STEM student Scott Grealish and mentors Michael Fraser and Jamon Motes play math games
Local Youth Mentored at MIT
STEM Mentoring Program Kicks Off the Year with Record Numbers
by Erin Michael Salius
In mid-January, 61 middle school students from the Boston and Cambridge area who participate in the School of Engineering’s Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) Program learned of the Massachusetts chapter of a national math games league that MIT students have recently launched. Having fun while building math acuity and team skills, many of the STEM students have chosen to participate in the league, receiving coaching from MIT students to prepare for competing against other teams around the country.
Playing math games is an integral part of the STEM Program, this introduction to the new league being the second in a series of three sessions of math games they'll have in the year. Last summer, local public school students from underserved neighborhoods in Cambridge and Boston spent five weeks at MIT exploring science, technology, engineering and math at the STEM Summer Institute. Invited to return in the fall, a record number of these young people accepted the invitation, gathering in Burton Conner House to kick off the fourth session of a unique mentoring opportunity designed to encourage them to pursue their dreams of attending MIT.
STEM student Dan Chu and his mentor, Ryan Slaughter, watch the gaming action
Shouts of “Who’s mine?” and “Who’d I get this year?” echoed from the registration line while participants eagerly waited to learn the name of their assigned mentor. On the other side of the room, anticipation was nearly as intense among the group of MIT undergraduates and graduate students, who tried to identify their particular mentee from a headshot and biography they received just days earlier. Each time a “match” was made and preliminary introductions exchanged, another pair would shuffle off together — anxious about finding points of common interest.
But soon enough, after all of the pairings were complete, nervousness gave way to excited chatter as the middle schoolers and their mentors discussed the activities they’d like to do as a team. Plans of all kinds were made for the following weekend: from window-shopping on Newbury Street to playing a pick-up game of touch football on campus, every twosome came up with something fun to look forward to. In addition to the academic tutoring that mentors voluntarily provide, their commitment also includes spending quality time with their mentees—participating together in the extracurricular interests they share.
MIT undergraduate Luis Torres and his mentee, Russell Soto, catch up while playing cards
The STEM Mentoring Program wants its young participants to be able to envision themselves as MIT students, and it accomplishes this goal by providing them with role models whom they resemble — young adults who come from the same types of schools, listen to the same music, play the same games…and just happen to attend the world’s leading technological institution.
Together, the STEM mentors and mentees will spend the rest of the academic year getting to know one another. In the months since their first Mentoring Brunch in October, the group has already performed crime scene investigations at the CSI exhibit at the Museum of Science, played a series of math card games designed by a local educator, heard presentations from some of MIT’s most innovative student inventors and—important—gotten the chance to establish strong bonds with one another.
The STEM Mentoring Program is made possible because of the generous commitment of its 57 volunteer mentors.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology