If you are among the hundreds of enthusiastic scholars at AHS who are interested in entering a STEM field as a potential career option, Project Lead the Way might be of interest to you! As ambitious young individuals, it is important to gain as much experience and knowledge as possible in our fields of interest; whether it’s robotics or other engineering options, Project Lead the Way gives you the opportunity to do just that with its “real world” like projects and assignments as well as providing a sense of what the engineering fields have to offer.

Bill Chapman, a teacher at AHS who teaches numerous computer science courses, described Project Lead the Way as “the nation’s leading not for profit organization providing STEM education.” Mr. Chapman stated that AHS uses Project Lead Way’s “Introduction to Engineering Design, Principles of Engineering, and Engineering Design and Development.” In addition to that, all of the courses have an “end-of-course assessment that measures how well our students [at AHS] do as compared to all other students in the country who take the exam. Needless to say, Arcadia students perform very well on the assessment.”

Besides the benefits that come from Project Lead the Way, such as accumulating a great deal of insight on your potential career and taking courses from the nation’s leading organization for providing STEM education, there are countless other benefits that are provided to students such as having the opportunity to build “Real World” design projects. To do so, Mr. Chapman described how the class uses “the JPL Invention Challenge and the FIRST Robotics Competition as two major projects.” Likewise, all the the courses are “UC-approved and have been selected by the UC to be upgraded as Honors courses.” As a matter of fact, many colleges also offer credit for them.

Mr. Chapman expressed that “Project Lead the Way came to be to help encourage young people to study more math and science to fill the need for engineers in the country.” There are currently 85 students who are taking the classes this year. If you have an interest in getting involved with this astounding program and gaining more expertise in engineering, make sure to look out for more information on the three courses: Introduction to Engineering Design, Principles of Engineering, and Engineering Design and Development.