KINGSVILLE (June 13, 2025) — The Frank H. Dotterweich College of Engineering at Texas A&M University-Kingsville (TAMUK) hosted 6th – 12th grade students from South Texas this past week for the Young Engineers of South Texas (YESTx) summer camp.
The five-day camp was held June 9-13 and was designed to introduce students to engineering and technology and pique their interest in the field through activities and hands-on experiences from each of the six TAMUK engineering departments and their representatives.
“We wanted to introduce these young minds to engineering educate them on what they could achieve through an engineering major or program.” said Jesus Reina, Outreach & External Relations Director for the College of Engineering and this year’s Camp Director. “Each department hosted activities and that included everything from learning about Raspberry Pi, all the way to knowing how to use the machinery in the labs to learning how mix concrete to build structures and many other things. No matter what their interest is, or what their passion is, we wanted to encourage them to pursue it.”
In all, the camp hosted 19 middle school students and 15 high school students, who took the camp in from their own unique perspective.
For Penelope Bruder, an incoming seventh-grade student, the camp changed the way she viewed the engineering field as whole.
“This experience was very educational and I’ve learned a lot and experienced a lot,” Bruder said. “I used to think that engineering was all mechanics and a male-driven field, but now, I see that there are a lot more women and that it includes a lot of chemistry, architecture and just starting from scratch and turning it to something beautiful.”
Ava Garza, an eighth-grade middle school student from Corpus Christi, enjoyed coding and liked the insight into every department.
“I liked learning about coding with electrical engineering and learning Raspberry Pi,” Garza said. “We learned about the different engineering majors. I came to the camp because I wanted to about more than one engineering major so I can get an idea of what I would like to do when I’m older.”
For some of the older students and camp veterans, the appreciation comes from the camp’s purpose.
“I have loved the camp every year that I have been,” said Rory Diaz, a Kingsville native and incoming TAMUK freshman. “There is a good mix of kids. I think it’s a great way to facilitate that interest in engineering and really have it blossom. We see a lot of the diversity of the different majors and a lot of the hands-on work and the benefits of each program. It’s a really, really good way of getting kids into engineering and see what exactly they would be interested in.”
Aside from the daily projects, the campers also worked on a weeklong group project that tasked them with creating a city out of simple supplies such as cardboard, cups, foil paper and more with the focus of sustainability and infrastructure. The groups concentrated on the concepts of food, energy, transportation and waste management.
“We wanted them to be creative by creating a real city, make up their own city or even recreate a fictional one,” Reina said. “We wanted them to think of these different aspects of engineering and how they would apply them in their cities. It was a simple project where we wanted them to think big picture. We wanted them to start thinking about all the things that go into planning a city that we may take for granted.
“There is a thought process and an engineer behind almost every single aspect of everything we do in our everyday lives,” Reina added. “The kids produced six great projects. It was such a blast and the parents loved it.”
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