By Ava Dalton '26 and Rushil Reddy '27, Features Desk Editors

At her summer program, Yobosa Idahosa ‘26 walks into class with her math textbooks ready to learn about complex mathematics.

This past summer, Idahosa attended the Pennsylvania Governor’s School for the Sciences (PGSS) at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

PGSS is a highly competitive residential summer program for rising seniors across the state with an under 15% acceptance rate. At PGSS, peers with similar interests dive deeper into more advanced scientific and mathematical concepts.

Idahosa was interested in PGSS because it allows students to pursue their interests outside of the classroom environment.

During the program, Idahosa and the other students took five core classes: discrete mathematics, special relativity, computer science, organic chemistry, and biology. These classes are fast-paced and challenging, designed to push students beyond the high school standards.

In addition to these classes, students dove deeper into one of the core subjects throughout lab sessions. Idahosa chose a lab in mathematics, specifically operations research. In this lab, Idahosa worked largely on linear programming problems about optimization, or maximizing profit and minimizing cost.

Beyond labs, one of the most important parts of the program is the team project. Each student joined a group aligned with one of the core classes.

“I was part of the Electrical Engineering/Physics project, which was building a metal detector using self inductance,” Idahosa said. “We worked on the team project and we wrote the report and did a presentation.”

Working with her team, she learned how circuits and inductors could be manipulated so that when the detector passed over metal, the inductance of the circuit changed, signaling the presence of the material.

Of course, PGSS wasn’t all lectures and lab work. With 70 students living together in the same dorm, community life was just as integral to the experience.

“We would all do our homework together,” Idahosa said. “We would stay up late and have fun talking. Everyone was really nice and we’re all really close now.”

Additionally, the program also offered plenty of social opportunities, from campus events to outings around Pittsburgh.

“We would go out to events,” Idahosa said. “We went to Kennywood, we went to Picklesburg, and we went to the Night Market, which is like a festival. They also held events everyday on campus, and those were fun.”

Looking back, Idahosa described PGSS as both intellectually stimulating and personally rewarding. The program gave her a chance to engage in challenging coursework, work on hands-on problem solving, and build strong friendships with like-minded peers.