Recently, staff of the Center for Education of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia had the opportunity to share our educational model with other current or aspiring youth program coordinators.
Hosted by the fellows of the explored the interactions between science education and science popularization from the perspective of history and social science. Jacqui Bowman and Kevin Impellizeri, our Director of the Center for Education and Associate Director of After-School and Summer Programs, respectively, delivered a talk titled “’Kind of Like a Family': A Model for Developing Engaging, Safe Spaces for Youth Science Education.” The presentation introduced attendees to the Center for Education model, which Jacqui developed as the organizing principle of our four summer and after-school youth programs: the College Junior Fellows, the STEM Internship, Out4STEM, and the Girls One Diaspora Club. You can view : (the talk and the Q&A are between 16:14 and 45:30).
Our educational model consists of five key components: cohorts of students who meet regularly over the course of one or several years; an educational safe space through strong group cohesion; multilayered mentorship involving STEM professionals, College staff, and the students themselves; a focus on minimizing or eliminating potential economic obstacles; and a strong relationship with students’ families.
We also offered advice on delivering effective STEM-based youth programming during the COVID-19 pandemic. You can view the video for all the details, but the short version is exploring novel pedagogical approaches, maintaining empathy as the central driving principle, and fostering an emotional safe space in addition to an educational one. We will also be going into greater detail on ideas for game-based virtual learning in a future post.
If you’d like to know more about our model, feel free or