New Bedford High School will launch a new, nationally accredited Engineering Academy in September designed to inspire students to pursue science and math careers, officials said Monday.
The district’s pilot program, which started this school year with 64 students, won formal accreditation Friday from the National Academy Foundation, a New York-based nonprofit that runs a nationwide network of “career academies” designed to inspire students by connecting class time to work life.
“The type of students that we get are those types of hands-on learners and we felt we could do a better job of preparing them for graduation and their future,” said Engineering Academy coordinator Robert Gadbois, one of the teachers who proposed and helped design the academy. “So many kids are wandering aimlessly without any future plan at all. This really brings it into focus and gives them something to work towards, something to aspire to.”
The city’s full-fledged academy, which restructures and enhances the current “shop” offerings at the high school using a National Academy Foundation model and curriculum, will open to 50-75 freshmen next year, with the goal of adding a similarly sized group each year going forward, Gadbois said.
Students in the Engineering Academy will be expected to take one to two engineering classes per year and complete an internship under the current design. Participants will also take their regular classes together, with lessons designed to supplement the work they are doing in the academy, Gadbois said.
Within the program, students can specialize in five different tracks: construction and architecture; power, energy and transportation; robotics; television production, or computer support and networking.
“There’s real demand for our students to fill engineering careers and so this project aligns very much with current career trends,” said Andrew O’Leary, the district’s director of federal- and state-funded programs.
Acceptance to the program requires a short essay and statement of interest, Gadbois said. It is not based on grades and the goal is to have enrollment mirror the district’s demographics.
“We wanted to be inclusive. … The message has been sent to guidance counselors that we will take whomever is interested and fills out the appropriate paperwork and so on,” said Anne Oliveira, the district’s academic director for science, technology and engineering. “The recruitment has taken off slowly but we have gotten some girls,” she said, adding “Not as many as we would like.”
About 15 people will serve on the Engineering Academy’s advisory board, which is designed to help fund-raise for additional materials and connect the program to the business community for mentoring and internship opportunities.
“I look at this Engineering Academy as being a conduit to bring students into the technical world,” said Bill Ferreira, a member of the advisory board and the chair of the Portsmouth, R.I.-based Undersea Science and Engineering Foundation, who is involved currently in the district’s robotics program. “The value … is to bring the workplace closer to school so they understand why they need to study this math.”
The National Academy Foundation, which has about 500 schools in its network, approved the district’s pilot Friday after an April 26 review that checked for measures such as data collection, professional development and academy structure, Gadbois said.
A local team will attend the group’s annual conference in Florida in July to formally accept the accreditation, O’Leary said. He said the district will also benefit from learning from other schools in the NAF network, which was founded in 1982 by former Citigroup CEO Sanford Weill.
“It’s a sign of the quality and it’s also a standard for us to ensure quality going forward,” O’Leary said.