Kelsey Barta, a sophomore engineering major from Seattle, has invited the Lynchburg and Amherst middle schoolers here for an after-school “Engineering for Girls” event. The project is T-shirt chromatography, an introduction to chemical engineering. It is the first of three workshops Barta is running to get young girls excited about the field of engineering. The other two, focusing on electrical and mechanical engineering respectively, will take place in January and February.

Barta is funding her project through an Anne Gary Pannell Merit Scholarship. She is one of nine members of the Class of 2015 to qualify for the program, which was initiated in 2010-2011 to reward exceptional first-year students with the opportunity to fully explore an area of interest during their sophomore year. The Class of 2014 was the first to complete projects under the program.

Pannell Scholars receive a merit award applied to their tuition and funds to support their project. It can be used for research, creative endeavors, or travel for academic purposes or service.

On this Thursday evening in early November, those funds have purchased a rainbow of permanent markers, white T-shirts, household rubbing alcohol and an assortment of packaged snacks. The latter fly about as Sweet Briar student volunteers toss little bags of Cheese Nips to waiting hands across the crowded room.

Barta explains that chromatography is a process used to separate substances, for example blood or ink found at a crime scene or pollution in air or water.

The girls stretch the shirts over plastic cups and secure them with rubber bands. Using eyedroppers, they drip alcohol onto dot patterns they’ve drawn in the circles formed by the cups, which causes the colors to separate and spread. The more they drip, the more the colors run.

They get creative. A sixth-grader makes a peace sign. Another draws the face of Firestar, the sleek ginger cat in “Warriors.” She’s a big fan of the children’s book series and, by the looks of it, a budding artist. Maybe just the kind of inventive female mind Barta wants to see entering the engineering profession.

She recalls being one of only two girls who participated in her high school’s engineering pathways program. “I always thought, ‘I don’t know why there aren’t other girls in here, because the stuff that we do is fun,’ ” she says.

“So I figured middle school would probably be a good age to expose girls to engineering, because they can then discover what it is and that they can actually have a career in it. So maybe as they move on to high school and start thinking about what they want to do, they might think of engineering.”

It seems to be working so far. Many are there because they like science in school, others are simply curious. But when Barta starts to wrap up the two-hour session, there are cries of protestation.

“Is it over already?” one asks. “I’m not ready to go home.”

The objections are short-lived, thanks to the final planned activity of the afternoon.

“Who wants to see live sharks?” a professor calls out to shouts of “I do! I do!”

The eager group flows toward the lab, where the biology department’s chain catshark colony thrives in aquaria — though evidently not without some trepidation.

“They wouldn’t allow wild sharks at the college,” one is heard to say as they pass.

— Jennifer McManamay

A non-competitive ‘fun run,’ this race is the culmination of the region’s Girls on the Run fall program. Central Virginian girls ages 8 to 13 have been training for 10 to 12 weeks in preparation for this event, which recognizes and celebrates their efforts. Anyone wishing to run along must register online. Registration is $25 until Nov. 14. Beginning Nov. 15, the registration fee will be $35. Pets or strollers are not permitted. For more information, visit girlsontherunva.org or call (434) 607-2024.

The Lynchburg-based Girls on the Run council has already held two races at Sweet Briar since the two women’s organizations announced a partnership in August 2011 — one in the fall of 2011 and one this past spring. As in May, the picturesque route will take runners from the old train station through campus and along the Dairy Loop, winding its way past the riding center and through the woods.

Sweet Briar is a proud supporter of Girls on the Run’s mission, which is “to inspire girls to be joyful, healthy and confident” and to “educate and prepare girls for a lifetime of self-respect and healthy living.” Girls on the Run also provides opportunities for Sweet Briar students to volunteer, mentor the younger girls and share some of the benefits they’ve experienced in an all-women’s educational environment.

Dozens of volunteers, including Sweet Briar students and employees, will help with course setup, work pre-race activities such as the happy hair table, or serve as running buddies for more than 515 registered girls as they tackle the challenging 5K course.

