"You, too, can go to a place like Cornell," said Jake Sneva, program director of Upward Bound, to about 50 high school students from low-income families, July 17. "We're opening our doors to expose you to what is great about higher education." The students are visiting Cornell for six weeks this summer.

Upward Bound, funded by the U.S. Department of Education, brings high school students to universities to give them academic support with an emphasis on college preparation.

The Cornell program serves high school freshmen and sophomores from the Groton Central and Elmira City school districts. The students study at Cornell each summer until they graduate from high school. Sneva and an associate director track the students' progress during the school year, offering counseling and tutoring that will continue until the participants are sophomores in college.

During the on-campus summer session, morning classes focus on math, science and composition. Afternoons are spent in academic exploration and cultural activities. Upward Bound partners with such on-campus programs as the Johnson Museum, the Southeast Asia Studies Program, the Department of Mathematics and the Center for Materials Research.

Instructors include graduate students and high school teachers and 11 Cornell students, five of whom act as program assistants. The program assistants mentor the high school students and share their interests, such as theater, dance, public debate and physical education, in the afternoon.

Throughout the summer, faculty members give presentations to students on topics ranging from library research and engineering projects to media coverage of the Mars Rover project. Through these presentations, the Upward Bound program is "trying to expose [the students] to the breadth of possibilities that college has to offer," Sneva said.

Brandon Ayres, a sophomore at Groton High School, said he applied to Upward Bound to help him with college admission. "I really like building and working with my hands and drawing blueprints," he said, adding that he hopes to attend architecture school and was particularly interested in the tour of Cornell's College of Architecture, Art and Planning and leaning about its admission requirements.

Upward Bound also plans to work closely with school districts' curricula and administration.

"We want to, over the next handful of years, really show that we have one of the best programs in the state of New York and hopefully the country," said Sneva.

The program is operated jointly through the Office of the Associate Provost for Outreach and the Cornell Public Service Center.

Laura Janka '09 is a writer intern at the Cornell Chronicle.