On December 6, 2002 six Hopeworks trainees traveled from Camden, NJ to State College, PA for a personalized tour of Penn State University. We came at the invitation of Chris Pfeiffer and Maurie Kelly of (PASDA), one of the main hubs of geographic information systems at the University and across the state of Pennsylvania.
The trainees attended an orientation session with an admissions officer and toured the campus with a student volunteer from the University's Student Minority Advisory and Recruitment Team (SMART) .
In the afternoon, we were given an in depth presentation from the Earth and Mineral Sciences college within the University where much of the GIS work at the University is done, as well as saw a "high-performance" computer that had its own climate-controlled room with a multi-terabyte storage silo. Overall it was a great experience that allowed the trainees to expand their horizons and see the importance of attending college. We look forward to even more college trips in the future!