About a dozen students presented the Diversity Monologues for members of the Class of 2016 in Murchison Lane Auditorium Monday evening. Beginning last year, the monologues were added to first-year orientation. A spring semester program also was held.

Some students read their own material; others brought to life stories of someone else’s experiences, both before and after their arrival at Sweet Briar. They explored race, religion and sexual identity, but topics came from less expected places, too: being too tall, being “ginger,” having epilepsy or just coming from a complicated family situation. One monologue was about being a college student who doesn’t like to party.

They were funny, serious, poignant — and spoken from the heart.

Senior Molly Harper has written several monologues that she and others have performed since the inaugural program in fall 2011. An outgoing leader on campus working on her Bachelor of Fine Arts in theater and music, her inner struggles don’t announce themselves. But they are there. She has written on being a pagan, weight and body image issues and on being a bully — and how one led to another. As a child, Harper said she was picked on for “being too tall, too large, too everything.”

“I find the bully monologue to be very important, because it touches on the matter of civility and the treatment of others,” she says. “The fact is, when I was little I was bullied so much, I became a bully to stop the kids from making fun of me. It led me into a lot of trouble and so today, I am extremely intolerant of bullying in general.

“That is the reason I participate [in the monologues]. Name calling, jokes and pranks that hurt a person because of their differences are something that I hate and so I want to stop any and all of that on the Sweet Briar campus.”

The monologues recognize that such differences, visible and otherwise, come in all forms. They help new students, who may be working through their own conflicts, understand that they are not alone.

“By presenting a monologue you are showing yourself to be a person who can be approached on the subject matter and saying you are willing to help anyone who needs help,” Harper says.

The monologues show Sweet Briar as the diverse community that it really is, says junior Ty Shreve.

“They’re a way of telling everyone a story that they can relate to about different topics,” Shreve says. “Because a lot of people will take a quick glance at Sweet Briar and the first thing that pops into their mind might not be diversity. [The monologues] show there are all types of diversity.”

She says the monologues start conversations that continue afterward, and allow new students to open up about what’s on their minds. As an orientation docent last year, Shreve talked to first-years who attended the 2011 monologues.

“The basis of what I heard was, ‘I can relate,’ ” she says.

Shreve’s monologue is the last in the lineup and serves to sum up the program. In it, she implores listeners not to dredge up past conflicts and illuminates the American paradox that our differences are what unite us. The same is true of Sweet Briar, she says.

“We’re Sweet Briar sisters, we’re in America. In America, we’re supposed to be celebrating our differences, especially at Sweet Briar. [Here] everyone is so different and that’s part of the empowerment of girls — that we are all unique and we can use our different abilities and experiences to be empowered.”

The seminar focuses on “Teaching Proficiency through Reading and Storytelling” (TPRS), a method developed by Blaine Ray. In the last 20 years, TPRS has become popular among language educators. The seminar is one of many TPRS programs held nationwide, but it is the only one offered exclusively for German teachers.

The American Association of Teachers of German (AATG) has sponsored and publicized the program since its inception in 2003.

“Through the sponsorship of the program Sweet Briar has become well-known with German teachers from all over the United States and from some foreign countries,” said Ronald Horwege, professor of German at Sweet Briar.

The seminar originated after Julie Baird, a German teacher from Indiana and one of the leading experts in teaching German through TPRS, conducted an immersion weekend program at Sweet Briar College in 2002.

“After the immersion weekend, Julie and I sat down together and decided to follow up on the positive response the program had gotten by organizing a weeklong TPRS seminar,” Horwege said. “The idea was presented to the AATG and bore fruit.”

For the first seminar in 2003, Baird was assisted by Robert Williams, who teaches German at Fairfax High School in Fairfax, Va. Because enrollment grew with each session, the group expanded in its third year by adding Hank Schwab from North Brunswick Township High School in New Jersey. In subsequent years, other staff members were added. For this year’s seminar, the staff consists of Baird, Williams, Schwab and Horwege, who has organized and administered all seminar sessions.

German teachers from around the country gather at Sweet Briar College for the 2012 “TPRS Coaching and Learning” seminar.

