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STEM-focused Impact Academy to open later this year
CAMPBELL
Students will have a new schooling option next fall that focuses on science and technology.
The upcoming Impact Academy will begin operating in a wing of the Campbell Elementary and Middle School beginning Aug. 20.
The school is focused on Science, Technology, Engineering and Math – STEM – education, as well as humanities courses to help contextualize the sciences and understand their impacts on the world outside the lab.
Kent Polen, the school’s chief administrative officer, said the school would focus on problem and solutions-based learning by using nine-weeklong projects for the students to collectively work to solve.
The school will be broken up into three primary paths; health, energy and digital.
The health track will focus on health care and related technologies; the digital track will focus on web design, software security and informations technologies; and the energy track will focus on the oil and gas industry through shale as well as alternative energy via solar power and other emerging forms of power.
In addition to offering a mix of trade-school skills training and traditional school classroom work, students can also earn college credit through the academy’s partnerships with Stark State University and Eastern Gateway Community College.
The academy will take 50 to 60 students per grade. In its first year of operation it will accept seventh- and eighth-grade students. In its second year, seventh- through 10th-graders will be accepted, and in its third year, seventh- through 12th-graders.
All students will be chosen through a lottery that will be conducted April 30. Parents interested in enrolling their students can register from April 2-26.
The academy is open to students across the state.