Cal State East Bay Holds MESA Day Competition March 7 to Aid Educationally Disadvantaged Youth
- March 3, 2015
Cal State East Bay’s seventh annual MESA Day Preliminary Competition is set for 8 a.m. - 4 p.m. this Saturday, March 7. The event, which gives educationally disadvantaged students from local schools an opportunity to participate in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) competitions, is designed to help the students apply their academic skills in a hands-on, real-world setting.
The competition, hosted by the university’s Mathematics Engineering Science Achievement (MESA) Program, will welcome more than 600 students from grades 6-12.
Michael Leung, dean of CSUEB’s College of Science, and Saeid Motavalli, chair of the Department of Engineering, will get the program started with a welcome ceremony in the campus gym. Various STEM competitions and activities throughout campus will follow.
Students will design and build bridges, then test the strength of those bridges. Additional competitions include sailing airplane gliders, racing mousetrap cars, showcasing biological models, and participating in the Prosthetic Arm National Design Competition. Most of the MESA Day competitions will be led by volunteer scientists and engineers — faculty and students from CSUEB and local industry.
“MESA Day is our capstone event; students have worked all year to prepare their projects for this day,” said MESA Program Director Ramona Neveu. “It's exciting to see how they have bonded together and tuned in to their strengths as mathematicians and scientists.”
Since the MESA program’s founding at Oakland Technical High School 45 years ago, it has been preparing and motivating educationally disadvantaged students to succeed in math and science courses, pursue STEM-focused college degrees, and graduate as STEM professionals. MESA centers are now located throughout California to support students at the K-12, community college, and university levels. The program has also been replicated in more than a dozen states.
“MESA has helped my students hone their potential in math, science and engineering,” said Fema Bernido, a De Anza High School chemistry teacher and MESA advisor. “While doing their projects, they have seen the clear connection of these three fields of discipline. They tell me that MESA helped them develop their analytical and critical thinking skills.”
MESA Day partners and supporters include Cal State East Bay, the university’s College of Science, Department of Engineering, and campus organizations and community partners, as well as Chevron Corp., Bank of America, the Irene Scully Foundation, and Lam Research Corp.