— Janika Carey

Quamia Dennis works on the lyrics for a song during her morning writing lab.

It’s a Thursday morning in July, and the second session of UVa’s Young Writers Workshop is in full swing.

In a tiny classroom a handful of songwriting students have picked up their guitars, their fingers searching for notes that might inspire words. Handwritten signs taped to the wall with bright pink duct tape read “Contribute,” “Take risks” and “Revisions.”

In the kitchen lounge just outside the classroom, another student is listening to hip-hop beats on his computer, his head nodding as he scribbles down lyrics.

For 30 years, high school kids from across the country and abroad have been gathering during the summer to immerse themselves in their art. There are workshops in fiction, poetry, non-fiction, script- and songwriting. Some students have been coming for years; others became counselors and now teach some of the writing labs. The second session, which lasts three weeks, typically draws 50 percent of its applicants from workshop alumnae, according to assistant director Jeff Martin.

One thing is different in 2012: It’s the first time the workshop is taking place on the campus of Sweet Briar College, and not at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.

“It’s been wonderful,” says Margo Figgins, founder and director of the program, which admits between 150 and 200 students each year.

After last year’s hiatus due to renovations at UVa, she’s glad to have found a new home for her young writers — at least for the moment. It’s too early to say whether Sweet Briar will become a permanent residence, but so far the campus seems like a natural fit for the program.

“The location here is much nicer,” says scriptwriting student Natcher Pruett, a 17-year-old from Minneapolis. It’s his second time participating in the workshop.

Students Libby Brennan (from left), Katherine Thompson, Helena Chung and Sarah Yung don’t mind writing in the company of other poets.

“It’s nice to wake up in the morning and see the mountains when you look out of the window.”

Chicago native Leah Barber, 16, agrees. “I really like Sweet Briar College as a location because it brings character to the program.”

Despite her urban background, the quietude of the campus doesn’t bother her. On the contrary, she says, it’s nice not having distractions.

“You can really focus on your writing,” she says. In her case, that’s poetry.

Some students call the landscape “inspiring” — a vibe Martin feels, too.

“One of the biggest differences I’ve noticed in shifting from Charlottesville to Sweet Briar is that, odd as this may sound, the land seems to have a calming effect on both the students and the parents,” says Martin, who’s been with the program since 2001.

“In Charlottesville there was construction around us every summer for more than a decade, and we were right on a major road, so it was a very busy space — both literally and to the eye — and never really quiet. Here, though, I’ve noticed from as early as registration — when the parents and their children first drive onto campus — that the land gets their attention: they talk not just about how pretty it is, but also about how quiet it is, and how peaceful.”

The campus environment emerged as a theme so often that it prompted Figgins to speculate on its impact.

“It’ll be interesting to see what role the landscape plays and how it enhances their experience,” she says.

Director Margo Figgins is also an associate professor at UVa’s Curry School of Education.

But there’s something else that students are benefitting from just as much as the landscape.

“The other major difference that helps immerse the students in the Young Writers experience is that here at Sweet Briar they’re surrounded by other arts programs, which wasn’t the case in Charlottesville,” Martin says.

“Between BLUR [Sweet Briar’s interdisciplinary arts camp] and [the College’s theater company-in-residence] Endstation, we’ve had opportunities for collaborations that we’ve never had before, and the effect of that is pretty powerful — after a while students simply accept that they’re surrounded by all kinds of different artists, and when art becomes the comfortable norm, the creation and sharing of it becomes much easier to do.”

Scriptwriting students assisted Endstation playwrights with some of their new scripts, and all workshop participants attended at least one Blue Ridge Summer Theatre Festival performance.

The Young Writers Workshop also collaborates with the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, which is located just across U.S. 29. VCCA fellows come to campus to read from their works and to teach electives — classes that fall outside of the students’ disciplines, but are always tied to writing. They’ve explored “Queer Theory in Beatles Songs,” invented a sock puppet world based on a YouTube video of an old MTV show, and delved into the art of a concept album, which involved listening to “Ziggy Stardust.”

“The VCCA is such an amazing resource,” says poetry student Zoe Jeka, 17, from Maryland.

