The annual BATEC Outreach Summit provides a forum for educators to reflect on their practice, to identify new strategies, and to develop a work plan to strengthen the various connections between the academic levels.

8:30 a.m. Continental Breakfast & Registration

9:00 a.m. Welcome & Introduction

9:15 a.m. – 10:15 a.m. Student Mobile Programming Contest Presentation

10:15 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. Breakout Session Overview and Break

10:30 a.m. – 11:45 a.m. Breakout Session 1

Strand 1-2: Pathways: High School to College Transition
(John Zinkowski, Sharon Caulfield, and Colleen Spence)
This session will be focusing on how schools, community colleges and other education partners collaborate to reduce barriers to postsecondary education transition. Presenters and participants will discuss a college partnership transition model in which high school teachers, counselors, community college faculty members, college placement assessment coordinators, academic advisors, and education partners work together to pilot a postsecondary education transition model. Materials: Program of Study Grid andBMT Math Intervention Description, Presentation , ACCUPLACER

11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. Lunch and Networking

12:45 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. Breakout Session 2

BREAKOUT 2 (Strand 2-1 and 2-2)
Strand 2-1: Employment: Developing an Infrastructure for Internships: Resources from Two Experiential Learning Projects
(Lori A. Weir, Felicia Vargas, Julie R. Komack, Sharon Schaff, and Faith Wong)
The Massachusetts Community Colleges Experiential Education Committee—a team of professionals in the Career Services, Cooperative Education and Internship Fields—have developed a comprehensive handbook designed to guide experiential education initiatives. BATEC and their partner TechBoston have created a manual for the Tech Apprentice program, a high tech internship aimed at high school students. Both outline best practices and important information that is critical to designing, implementing, supervising and assessing internships and co-ops. This session will provide an opportunity for members of each program to discuss the project and the scope of their work and, for participants explore the potential value this work will add to your institutional experiential education programs.

 Strand 2-2: Pathways: Community College to 4 Year STEM Transfer
(Rick Adrion, David Cedrone, Laren Lang, and Jim Kurose)
In this session participants will be introduced to the idea of creating a statewide one-year STEM block transfer. There will be an opportunity to work together and brainstorm what that would look like, discuss issues of feasibility and anticipated impacts on high school preparation. The goals include aggregating commitments and designing next steps for future planning discussions.  Materials

Rick Adrion, Professor of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts Amherst
Rick Adrion is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He directs the BPC Commonwealth Alliance for Information Technology Education (CAITE), and directs the REUMass REU Site. He also co-directs the Commonwealth Information Technology Initiative (CITI), and the Research in Presentation Production for Learning Electronically (RIPPLES) group. Rick has been developing multimedia systems for teaching and learning since 1995 and has been involved in software engineering research and teaching since 1975. He founded and served as president and chair of the board of the Applied Computing Systems Institute of Massachusetts, a corporation designed to transfer technology. He was the founder and served as Editor-in-Chief of ACM Transactions on Software Engineering and Methodology. Rick received his BS and MEE degrees from Cornell University and his PhD from The University of Texas Austin.

Sharon Caulfield, Senior Special Programs Coordinator, Bunker Hill Community College. Sharon received a BS in accounting and minor in economics from Jackson State University as well as a MBA from Babson College. In her present role at Bunker Hill Community College, where she has worked for over 16 years as the Special Programs Coordinator for Tech Prep, she works to enhance the educational experiences of students from career/vocational technical high schools. She finds that introducing students to STEM careers has been the most fulfilling. Several of these programs have been in collaboration with BATEC. She serves on advisory committees for several vocational high schools and also serves on the Massachusetts Statewide Health Occupations Students of America Advisory Committee, and the Chelsea Science Alliance.

David Cedrone, Associate Commissioner for Economic and Workforce Development, Massachusetts Department of Higher Education
David oversees the critical requirement to align education and training programs offered by the Commonwealth’s 29 public universities and colleges with the needs of local businesses and industry. He is also assuming a new responsibility within the Department as Executive Director of the Governor’s STEM Advisory Council. David most recently served on behalf of the Governor of Rhode Island at the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation as Director of “Project Making the Grade.” This statewide initiative implemented STEM educational improvements throughout Rhode Island schools.

Julie R. Komack, Director of Career Services, MassBay Community College
Julie has worked in Career Services for over 10 years in both public and private higher-ed institutions. She is an adjunct professor at MassBay, teaching Career Life Planning and Life Span Development. She has worked helping to create positive social change in the realm of education as a School Liaison for the Cambridge Housing Authority, Program Developer for the YWCA of Greater Lawrence and Minority Transfer Counselor at Suffern Community College. She is also an active Wellesley Rotarian and advises MassBay’s Rotaract Club.

