Stark State College and two Ohio community colleges
receive $695,000 grant from National Science Foundation

Stark State College and two Ohio community colleges have received a three-year, $695,000 grant from The National Science Foundation (NSF) to develop an associate degree in computational science. The initiative is part of a statewide coalition involving Owens Community College near Toledo, Sinclair Community College in Dayton, and an educational initiative of the Ohio Supercomputer Center (OSC) in Columbus.

The partnership will be led by OSC’s Ralph Regula School of Computational Science, a virtual statewide school focused on teaching computer modeling and simulation to solve real-world problems in a wide range of fields including medicine, manufacturing, finance and earth science.

“Stark State is pleased to be part of this important statewide initiative that will strengthen the competitiveness of our young people in science and engineering,” said John O’Donnell, president of Stark State College. “We look forward to developing an associate degree in computational science to provide an additional educational pathway in high-performance computing.”

The goal of the project is to complete a statewide computational science curriculum, already in progress, by developing associate degree programs that constitute the middle two years of an articulation from the high schools to the community colleges and four-year colleges and universities. The grant will fund the development of courses and materials, a model articulation agreement from high school through baccalaureate programs, professional development for high school and community college faculty and a model for a shared program that can be replicated nationally.

The collaborative project entitled “Computational Science Program for Ohio Community and Technical Colleges” was awarded through NSF’s Advanced Technological Education program.

Project Lead the Way (PLTW), another key partner in the project, has developed a sequence of courses which, when combined with college preparatory mathematics and science courses in high school, introduces students to the scope, rigor and discipline of engineering and engineering technology prior to entering college. The Ralph Regula School staff will be working with the Ohio PLTW program to develop a new course in computational science to prepare students for the associate degree program.
 

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