Pruett, Barber and Jeka’s eyes light up when they talk about their classes. One of their favorite experiences was the 24-hour play, a workshop tradition in which students write and rehearse an original play in just one day. Barber and Jeka also loved finding random science books in the library to use as inspiration for their poetry.

During the academic year, assistant director Jeff Martin teaches composition, literature and fiction writing courses at the University of North Carolina in Greensboro.

On weekends, counselors organize field trips to local orchards and farmers’ markets; during writing labs, students occasionally visit coffee shops and antique stores in Lynchburg. Sometimes, activities are meant to inspire, other times they’re just for fun. But in the end, the one thing everyone wants to do — all the time — is write.

It’s not uncommon for program participants to spend lunch breaks talking entirely about what they’ve been working on, Barber says. Most of the time, she adds, students can’t wait to get back to work. “We’re always writing.”

With just days before this year’s workshop ends, all three students say time has gone by way too fast. They’re not ready to part from newly found friends and return to their high schools, where writing is just one of many subjects.

“I wish it was all summer,” Barber says with a sigh.

Martin knows from experience that there will be “lots of tears” come closing day. “Which is a little sad to watch, but it also means we did our job,” he adds.

— Janika Carey

The conference, which includes an interactive workshop, is geared toward anyone who is involved in one of the hundreds of historical societies in Virginia. Addressing issues that town or county historical societies face, the event will feature presentations from speakers with experience in improving fundraising, developing effective advisory or oversight board governance, creating new community partnerships, establishing a social media presence and tapping the resources of statewide organizations.

Historical society board members, staff, committee chairs and active volunteers are all encouraged to attend. In recognition of the financial challenges local historical societies are experiencing, conference organizers have set the fee for registration at $20, which includes a boxed lunch and continental breakfast beginning at 8:30 a.m. The event runs from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m.

Registration deadline is Aug. 6. Participants may register online through Sweet Briar College’s Tusculum Institute.

The morning session will open with a welcome from Kathleen S. Kilpatrick, director of the Virginia Department of Historic Resources, followed by presentations from three guest speakers:

• David Bearinger, director of grants and public programs at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and Jo Ann Williford, member of the Federation of North Carolina Historical Societies, who will discuss the importance of partnerships and collaboration;
• Claire Holman, a Charlottesville-based consultant to nonprofits, who will address ways to improve fundraising campaigns; and
• Sam Davis, a consultant with more than 25 years of strategic management experience working with family enterprises and philanthropic organizations, who will speak about effective board governance.

The afternoon session will include a presentation by Tusculum Institute director Lynn Rainville on using social media channels — from tumblr to twitter and from Facebook to Flickr — to reach new audiences.

Following the plenary presentations, the remainder of the afternoon will be devoted to concurrent breakout sessions hosted by representatives of state organizations who will focus on the available resources offered by their respective organizations to assist and support the mission of a local historical society.

Afternoon speakers include:

• John Metz, director of archives, records and collections, Library of Virginia;
• John Kneebone, director, Public History Program, Virginia Commonwealth University;
• Phyllis Leffler, director, Public History Program, University of Virginia;
• Bill Obrochta, director of education, Virginia Historical Society;
• Ann Miller, senior historian, Virginia Department of Transportation Research Council;
• Bob Carter, director, Sweet Briar College satellite office, Department of Historic Resources.

The afternoon will also include scheduled opportunities for participants with shared interests — “affinity groups” — to spend time together during two half-hour coffee breaks to discuss issues of mutual concern. Additionally, a conference-wide half-hour session is planned for brainstorming and discussion about plans for future annual conferences.

The conference schedule is available online at tusculum.sbc.edu/HistoricalSocieties.

Akila Logan, 16, from Atlanta, works on her drawing machine.

Clearly, no one’s going to ride the bike anymore. Instead, it’s being repurposed as a “sunflower seeder,” explain 16-year-old Carter Kyle from Austin, Texas, and Hanna Frazier, 17, from Utah.

“We came up with it ourselves,” they say as if it’s no big deal.

