Covid-19 locked the summer down. These students stepped up. “A salaam alaikum,” said Nathan (C/O ’22), a second-year TeenSHARP student, as he greeted the Summer Learning Symposium crowd.
In comfortable, confident Arabic, Nathan reflected on the busy summer he spent learning the language and preparing for a future career in pharmacy. Then he translated the remarks to English, so the audience could understand. Everyone snapped and clapped—even with their mics muted.
This summer, TeenSHARP scholars like Nathan went above and beyond in terms of personal growth and learning, despite the immense challenges they faced during the pandemic. For our part, TeenSHARP made sure they had engaging, extraordinary alternatives to their plans to travel or attend elite, in-person programs.
It’s TeenSHARP’s goal to place students in competitive, premiere summer programs that develop their leadership skills and knowledge. This year, in response to pandemic-related closures, TeenSHARP even developed and delivered our own rigorous programs to fill-in for students whose plans were called-off or disrupted by Covid-19. For students who did participate in elite virtual programs, it marked the culmination of dozens of competitive applications prepared and submitted with support from TeenSHARP.
“This summer was my most productive, in spite of being in quarantine,” said Asquith Clarke II (C/O ’21).
He got to check a box off his wish list when he designed a video game in his TeenSHARP CyberSPARK summer class. He also attended the Freedom Literacy Academy, through a unique partnership with TeenSHARP and the Center for Black Educator Development in Philadelphia. “Reading W.E.B. Du Bois changed my whole career path,” Asquith said at the symposium. “I now want to be a truth speaker.”
Another high school senior, Daniela Rosiles (C/O ’21), attended the Telluride Association Summer Program (TASP) to study education and citizenship. For six weeks, she and her virtual peers were immersed in the writings of Plato and Socrates, precedent-setting court cases like Plessy v. Ferguson, and essential philosophical questions.
“It helped me a lot with my reading, writing, and analytical skills,” she said. “I’m still kind of shocked by how much we learned during that time.”
In addition to TASP, our students participated in the National Strategic Language Initiative, the ACLU Summer Institute, the Black Engineers Institute at Virginia Tech, the College Readiness Scholars Institute at University of Delaware, the EDGE program at University of Delaware, and Student Voice Week at DelawareCAN, among others.
David (C/O ’21) spent his summer solving problems: how to keep football players safe from CTEs, and how to decontaminate everyday items in a pandemic-era workplace. He even learned how to code Python, a high-level programming language, in six weeks.
“It was pretty hard, really crazy, and super fun,” David said during the Summer Learning Symposium—just before he began a demonstration of the prototype helmet he created with peers while attending MOSTEC at MIT.
“I stayed up very many late nights trying to get the bugs from the code,” he said, with palpable enthusiasm and curiosity. “It was a completely different experience than what I thought it would be, and it was excellent.”
David also participated in the Science and Engineering Apprenticeship Program, run by the Office of Naval Research. During the eight-week program, his team designed a decontamination chamber that uses high-energy, UV-C light to neutralize viruses on surfaces. Then they had to present it to the Naval officers. “It was kind of intimidating,” he said.
Still, he knocked it out of the park.
Beyond academic and professional accomplishments, our TeenSHARP scholars formed a community this summer—connecting across virtual distances to learn and grow together, and support one another.
Aja (C/O ’21) joined TeenSHARP in April. Or, as she tells it, she “joined, unsubscribed, and re-joined.”
“I got the little email from Ms. Kim with 25 writing prompts, and I thought, ‘I’m not doing that much extra work,’” Aja said. Then someone from TeenSHARP followed up with a phone call. She said, “You don’t have to do the extra work—but it’s really helpful.”
During the symposium in late August, Aja thanked TeenSHARP for making sure she didn’t fall through the cracks. “I’ve never been in a community where I’m striving to be like the others around me,” she said. “We’re all encouraging each other. Let’s rise together.”
