Miami, May 29, 2024 – For the seventh year in a row, Miami Dade College’s (MDC) Homestead Campus will host the one-of-a-kind MDC Microbiology Girls Club, a prestigious summer camp designed for minority female students from area high schools. This unique opportunity aims to inspire young women to pursue careers in STEM. The six-week camp, from June 18 – July 26, will welcome 24 students and 18 STEM female professionals as guest speakers.
The camp was created by Dr. Nia Madison, Senior Associate Professor of Microbiology and a renowned Director of HIV Research. She will lead the group in collaboration with Professor Simón Bolivar, an esteemed Endowed Teaching Chair from the Department of Mathematics and Natural Sciences at the Homestead Campus. Students will be guided through exciting experiments to identify unknown bacteria at the microbiology lab, attend lectures, attend career development and growth mindset workshops, tour the labs and end each day with 30 minutes of physical fitness. Students will complete approximately 90 volunteer service hours each and 1,890 volunteer service hours as a group.
“My goal for the Microbiology Girls Club is to inform and engage the girls with an experiential learning opportunity to develop a new skill set with cutting edge, state-of-the-art laboratory techniques and to inspire them to potentially see themselves as successful STEM professionals in the future,” Dr. Madison said. “This is an effort to diversify, recruit and retain more young women into STEM fields.”
This MDC Microbiology Girls Club is funded by a five-year $500,000 Children’s Trust Youth Development Grant that Dr. Madison co-wrote. The grant is shared between Homestead and North campuses for two independent summer camps.
Students selected to participate this year are from South Dade Senior High School; Medical Academy for Science And Technology (MAST@) at Homestead; School Of Advanced Studies (SAS) at Miami Dade College, Homestead Campus; Cutler Bay Senior High School; Faith Fellowship School; and Homestead Senior High School.
For more information, contact Dr. Madison at mmadison@mdc.edu.