Kerry Xiao ’26 and Colin Cotton ’26 know they’re lucky: Growing up, they had adults around them who offered them life-changing opportunities, and last summer the duo worked to do the same for middle schoolers in their hometown of Wilmington, Del.
The two juniors ran a three-week workshop introducing underserved youth to a variety of STEM topics, including robotics, biology, and computer science. Their work was funded by Projects for Peace, a not-for-credit program that awards college students $10,000 to create and execute a project promoting peace and understanding anywhere in the world.
Growing up in Delaware’s most violent city was the catalyst for their project: When Cotton and Xiao were in middle school, teens were more likely to get shot in Wilmington than in any other city in the United States and in 2022 their hometown had a higher per capita crime rate than 96 percent of U.S. cities.
Now the two believe that educational opportunities can be a strong antidote to violence.
During their workshop, held at Wilmington’s Bellevue Community Center, they guided the 12 participants to explore new ideas, equipment, and academic experiences—all with the goal of sparking interests that might help keep students engaged in school long-term. They were less concerned with teaching specific skills than diversifying students’ educational exposure.
“We wanted them to see that if they liked any of the things they did in our workshop, they can focus on these classes in high school and major in this field in college, and they could end up with a career they would like,” says Cotton, who is majoring in robotics engineering.
“For me, this was personal because in middle school I was in the same shoes as these kids,” Xiao says, remembering that every day after school he would help out at the Chinese restaurant where his parents worked. “I didn’t know what there was out in the world to do.”
Everything changed for Xiao in seventh grade, when a teacher encouraged him to join the school’s robotics team. Now he’s double majoring in robotics engineering and electrical engineering and has served as vice president of WPI’s Society of Asian Scientists and Engineers chapter.
“The fact that someone noticed me and believed that I could be good at this one thing is the reason I’m here at WPI today,” he says. “Most of the kids that we were teaching over the summer had never been part of a school accelerator program before and didn’t have the opportunity for any of these science-related project-based learning experiences.”
