Southwestern Oklahoma State University in Weatherford will host a *free* 2-week overnight (on-campus) 7th annual science camp for middle school students this summer. The camp is academically intensive, hands-on, minds-on, and very fun. Classes are offered in robotics, rocketry, biology, nutrition, astronomy, energy (solar cars and windmills), and more. Participating students live in the dorms and eat in the cafeteria (they are well supervised and are never left to themselves). The participants also go to Frontier City amusement park, Science Museum Oklahoma, participate in a ropes course, get visited by an astronaut, and more.
The camp is paid for by ExxonMobil and is run through the Bernard Harris Foundation http://www.theharrisfoundation.org.
One purpose of the camp is to draw under-represented and economically disadvantaged kids into science, tech., math, and engineering fields.
The camp is limited to approximately 50 students who will be entering 6,7,8 in fall 2011. They are selected mostly on academic performance and teacher recommendation. The camp especially focused upon meeting the educational needs of minority and under-represented students. A copy of our application can be found at:
http://www.theharrisfoundation.org/Uploads/Groups/117/DocumentGallery/2011SWOSU.pdf
A short video about the camp can be seen here:
The camp website is
http://www.swosusciencecamp.org