Girls Leading Girls in North Carolina
Photo by The Gaston Gazette in Gastonia, NC
Fifth grade girls at the North Belmont Elementary School in North Carolina are getting a chance to hone their math and science skills with the help of some very special tutors. In a program called Girls Leading Girls, each 5th grade girl is matched with a woman STEM major from nearby Belmont Abbey College, who will act as her mentor, reports the Gaston Gazette. The youngsters also spend at day at the college, taking a tour and sitting in on math and science classes with their mentors. The program was created by Judith McDonald, a science teacher at the college. McDonald told the paper that when she earned her engineering degree she was struck by how few women were in her classes. She thinks the way to get girls more interested in STEM subjects is to reach them at an early age. Fifth grade teacher Kim Rohan says the program “is really beneficial to our girls,” and she has seen some girls who previously cared little for math and science now taking an interest. McDonald hopes to track the students through their middle school and high school years to see if the interest levels hold up. It might not. A recent National Science Foundation study found that in middle school, girls and boys are equally attracted to science, but for girls that interest wanes in high school. Why? Peer pressure. High school girls don’t want to be seen as nerdy.
Filed under: K-12 Education News
Tags: Programs for Girls, STEM subjects
