Sweet Briar’s Spring 2019 Explore Engineering Weekend for High School Girls is taking applications

Two students work on their project during the Summer 2018 Explore Engineering Design Course at Sweet Briar College.


Registration is now live for Sweet Briar College’s Spring 2019 Explore Engineering Weekend, which takes place on campus Friday, March 22, through Saturday, March 23. The event is open to high school girls in their sophomore, junior and senior years.

During the weekend, participants will work in teams with Sweet Briar professors and current students in the College’s Margaret Jones Wyllie ’45 Engineering Program on a hands-on creative project that is suitable for beginners and experienced students alike. In addition to technical skills, they will learn about the design process — from brainstorming to testing to revising prototypes. This year’s project: an Arduino-based magnetic levitation device.

Students also will gain valuable insight into working as an engineer, being an engineering student, and what they can do with an engineering degree from Sweet Briar — one of just two women’s colleges in the U.S. to offer an ABET-accredited engineering program.


Computer programming is among the skills students will learn during the weekend course.


Registration for the Spring 2019 Explore Engineering Weekend is $65, which includes lodging, meals, snacks, a T-shirt and supplies. Interested students may register online or contact Rebecca Girten at rgirten@sbc.edu or 434-381-6447. It is recommended that participants register by March 1, as space in the program is limited.

The weekend begins at 4 p.m. Friday with an optional campus tour led by admissions. Explore Engineering students then meet at 5 p.m. over dinner and begin their projects that evening. All participants stay overnight in residence halls with Sweet Briar engineering student mentors. A full day of designing, building and experimenting wraps up at 5 p.m. Saturday with a closing exhibition for family and friends.

Explore Engineering is a series of immersive engineering design courses for high school sophomore, junior and senior girls. Weekend events are offered in the spring, summer and fall, and a weeklong pre-college, for-credit course is offered in the summer. Over the past 10 years, more than 500 students have attended an Explore Engineering event, designing and building such things as computer-controlled smart wearables, automated musical devices, sustainable building materials, automatically refilling pet bowls, electromechanical drawing machines and optical bass guitars.

For more information, visit the Explore Engineering website.