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July 31, 2020P-TECH Students Learn New Skills Virtually Thanks to HVCC, AlbanyCanCode
It may be the middle of summer, but students in the Capital Region BOCES Pathways in Technology Early College High School (P-TECH) program are getting a head start on school.
P-TECH sophomores and juniors met on Thursday with representatives of Hudson Valley Community College (HVCC) and AlbanyCanCode to gain new skills on everything from making virtual learning presentations using items such as info graphics to studying and learning in college.
Students from the P-TECH West Campus at the Center for Advanced Technology at Mohonasen met with Aneesa Hussain and Greg Westover of AlbanyCanCode while students from the P-TECH East Campus at Watervliet High School met with Andrew Roberts of the Center for Academic Engagement at HVCC.
Advice ranged from highly focused on topics such as color schemes in info graphics to the more general on increasing grades and improving studies in college.
“I have had professors on our campus who give extra credit on your final grade for visiting them during office hours – even if they are virtual,” Roberts told the students.
Thursday’s presentations came on the third day of the five-day P-TECH Summer Bridge program for returning students. The program launched on Tuesday with a myriad of business partners sharing advice and insight on critical thinking, time management, communication and other professional skills and concludes next Wednesday with a series of presentations by students to their business mentors.
Fifty-one student’s from a dozen area schools who are returning to P-TECH for their sophomores and junior years are taking part in a five-day summer bridge program that is designed to keep them thinking about their education while also teaching them skills they can not only use when they return to school, but in the future.
Launched in 2018, P-TECH is a four- to six-year program (grades 9-14) offered to students throughout the region through a consortium that includes Capital Region BOCES, the Capital Region Chamber, Hudson Valley Community College and SUNY Schenectady County Community College.
The program’s two campuses – East Campus is at Watervliet High School, West Campus at the Center for Advanced Technology at Mohonasen – provides pathways for students to earn free college degrees in Computer Science, Computer Information Systems and Cybersecurity.
