Bridges Magazine

Elementary school concerts are a sweet annual tradition. Parents and caregivers proudly snap photos and crane their necks to see their student come on stage. What they might not see under the bright lights of the Performing Arts Center is the months of learning that led up to that one, special night.

Lea Papa is in wonder at how the brains of babies and their mothers develop and change before and after birth. Papa, a senior at Yale University, studies those changes as a student and plans to delve deeper into the topic in graduate school after graduation. 

This 2023 South Milwaukee graduate actually started his career in 2022 as a Youth Apprentice through the high school's Career and Technical Education Program. The Youth Apprentice program is a Wisconsin initiative that pairs students with careers that offer good pay and are in high demand in the state. It was as a junior that Pitzo interviewed with Faith Technologies and was hired. He worked over the summer of 2022 and part-time during his senior year, learning his trade while finishing his classes to graduate. 

The middle school years of a student’s life are full of change and growth. Dr. Megan Butler, who will be the new principal of South Milwaukee Middle School starting July 1st, loves it. 

The students have explored what the soil is made of, what’s living in the ground, what kind of plants should go there, and asked if those plants would be safe for local wildlife. It’s not uncommon to hear big words like “decomposition” and “ecosystem” used by these seven- and eight-year-olds. 

Programming, designing, collaborating, prototyping, and redesigning – that’s what happens in labs and design studios in the tech industry. It’s also happening in South Milwaukee’s STEM labs. An acronym for science, technology, engineering, and math, STEM is a hands-on way to look at the world that combines all those disciplines. 

Au name Herb Kohl Teacher Fellow