ELYRIA, Ohio – Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems LLC has donated $10,000 to sponsor a week-long summer experience designed to engage local rising ninth- through 12th-grade students in hands-on, interactive computer coding activities. The experience, called the High School Coding Camp, is scheduled for Aug. 3-7 at Lorain County Community College (LCCC), in Elyria. Part of a newly designed program for Northeast Ohio (NEO) high school students, the camp is one of five sponsored by leading NEO employers and industry groups in conjunction with TECH CORPS and the Northeast Ohio Regional Information Technology Engagement (RITE) Board.

The five camps – free to participating students – are being held at colleges and universities in Northeast Ohio. They will serve a total of 100 students selected through an application process. Each camp consists of a 40-hour program in which 20 students will learn industry-standard programming languages and – through a series of labs and activities – will be exposed to the same challenges software designers encounter daily. Students also will interact with technology professionals from the sponsor organization and will learn about educational and career pathways in the region.

“It’s very important to engage young people and encourage them to enter technical fields – with Information Technology (IT) as a prime example, where the need for high-skilled developers is only going to keep growing,” said Paul Szentkiralyi, Bendix director, Americas IT. “This week-long immersion into the coding world will give students a look at how fun and rewarding it can be, help them discover their passion, and serve as a good start in building the skills needed to become contributing members of the IT workforce, which is so critical to our region and its employers.”

Szentkiralyi and Kate Scheibelhut, Bendix manager – Americas IT applications, serve as LCCC RITE Council employer representatives for Bendix, the North American leader in the development and manufacture of leading-edge active safety and braking system technologies for commercial vehicles. Together, they helped spearhead the company’s sponsorship of the High School Coding Camp. The effort is part of Bendix’s ongoing commitment to support local STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and education initiatives, as well as area-wide community growth.

“The coding camp sponsorship – an investment in education and technology – is perfectly in line with our community involvement mission at Bendix,” Scheibelhut said. “Programs such as this camp help the students, help our business and help the region by building the base of technical talent. By contributing to inspiring efforts like the High School Coding Camp, we’re helping to sow the seeds for the future.

Bendix will support other local students on May 28 when it sends engineers to help at Keystone Middle School’s STEM Day. In the one-day event at the middle school in LaGrange, Ohio, students will work at solving a problem by navigating through the design process. Bendix engineers will be among those who assist the students and serve as judges.

The Keystone program isn’t the first time in recent weeks the company has supported students in the area. In mid-March, Richard Beyer, vice president of engineering and R&D at Bendix, served as an Invention Convention judge for the Westlake City Schools. The competition was designed to build problem-solving and manufacturing skills among young students.

In another initiative, the company recently donated approximately $3,500 in new Bendix components for use in the high school Diesel Tech Program at the EHOVE Career Center, in Milan, Ohio. Bendix also hosted the program’s future truck and heavy equipment mechanics on a school field trip to the company’s Elyria headquarters, where the students toured the facility, had lunch and interacted with Bendix professionals.