than 100 participants, mostly graduate students, from around the world will come to Princeton to attend lectures and workshops in physics and materials science led by prominent researchers from Princeton, Microsoft, Florida State University and other institutions. The broad themes of this year's summer school are criticality and quantum computation. The program is organized by Princeton graduate students and sponsored by the PCCM and the Princeton Center for Theoretical Science.

Princeton Plasma Physics Lab (PPPL)

Contact: Jeanne Jackson DeVoe, 609-243-2757, jjackson@pppl.gov

Research Experience for Undergraduates, June 9-Aug. 15

A total of 29 undergraduate students from across the country will spend 10 weeks working with PPPL scientists on current research projects through the National Undergraduate Fellowship Program, the Science Undergraduate Laboratory Internship of the Community College Internship.

Princeton University Art Museum

Summer Internship Program, June 10-Aug. 9

Contact: Caroline Harris, 609-258-7482, ciharris@princeton.edu

The art museum offers a nine-week summer internship program for undergraduate and graduate students from any accredited four-year accredited university or college program. Interns have the opportunity to work in one of the following departments: curatorial, education, development, information technology, marketing, office of the registrar, publications or retail operations. Not all departments take interns each summer, and interns are placed on the basis of their experience, academic training and departmental need. In addition to their departmental responsibilities, interns participate in a two-day orientation program during their first week and weekly lunch discussions with Museum staff. Field trips and networking opportunities with interns at other arts-related organizations are also arranged.

Program in Teacher Preparation

Princeton University Preparatory Program (PUPP), June 21-Aug. 8

Contact: Jason Klugman, 609-258-3337, jklugman@princeton.edu

This intensive, three-year college preparation program supports a select group of academically gifted high school students from low-income families who attend partner schools in Mercer County, New Jersey. The goal of PUPP is to prepare students to be viable candidates for admission to and success at selective colleges and universities. Students take courses in art, writing, literature, math, physics, biology, social science and college-preparation skills, while also attending a leadership retreat at the Princeton-Blairstown Center, going on college tours and taking cultural excursions.

QUEST and CONNECT-ED Summer Institute, July 7-Aug. 6

Contact: Anne Catena, 609-258-2537, acatena@princeton.edu

Princeton's Program in Teacher Preparation will offer four weeklong summer institutes in science and mathematics for teachers of grades K-12 that are designed to enhance teachers' content knowledge and their skills for inquiry-based teaching through hands-on experiments and discussion. The summer program will include the July 7-11 campus-based seminars, "How Do Humans Impact Local Climate?" for teachers of grades 3 to 8, which will focus on the research of Princeton Assistant Professor of Geosciences David Medvigy. The same week, teachers in grades 3 to 12 will partake in "Sustainability — Living on the Edge," which will explore the mitigation of damage from natural disasters. A new field-based program will have teachers at the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary in Kempton, Pennsylvania, July 26-29 studying the ecological benefits and population decline of vultures. From Aug. 2-6, another field-based research project will focus on the impact of severe weather on the terrapin population in New Jersey's Barnegat Bay.

Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs 

Contact: Gilbert Collins, 609-258-4809, gcollins@princeton.edu

Junior Summer Institute, June 12-Aug. 1

Thirty-one students, representing 24 colleges and universities throughout the United States, will participate in the Wilson School's 2014 Junior Summer Institute. Students come from 17 states and six countries — Afghanistan, Brazil, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Liberia and Peru — and represent 25 undergraduate majors. The program helps prepare students for graduate study and careers in public policy and international affairs by providing participants with the tools of critical thinking, speaking, writing, quantitative reasoning, and the skills and experiences necessary to create, analyze, implement, evaluate and affect policy in a multicultural, multiethnic society. Coursework includes seven weeks of policy-related classroom instruction, including a policy workshop on either a domestic or international policy issue. As part of the program's culmination, students will present a comprehensive final report on a current policy issue that will encompass the skills and knowledge they have gained. The institute is one of four held at U.S. universities through the Public Policy and International Affairs Fellowship Program, a national consortium of top graduate public policy and international affairs schools that prepare college students for advanced degrees and careers serving the public good.

Santa Fe Indian School Leadership Institute’s Summer Policy Academy, June 16-20

This program provides high school Native Americans the opportunity to explore challenges and issues facing Native Americans and to examine how federal policies have an impact on tribal communities. Students are nominated to participate in the program by teachers, community leaders, professionals and tribal leaders. This year's participants come from the Pueblo, Navajo and Jicarilla Apache nations of New Mexico. 

Through roundtable discussions, case studies and presentations by Native American leaders and noted scholars, students will examine Native American policymaking on the federal level and the current political climate. This year's program will explore the impact of voter identification laws and Native American participation in local, state and national elections; the changing demographics of tribal communities, where citizens ages 30 and younger are becoming the majority; the place of language, culture and Native American history in education, access, equity and justice; redefining community development; mascots and ending the legacy of racism; and the impact of major water projects on Native American lands. The week will culminate in Washington, D.C., where students will present their findings and policy recommendations to the National Congress of American Indians, the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, the New Mexico congressional delegation, the World Bank and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a Princeton alumna.