The California Summer Science and Technology Academy is hereby established. The academy shall be a statewide program that shall be developed and operated to identify public high school pupils with high academic potential in mathematics, science, and technology, with an emphasis on females and minority members, to participate in university-based research programs. Special consideration shall be given to recruiting pupils who are participants in the Mathematics, Engineering, and Science Achievement program described in Chapter 3.5 (commencing with Section 8600). The pupils, in cooperation with teachers from sponsoring high schools, shall work directly with university research faculty to undertake and complete research purposes that are educationally significant and scientifically manageable. The objective of the research, for the purposes of this chapter, is to enhance the instruction in mathematics, science, and technology that is otherwise provided to the participating pupils in high school, to better prepare those pupils for coursework in those subject areas at the university level, and to provide research data to enhance the participation of those pupils in statewide, national, and international competitions in those subject areas.
(Added by Stats. 1990, Ch. 1443, Sec. 1.)