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Wanted: Volunteers For Duke's 'School Days'

Duke will host 300 students from Durham middle schools Oct. 21

Jennifer Nuez, a Duke Medicine surgery resident, helps Xavier Lawrence, a Durham Public School student, perform a simulated gall bladder surgery in the Surgical Education and Activities Lab (SEAL) at Duke Clinic during the 2010 School Days program.
Jennifer Nuez, a Duke Medicine surgery resident, helps Xavier Lawrence, a Durham Public School student, perform a simulated gall bladder surgery in the Surgical Education and Activities Lab (SEAL) at Duke Clinic during the 2010 School Days program.

About 300 energetic eighth-graders, clad in purple T-shirts emblazoned with "School Days," will stream off buses outside Cameron Stadium on Oct. 21, eager for a taste of college life.

School Days, a cooperative effort by Duke and Durham Public Schools, introduces local eighth- graders to college, including academics, admissions and athletics. Duke organizers invite faculty and staff to volunteer to assist with activities from 8:45 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 21.

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"What we need are staff members who can spend part of the day with them as escorts and walking mentors as these students explore the notion of higher education," said David Stein, senior educational partnership coordinator with Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership. "We have found that by the time a student has entered high school, they have often already made decisions about whether or not to aim for college."

The School Days program works with students with a strong academic record but who may not see college as part of their future because they have no family members who have attended college, Stein said. 

During the day, students receive information about the value of higher education, and they visit famous Duke landmarks like Duke Chapel and Perkins Library. Students also engage in specially designed 20-minute academic or lab sessions with faculty volunteers to experience the intellectual life of college. 

To volunteer, Duke faculty and staff are asked to register online. Faculty members interested in offering a 20-minute presentation on their research can also register for presentation times online.

Last year, approximately 40 Duke students and 70 faculty and staff volunteered for School Days. Among them was Steve O'Donnell, senior communications strategist in the Office of Information Technology.

"Seeing these eighth graders come alive with intellectual curiosity was well worth the effort of chaperoning," he said. "It reconnected me with the purpose of Duke: the educational mission."

 Volunteers are invited to an orientation/breakfast at 8:45 a.m. Oct. 21. After, they accompany a group of 10 students on a pre-arranged campus tour and academic sessions, and eat lunch with them in a dining hall. The volunteers also are exposed to parts of Duke they might not normally visit, from the 3D Virtual Reality Lab to the Human Patient Simulator.  The day ends with Duke student performers and a closing slideshow in Reynolds Theater.

"It is a very full day, and the students are often quite exhausted at the end," Stein said. "But we hear over and over again that the program touches them deeply."