The Berkeley Lab Director’s Apprenticeship Program (BLDAP) is a project-based high school STEM program designed to help participants develop 21st century skills, learn about Berkeley Lab’s research activities, receive college and career guidance, and develop a STEM network in a real-life work environment. BLDAP seeks to remove systemic barriers, such as a lack of access to professional networks and work-based opportunities, by providing strong connections to the scientific community at Berkeley Lab.
The BLDAP 2025 cohort (21 students) will meet monthly (October - April) on Sunday afternoons or weeknights. In addition to college and career workshops, students will be working in teams to carry out a data science research project highlighting a community issue of their choice. The Berkeley Lab K-12 team is seeking mentors to check-in with the student team about once every other month to give feedback to their work and check on their progress. Check-ins will be conducted virtually over Zoom. We will try to pair mentors as a mentoring team.
Mentors do not need to be data scientists - any experience working with data and data analysis is welcome! There will be an info session (October 14th at 10 am) to give an overview of the data science project. Most meetings will be held online unless indicated as hybrid.
Check-in dates and project deliverables are as follows (please note that dates in January through April are subject to change):
- October 26 (hybrid): Meet mentees, refine research question, and data collection methods
- November 23 (check-in optional): Data collection ongoing
- December 14 (in-person; optional): Data collection ongoing; mentors are invited to join a lunch with mentees and BLDAP alumni
- January 25: Data collection done, data cleaning
- February 22 (check-in optional): Exploratory data analysis, data visualizations, data modeling
- March 22: Finalize data visualizations and findings for presentations
- April 19: Initial drafts of presentations ready for review
- May date TBD (in-person, optional for mentors): Presentations
All volunteers participating in K-12 programs must complete an online working with minors course (~90 minutes), sign and submit a CANRA form, and pass a background check.
For any questions, please contact the K-12 Lead Education Facilitator, Corbin Shatto (cshatto@lbl.gov).
For any questions, please contact the K-12 Lead Education Facilitator, Corbin Shatto (cshatto@lbl.gov).
