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polymer science program. Here they are going to help me to get as [many] scholarships and money as possible that I would need.” After completing an undergraduate degree, Stafford-May wants to go on to graduate school, where he can then encourage high school students to pursue a similar path. Stafford-May has strong models to follow as he embarks on his college career. Two of Brownlow’s former students, both college freshmen, are seeing success in USM’s polymer program. O’Meshia Moffett is being honored with a research award; her portrait is going to hang in the USM polymer building. Another student, Hannah Brown, is being credited in a published article. Brownlow cannot hide his pride when discussing these success stories. “Not too many entering freshmen get to say they have been published,” he said, speaking of Brown. What makes the Polymer Science program work so well? What makes these students strive to succeed? In part, the answer may be found in the way the polymer classroom is structured. Where traditional classrooms focus the attention on the teacher through lecture-style learning methods, teachers like Brownlow take a constructivist approach to their teaching. This teaching style places the focus on the students, who are actively engaged in the classroom. The Polymer Science pathway achieves this through hands-on activities that encourage students to apply what they’ve learned to the experiments they do in class. In one of Brownlow’s labs, his students are getting to learn about composites—the same technology that is being used by Boeing to create the new 787 jets. The new composite coating can make a piece of balsa wood nearly unbreakable, as the students learned in their experiment. Brownlow explained that this technology is considered cutting edge in industry today: “Not only are they using the composite in Boeing aircrafts, but they also use it STUDENT down at Northrop Grumman. [It can be found in] some of the composite units that they put on those new smaller class destroyers that they’re doing. The tower itself, all of the above deck part of the ship is completely done in composite. And Mock interviews teach high school some of those panels are $4-8 million panels, and so the kids working here are working on similar students how to dress for success things to what they are doing there.”
Spotlight
Future Business Leaders of America
Mississippi students in the Future Business Leaders of America attended the 2011 FBLA National Leadership Conference in Orlando, Fla. The chapter at Prentiss County Vocational Center received a Gold Seal Chapter of Merit Award. The following students received special recognition:
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Debbie Griffin, Local Advisor of the Year (Northeast Jones High School) Zach Newton, Who’s Who (Picayune Career Center) Mollie McKay, 3rd place in Job Interview (Philadelphia High School)
The Mississippi FBLA also participated in the Phi Beta Lambda portion of the Orlando conference. Charlotte Overby, of the Itawamba Community College Tupelo campus, was named Mississippi Local Advisor of the Year. East Central Community College took home 5th place in the Local Annual Business Report event. The following students also received special recognition: • Zachery Gibbs and Bryan Wiseman, 1st place in Network Design (East Central Community College) • Michael Tripi, 2nd place in Information Management (Meridian Community College) • Jimmy Anderson, Roger Cloward and Sara Noullet, 6th place in Website Design (Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College, Perkinston) • Terry Collum, 7th place in Cyber Security (Meridian Community College) • Kelcey McLemore, 9th place in Economic Analysis and Decision Making (Copiah–Lincoln Community College, Wesson) • Bruce Mapp, 9th place in Market Analysis and Decision Making (University of Mississippi-Tupelo) • Zach Fetcko and Caleb Stewart, 10th place in Business Decision Making (Copiah–Lincoln Community College, Wesson) • Kanisha Patterson, 10th place in Future Business Teacher (Mississippi State University) • Jimmie Anderson, 10th place in Help Desk (Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College, Perkinston)
Building jet engines and war ships – it seems like imaginative child’s play, but this is play with a purpose. Brownlow’s aim is to place the act of learning directly in the students’ hands, getting them excited about the subject and their futures. “We are extremely proud of the program so far,” Brownlow said.
Deidre Bland, teacher at Meridian’s Ross Collins Career and Technical Center, knows that adequate preparation and practice can help her students rise to the top and get desirable positions when they go on the job market. To help her students prepare, she arranged for local community members and business owners to perform mock interviews with her students. Students were required to demonstrate professionalism on all accounts just like they would in an actual interview. Page 4
And Brownlow has good reason to be proud. After all, two of his students are excelling in their college education, and two more are already working toward building a strong research portfolio for their college applications. It is an exciting time for Polymer Science students, who can use their education to take them nearly anywhere they want to go. For more information about the Polymer Science curriculum or any of the other career pathways, please contact the Research and Curriculum Unit at www.rcu.msstate.edu or by calling 662.325.2510.
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