School opens registration for summer programs, increases capacity – Morganton News Herald

Open to rising fifth through 12th graders from across the state, the summer accelerator programs will take place on one of the NCSSM campuses in Morganton or Durham, at the North Carolina Center for Engineering technologies (NCCET) in Hickory or online.

According to Kevin Baxter, vice chancellor and chief campus officer for NCSSM-Morganton, the new Morganton campus will more than double the number of students it is able to accommodate this year compared with 2022.

“We’re increasing it to more than double the number of seats in Morganton from last year,” Baxter said. “We’ve already seen unbelievable response in a week’s time — in the hundreds of people who have already signed up.”

According to the school’s website, the classes are open to any North Carolina student “with an excellent academic record and a keen interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.” Some courses come with prerequisites that must be met before beginning the application process.

Course offerings are broken down into three age categories: Early Accelerator for rising fifth and sixth graders; programs for rising seventh through ninth graders; and those for rising 10th through 12th graders. Courses will be taught by NCSSM instructors.

Early Accelerator courses are weeklong, non-residential day programs that run from 9 a.m. through 3:30 p.m. The cost is $350 and students must bring a lunch. Courses will be offered at the Morganton campus June 19-23, 26-30, July 10-14 and 17-21 and include:

• Build-A-Bot Engineering & Design
• Discovering the Art of Mathematics
• Surface Area & Urban Construction
• Our Home in the Universe
• From Failures to Successes: GRIT in Pots, Artifacts and Engineering
• MARVEL-ous Science in our World
• Youth Climate Heroes
• Electrified

For seventh- through ninth-grade students, NCSSM will offer both residential and online courses. Online courses run in two-week blocks throughout the summer and cost $495 each. Course offerings include:

• When BIO & TECH Collide: Biotechnology in the 21st Century
• Math Puzzles and Games
• Co-Creators of Change
• My Body Does What?! Understanding Human Anatomy Form and Function

Residential programs are weeklong programs running throughout the summer. The cost for residential programs is $1,495. Residential programs offered at NCSSM-Morganton include:

• Environmental Explorations
• Explorations in Genetics
• Urbanization and Water Quality
• Game Design
• Cryptozoology, Folklore & Author’s Purpose
• Biotechnology
• The Art of Climate Change
• The Science of the Catawba River

For rising 10th- through 12th-grade students the school will be offering three-week courses either totally online or a hybrid of online and residential throughout the summer. The courses with a residential component will begin with two weeks online culminating with a week of in-person learning. The cost of online courses is $695 and offerings include:

• Real Entrepreneurship 101
• From Data Ethics to Data Justice
• Quantum to Cosmos: A Journey from the Very Small to the Very Large
• Introduction to Machine Learning with Programming
• Storytelling and Persuading Using Data
• From Zero to Warp Speed: Relativity in Science and Fiction
• Design Your Future: Website Creation
• Introduction to Cryptology with Programming

Residential courses for rising 10th- through 12th-graders are $1,925 and offerings at NCSSM-Morganton include:

• Explorations in Genetics
• Invitation to Neuroscience
• Website Creation – Project – Based Learning
• Forensics
• Pump It Up! An Exploration of Body Systems and the Role of Exercise
• The Physics of Sports
• Real Entrepreneurship 101

Additionally, five courses will be offered at NCCET in Hickory:

• Real Entrepreneurship 101 — For rising 10th through 12th graders
• Website Creation – Project-Based Learning — For rising 10th through 12th graders
• Our Home in the Universe — for rising fifth and sixth graders
• Rockets in the Classroom — for rising fifth and sixth graders or rising seventh through ninth graders
• Electrified — for rising fifth and sixth graders

For more information on the NCSSM Summer Accelerator 2023 program, course offerings, application process or specific course dates and times, including courses offered at the school’s Durham campus, visit www.ncssm.edu/summer-programs.