Saturday, June 16, 2012

Silver City's 2012 Summer Program Begins June 19

Creating the Problem-Solvers of Tomorrow:
Summer Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) Classes

The first STEM class of Silver City Summer Youth Program is on Tuesday, June 19th from 10am-noon and will be taught by University of Nevada Cooperative Extension teachers Rebecca Wellnitz and Jessica Ramirez. Parents are encouraged to stay and help build Eco-Bots, small proto-type robots like those used to clean the ocean when a disaster like an oil spill hits. The Eco Bot Challenge is designed to help kids learn about robotic engineering.They'll learn to assemble their own robots and can even test its design features to determine the most effective environmental clean-up solution.





The class is at the Silver City School House/Community Center and is part of the annual free Silver City summer youth program organized by Silver City Community Partners, a partner group of Healthy Communities Coalition. For more info about the program, please call Sara Ross or Quest Lakes.

Because creativity and "thinking outside the box" are essential elements of human progress, we also add the Arts to our STEM lessons, to make "STEAM". On other Tuesdays and Thursdays this summer, volunteers from Silver City will offer activities in art, culinary arts (cooking), organic gardening, photography, etc.The annual field trip to  Shakespeare at Sand Harbor at Lake Tahoe will take place in August. The summer program also includes access to 1,000's of books in the Silver City Volunteer Library, including books and reference sets for all reading levels on many science topics. Watch the bulletin board and your P.O. Box for announcements about the summer program special events on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10am-noon.

The STEM classes in Silver City this summer are funded through the Lyon County 4-H and UNCE, Silver City Community Partners and donations from Silver City Volunteer Fire Department. If you'd like to know more about the 4-H programs in Lyon County, including robotics and engineering programs through 4-H Clubs, please contact Jessica Angle, Lyon County 4-H Program Manager at 463-6541.