Chico State students Mauricio Anaya, Gabriel Garcia, David Gonzalez, and Elyja Swick, seen in the back row were selected to attend a STEM-focused conference.
Four Chico State students attended a leadership conference in San Diego on Oct. 18 and 19 for mathematical and mechanical learning.
The Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement Student Leadership Conference brings engineering and computer science majors together from across the state, wrote Danielle McNamara, the assistant director of strategic communications at MESA, in an email to The Orion. Students attended the convention to network, gain science, technology, engineering and math career exposure and build leadership skills by interacting with industry representatives.
The students attended workshops about effective communications, team building, leadership skills and participated in mock interviews, she wrote.
Paul Villegas, the director of the MESA program at Chico State, recruited the four students to attend the conference.
The nationwide program is designed to provide education, recruitment and retention to science, technology, engineering and mathematics programs, Villegas said.
“We’re training students to be engineers, but what they’re not always going to learn in the classroom is how they are going to conduct themselves in an interview,” he said. “The conference brings MESA students from all over the state of California in one spot for intense seminars and workshops.”
The 13 MESA chapters across California promote education by focusing on students in majors within the college of engineering, Villegas said.
“One of the things that statewide MESA does for us as a national organization is they want to get our students involved in companies and professional development,” he said. “Companies want to grow the future workforce.”
The MESA program promotes science, technology, engineering and mathematics success for more than 28,000 educationally disadvantaged high school, community college and four-year college students in California, McNamara wrote. The program promotes success with project-based learning, academic counseling and exposure to science, technology, engineering and math careers. This helps them graduate from college with math-based degrees.
Nathan Lehmann can be reached at [email protected] or @theorion_news on Twitter.