The project is part of a hands-on engineering camp for girls interested in “Exploring Engineering Design” at Sweet Briar College. This year, the weeklong program brought in 22 students from Virginia, New Hampshire, Utah, Texas, Georgia and Florida. For the past week, they’ve all been living on campus with their college mentors.

Designed to fit every experience level, the course encourages students to explore engineering through creative projects in a collaborative environment.

“We try to make the program open-ended, but approachable,” says Hank Yochum, director of the Margaret Jones Wyllie ’45 Engineering Program at Sweet Briar.

He didn’t want the projects to seem too daunting to anyone, Yochum adds. “Everybody can do it.”

But it’s not easy to come up with a project anyone can do, “especially when you want it to be interesting at the same time,” he says.

The seed de-sheller is an element commonly used in design projects because of its value to developing countries, he explains. Aside from fostering creativity, it also teaches students how engineers are making a difference in the world.

“The idea is to provide a business opportunity for poor areas,” he adds. And because these areas may not have access to electricity or batteries, the de-sheller has to be constructed without a motor — that’s where the bicycle comes in handy.

The students’ second project is a drawing machine. While each team uses slightly different materials, the basics are the same: a pen is attached to wooden arms that are moved by motors; the pen then draws circles or figure eights on a piece of paper.

“You don’t want to tell them exactly what to do,” Yochum explains. “It’s important for them to get that sense of ownership.”

Judging from the excited hustling and bustling in- and outside of the engineering classroom, Yochum’s philosophy is working. Drills, saws, screws and 2-by-4s litter the floor and tables. Amidst the chaos, students with safety glasses huddle around their projects trying to make them work. Everyone is doing something.

Kate Parry, a 16-year-old from Alexandria, is here for the first time. She wasn’t really interested in engineering before, but the program has changed her mind.

“After this camp, I’m like, wow, this is pretty cool,” Parry says, adding that she’ll probably major in engineering. In part, her decision was influenced when she talked to Sweet Briar engineering alumnae, who told students about their careers.

“You’re wanted everywhere,” Parry says.

North Carolina native Leah Spinner, 16, agrees.

“It’s nice to know you have somewhere to go after college,” she says.

Even though she plans on becoming a doctor, it’s her second time exploring engineering at Sweet Briar. Last year, she participated in the weekend course that takes place in March.

Sweet Briar College is one of only two women’s colleges in the U.S. to offer an accredited engineering degree. Every year, the College reaches out to high school students (and for the first time this year, middle school girls) through its spring and summer camps.

“Sweet Briar is really committed to increasing the number of women pursuing engineering,” said Yochum when speaking with CBS affiliate WDBJ 7 on Thursday.

Connecting prospective engineering students with successful women engineers is an important part of the summer program. But it doesn’t always have to be a question-and-answer session.

On Wednesday, engineering campers and alumnae worked on a one-hour design project that involved using bamboo found on campus and a variety of recyclable materials. They idea was to imagine that they lived in the Philippines and had nothing but bamboo and whatever they could find in a dumpster to create something they could sell.

“How can you turn these materials into something that has value?” Yochum said, adding that “real” engineers often deal with similar constraints — whether it’s a limited budget or specific building regulations.

Inspired by the challenge, students came up with a variety of items. One team made flip-flops using bamboo and duct tape, others made a kite, a marionette, a picture frame, a toy robot, and bracelets from bottle labels that they displayed on a stand made of bamboo and beer cans.

“It looked like there was a crazy party going on,” Yochum says, laughing.

And in a way, there was. In addition to earning college credit and confidence in their skills, participants discovered that engineering isn’t just a smart career choice: it’s also a lot of fun.

Contact: Janika Carey

The 19-month project is a partnership between faculty at the colleges and 4th- and 5th-grade teachers and administrators in five area school divisions and local schools (Bedford, Amherst, Appomattox and Campbell counties, Lynchburg City and James River Day School). It was made possible by a $199,502 grant through the Math-Science Partnership program from the Virginia Department of Education, awarded in spring 2011.

