The Young Scientist Program aims to attract students to scientific careers and increase the participation of historically-excluded groups in science by bringing resources and scientists directly to teachers and students in the St. Louis area.

We exist to promote science literacy among students in grades K-12, encourage the pursuit of careers in STEM by introducing participants to areas of scientific study, provide reliable personal and academic mentorship to students to help them in their pursuit of STEM careers, and develop participants’ laboratory and critical thinking skills necessary for research areas.

The Young Scientist Program offers three main branches of programming:

Continuing Mentoring

The Continuing Mentoring program offers personalized and individual mentorship throughout a student’s high school career at Soldan International Studies High School and Collegiate School of Medicine and Bioscience.

Summer Focus

The Summer Focus program provides rising high school seniors with a funded summer research opportunity in biomedical science at Washington University Medical and Danforth campuses.

Teaching Teams

The Teaching Teams program introduces K-12 students to scientific study through interactive demonstrations brought into the classroom, held on the WUSTL campus, or at community events.