Girls Summer STEM Academy

The Harris Foundation's Girls Summer STEM Academy (GSSA) is a two-week non-residential academy hosted at Alief Independent School District located in Houston, Texas providing 36 rising sixth grade girls with an opportunity to improve and increase their knowledge of STEM concepts and STEM career-fields.

Program Model

Enhancing Academic Success for young girls through STEM!

The Girls Summer STEM Academy will foster youth leadership and citizenship, as well as instill values of responsibility, fairness and respect; offer a program that involves exploring solutions to real-world STEM-related problems, questions and issues through team-oriented collaborative learning and the use of technology; and create an environment through activities and events designed to build self-confidence and self-esteem.

A Project-Based Inquiry Learning (PBIL) model will be used to combine inquiry with scientific and engineering practices that will connect a theme and core problem to field excursions and core curriculum subjects.