In collaboration with STEM and education faculty at the two colleges, 17 school teachers from the area spent the past year developing integrated STEM lessons — science, technology, engineering and mathematics — through an “iterative lesson study” process, creating lesson plans and instructional videos. Each lesson features either an inquiry- or problem-based teaching approach, engaging students in investigation and data analysis.

“These approaches to teaching and learning are known to help students access higher level problem solving skills and to develop critical thinking,” said Jill Granger, project director and professor of chemistry at Sweet Briar.

At the conference, project participants will give presentations and offer workshops to other local teachers. About 100 Central Virginia teachers are expected to participate.

Granger said the lesson plans and instructional videos will be disseminated via the Virginia Department of Education’s iTunes University and a project website this summer. Starting in September, the project’s participating teachers will “help others in their schools to adopt the new lessons for their classrooms,” she added.

For more information, email granger@sbc.edu or call (434) 381-6166. To read more about the project and grant, click here.

Contact: Janika Carey

The 26th annual Arts Day will be held at Sweet Briar College on the morning of Friday, April 20.

Shelbie Filson, who is organizing this year’s event, says the College is expecting 314 Amherst County fifth-grade students. Before attending workshops across campus, the students will eat breakfast in Prothro Dining Hall beginning at 9:15 a.m.

Sweet Briar student and staff volunteers will assist at breakfast, accompany groups to each activity throughout the morning and lead a variety of classes, such as square dancing, music appreciation, the art of chemistry, theater games, drawing sharks, natural art, creative writing, film music and more.

For more information, email sfilson@sbc.edu or call (434) 381-6228.

Twenty-five sixth-grade girls from Nelson Middle School in Lovingston came to Sweet Briar yesterday for the first Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day. The event was organized by Hank Yochum, director of the Margaret Jones Wyllie ’45 Engineering Program, and project coordinator Paulette Porter-Stransky as part of National Engineering Week (Feb. 19-25).

While Sweet Briar has hosted high school girls before, this marks the first time 11- and 12-year-olds were invited to put their engineering skills to the test.

“Many of them are scared of science because they think it’s a boy thing,” said Vickie Mays, math teacher at Nelson Middle School.

And yet, she said, the girls had been excited about this day.

“I actually have a lot of boys that were upset that they couldn’t come,” she added.

The event focused on building an audio speaker. After a brief introduction by Yochum, the girls were each given small plastic containers that held a speaker kit. The kit contained all the necessary elements for building a simple speaker: one plastic cup, one Styrofoam cup, one piece of sandpaper, one small square magnet, one speaker jack, insulated wire and two rubber bands. It also came with detailed instructions and pictures.

In addition, the engineering department provided a variety of miscellaneous items students could use in the process, such as colorful paper plates, cupcake holders and wire whisks.

“We want to encourage them to be creative,” Yochum said. “We want them to say: ‘What happens if I do this … ?’”

Watching the girls get excited about engineering is the best part, he said. And there was certainly no lack of enthusiasm in the room, especially as students pulled out their iPods and phones to test their science projects.

“With all the technology they’re using, it’s cool that they’re learning how some of it works,” Yochum added.

Throughout the two-hour session, Yochum and assistant engineering professor Bethany Brinkman, as well as student assistants Kate Fanta ’15 and Kelsey Barta ’15, zipped from table to table to help the girls build their kits, and to explain how electromagnetism works.

The engineering department developed the speaker kits several years ago and has taken them to various schools and conventions. The fact that they’re easy to use and can be altered safely is a huge plus, Yochum said.

But it’s not just about getting girls to like science, or encouraging them to step out of their comfort zone. It’s also about letting them find that comfort zone.

“Girls really get to experience the benefits of an all-women’s school when they’re here,” Yochum said. “There aren’t any boys to annoy them.”

Next weekend, Sweet Briar will open its doors yet again for another engineering event. Geared toward high school girls, the Spring 2012 Explore Engineering Weekend takes place for the fourth time on March 2 and 3.

For more information on upcoming engineering camps, please contact Hank Yochum at hyochum@sbc.edu or at (434) 381-6357.

Contact: Janika Carey