Giving Compass' Take:

· Silicon Valley schools are working to increase opportunities for low-income students through school programs preparing them for college and high-tech jobs. The Hechinger Report discusses some programs and the effects they have on students' success, education and future career.

· What kinds of programs are offered to help prepare these students for their future? How are these schools going the extra mile for their students?

· As society advances, technology is being seen everywhere. Learn how technology is shaping the future of education.

It was not an ordinary lunch period at Downtown College Prep Alum Rock High. Berenice Espino and her Quest for Space teammates had gathered in the engineering classroom to watch as a SpaceX rocket was launched into the atmosphere heading for the International Space Station, carrying onboard a science experiment they’d designed. NASA astronauts would test the device, which analyzes the effects of weightlessness on cooling and heating systems, and send data back to the students.

The launch marked the latest effort by the 5-year-old charter school, to expose students to the skills they’ll need to access high-tech jobs. The day after the launch, for example, Espino and classmate Jaime Sanchez were learning Python programming through Udacity, an online education platform that offers “nanodegrees.” Other students in their engineering class were constructing a robot for the Dell-sponsored Silicon Valley Tech Challenge and designing a “tiny house” to shelter a homeless person.

Most students at the high school, on San Jose’s East Side in the southern end of Silicon Valley, are from Mexican immigrant families. Nearly all will be the first in their families to go to college; some will be the first to complete high school. Espino’s mother works as a cook. Sanchez’s father is a landscaper; his stepfather, a construction worker.

The kids who grow up in Silicon Valley’s Latino neighborhoods, the children of groundskeepers, janitors, cooks and construction workers, rarely get a shot at high-paying, high-tech jobs. Just 4.7 percent of the Valley’s tech professionals are Latino and 2.2 percent are African-American, according to 2015 data from the American Community Survey. By contrast, 57 percent are foreign born, with many coming from India and China, a local industry group estimates.

Read the full article about low-income students in high-tech jobs by Joanne Jacobs at The Hechinger Report.