Two-year career-technical education grant will expand Bioscience Technologies program at Hilhi and enable CTE Innovation Summer Camp for historically underserved middle schoolers

December 8, 2017, Hillsboro, OR --Hillsboro School District recently learned it has been awarded $434,000 in CTE Revitalization Grants from the Oregon Department of Education (ODE) to support a major expansion of the Bioscience Technologies program at Hillsboro High School (Hilhi; $343,100) and to create a CTE Innovation Summer Camp for Latino and other historically underserved middle school students ($90,900).

Bioscience Technologies is a new career pathway being offered at Hilhi this year. The program seeks to introduce students to the world of modern biological research and its impacts on society, as well as careers within the growing biotech field. In partnership with the Bioscience Technologies program and Portland Community College, Hilhi's Bioscience Technologies pathway will allow students the opportunity to articulate up to 19 college credits.

The grant will work in conjunction with projects already slated to occur as a result of the District's recently-passed capital construction bond to remodel an existing home economics space to become a fully equipped laboratory with modern and industry-standard equipment and supplies. The grant will allow the purchase of larger-scale equipment and more of it so that lab groups can be kept at four or fewer to ensure each student's hands-on participation. It will also allow more varied and complex experiments to be conducted, especially in the advanced capstone class. In addition, it will help fund field trips for students to attend professional conferences where they can see, and hopefully present, current research. With this grant, Hilhi will become the area leader in the high school Bioscience field, with the first full Bioscience CTE Pathway in the State of Oregon.

"Industry partners are very excited by this partnership, as evidenced by field trips that have already occurred to the Oregon National Primate Research Center [ONPRC] and Genentech, extensive curriculum collaboration between PCC Biotech and Hilhi Biotech, and Experiential Learning Opportunities that have taken place at ONPRC for several Hilhi students," explains Bioscience Technologies teacher Brian Pendergrass.

The CTE Summer Innovation camp is a project-based learning experience that includes designing a product, developing a business plan, prototyping and executing the product design, testing it, and presenting to the larger community. The camp will last for a total of eight days: Monday through Thursday over the course of two weeks. The camp aims to serve Latino students and other historically underserved students and is designed to harness the strengths and assets, such as bilingualism, that students bring to the table. Camp instructors, who will be both licensed CTE teachers and staff who are experienced in serving families in the Hispanic community, will work directly with high school interns to develop the lesson plans and presentations.

Hillsboro was one of 101 recipients of the grants, which totaled $10.3 million for the 2017-19 biennium. This award brings to $985,244 the total of CTE Revitalization Grants earned by the District since January of 2016.
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