Where S.T.E.M. can take you: Elijah's Experience

Internships are at the core of our work. For over 10 years, senior high school students have repeatedly shared that personal experience is the number one reason they chose their career path. Our response to this insight has been to expand career awareness by increasing the experiences offered to students. We do this through our career mentoring, job shadowing, internship, and Real World Problem Solving programs, as well as with our Discover Day Series, our Family Career Awareness Day, and hands-on learning opportunities at our Makerspace.

Internships aren't just BB2C's work though; we also engage interns to help us do our work. One of our past interns, Elijah Ditchendorf, recently re-connected with us to talk about his experiences with BB2C and to share where he is now.

Elijah is a Marietta High School graduate. He went on to the University of Cincinnati and graduated in 2021 with a degree in biomedical engineering. His interest in the field was piqued while he was taking a career class with Kim Depue. Through that class, he was able to job shadow with a biomedical engineer from Memorial Health System. He explained that he was drawn to the career because it brought together both engineering and biology. It also allowed him to make things, learn new things, and use science, technology, engineering, and math.

During his time at the University of Cincinnati, Elijah was able to complete numerous internship and co-ops, including one with the BB2C Makerspace. In the summer of 2019, the BB2C Makerspace put on our first science, technology, engineering, and math camp (S.T.E.M.). The five day, four night residential camp was sponsored by the Ohio Governor's Office of Appalachia and brought high school students from Appalachia Ohio together to engage in creative hands-on learning. As the intern for the camp, Elijah had the opportunity to assist in planning, directing, teaching, and overseeing the students' experience. He said that his favorite aspects included having the chance to learn new things, share his knowledge with the camp participants, and work with the robotic arm they built.

Today, Elijah lives in Michigan and works as a systems engineer for a medical device company. He is working to refine an automated machine that uses PCP testing to screen for numerous things, including the COVID-19 virus. He is looking forward to spending time this summer traveling around Michigan and getting to know his new home more.

Elijah's advice to today's students is, "Keep trying new things. You never know what you'll end up liking. I got involved with biotechnology during an internship during the summer of my freshman year of college and it led to the start of my career."

Read more about his time as an intern in 2019.

The BB2C Makerspace's S.T.E.M. camp has evolved to a S.T.E.A.M. camp, with the addition of art. It is back, for the first time since 2019. It is open to incoming freshman through 2022 high school graduates from Appalachia Ohio. Applications are now being accepted. There is no cost to the 25 students accepted. For more information, contact makerspace@bb2careers.org.

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