Jim Kurose, Professor of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts Amherst
Dr. Kurose received a BA in physics from Wesleyan University and a PhD in computer science from Columbia University. His research interests include network protocols and architecture, network measurement, sensor networks, multimedia communication, and modeling and performance evaluation. He serves as Executive Associate Dean of the College of Natural Sciences at UMass Amherst and formerly served as a Dean of the former College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics and past department chair.

Karen Lang, Computer Science Teacher, Massachusetts Academy of Mathematics and Science. Karen began her professional career as a computer programmer. After several years working at various software companies in Massachusetts, she made a career change to education. Ms. Lang has taught math, computer applications and computer science to high school students in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, and England. She also acted as technology coordinator at American international schools in Venezuela and Hungary. She has taught computer science for the past eight years at the Massachusetts Academy of Math and Science in Worcester, MA. Her main area of interest is teaching problem solving skills through programming. With an undergraduate degree is in Fine Arts, Ms. Lang also enjoys exploring the arts with the students of Mass Academy in various elective courses. She has served on the board of directors of the Computer Science Teachers Association since 2009, and is actively involved in the Greater Boston chapter of CSTA.

Sharon Schaff, Coordinator of Internship Programs, Bunker Hill Community College. Sharon has worked in her current position for the last five years and enjoys staying connected to local practitioners through the Boston Internship Roundtable and other organizations.   Prior to Higher Ed she consulted for Outward Bound Professional and in career outplacement to non-profit and private sectors in New York and Boston, following a project management career in the telecommunications industry.  She values experiential education for its dynamic learning opportunities and appreciates the diversity and community-building in her work with students, faculty, and employers in the greater Boston area.

Navjeet Singh, VP of Research, Commonwealth Corporation. Navjeet Singh is Vice President of Applied Research and Evaluation at Commonwealth Corporation, a workforce development organization that builds pathways for youth and adults to prepare for high demand careers in Massachusetts. Navjeet leads a team that undertakes research on Massachusetts labor markets and successful models for workforce development and evaluates the effectiveness of training and education programs. Navjeet has previously worked both in the public and private sectors including Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies and Southeastern Massachusetts Partnership. Navjeet has an MS in Science and Technology Studies from RPI, an MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, and a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology at Kanpur.

Colleen Spence, Director Testing and Assessment, Roxbury Community College
Colleen has served as the Director of Testing and Assessment at Roxbury for over ten years. She oversees testing for placement, Nursing and Allied Health programs and is the colleges’ Chief GED Examine. She also directs the Pathways To Success program which is provides MCAS prep to 12^th grade high school students who have not passed the MCAS while providing pathway opportunities to postsecondary education. Colleen is also an adjunct instructor in math at Roxbury Community College and has a master’s degree in education (M. Ed).

Felicia Vargas, Director of TechBoston, Poston Public Schools (BATEC)
Felicia Vargas is the director of TechBoston, a unit within the Boston Public Schools’ (BPS) Office of Instructional and Information Technology that focuses on structuring advanced technology courses for Boston students. Felicia has worked for the Boston school district in several roles beginning in 1999. She worked for six years as a Support Specialist at the Timilty Middle School and also served as a grants administrator for the technology office. Prior to working for BPS, Felicia was public relations director for Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Felicia received her B.A. from Georgetown University and her master’s degree in Education Administration, Planning and Social Policy from Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Lori A. Weir, Program Coordinator for IT, Middlesex Community College (BATEC)
Lori has been a faculty member at Middlesex Community College since 1998 and the Information Technology Program Coordinator at Middlesex Community College since 2006. In this role she has total management responsibility of the Information Technology Internships and is working with the Massachusetts Community Colleges Experiential Education Committee to promote the adoption of handbook as a resource within Middlesex Community, and the wider BATEC community as well. Lori has been with BATEC since its inception in 2004 and has been MCC’s Team Leader since 2010.

Faith Wong, Director of Career Services, Quinsigamond Community College

Faith returned to her native Massachusetts in January 2010 to become the Director of Career Services at Quinsigamond Community College. Previously, she spent fourteen years at Broward College in Fort Lauderdale, FL where she held positions as: Service Learning/Perkins Career Center Coordinator; Campus Registrar; Associate Dean of Student Rights and Responsibilities; and Dean of Library/Learning Resources.

John Zinkowski, Tech Prep Planner, Boston Public Schools
John is responsible for developing working alliances and formal articulation agreements between BPS high schools and local community colleges, apprenticeship training programs, and proprietary 2 and 4 year technical colleges. He has been active in curriculum alignment, college placement testing, and development of programs leading to structured secondary to postsecondary pathways.