Digital Scholars Program

Digital Scholars Program

As a Digital Scholar, you will join a supportive cohort community and gain digital skills that employers are looking for! These skills include digital marketing, data analytics, social media, and data visualization.

Students participate in a three-quarters (spring, summer, autumn) experience that provides digital skills training with career and major exploration. The Digital Scholars community brings together students, professors, staff, community partners, and UW Bothell alumni to help students develop digital skills and a strong network of supporters.  

As part of the program, you will:

• participate in community-building activities.
• participate in workshops on career readiness, first-gen identity, and financial wellbeing.
• participate in paid summer career-connected project to apply learned digital skills to real-world work experience.
• take a spring and autumn 2-credit course to learn entry-level digital skills, including programming, marketing, data analytics, and graphic design.
• explore your career path and build up your resume.
• learn about UW Bothell resources to support your academic and personal wellbeing.
• build a social network with peers, staff, faculty, and industry partners.
• celebrate and reflect upon your learning.
• attend a digital skill conference.

The Digital Scholars program shares UW Bothell’s values of inclusion and diversity as core components of our mission to support students and educators within the UW Bothell community. To quote from UW Bothell’s commitment to inclusion and diversity,  our work begins with the acceptance and celebration of the differences that are represented through the many diverse and minoritized communities on our campus and in the surrounding community. We recognize that we are bound together in a collective experience and that our actions impact all in our community.

Application period is now open, the deadline is Friday, February 17, 2023. The Digital Scholars Program expects to accept 20 students each year. 

Applicant Criteria

1. Pre-major standing with less than 60 credits completed by the end of Winter Quarter.
2.  First-generation college students* who identify as first in their family to graduate from college. Neither parent nor guardian has completed a college degree.
3.  Eligible and intending to enroll for credit at UW Bothell during the Spring 2022 and Autumn 2022 quarters.
4.  Upon acceptance to the program, you will be required to register for a 2-credit course “B CUSP 133A” for the Spring 2023 quarter (Mondays 3:30-5:30pm) and a 2-credit Autumn 2023 course. You will receive an add code once accepted into the program.

Please reach out with questions, we are happy to help! Contact Kara Adams, Director of Connected Learning, at caseykl@uw.edu. 

Ready to Apply?

The online application asks you to share information about you and your background, and respond to these four questions:

1. Why do you want to participate in the program?
2. What about the program aligns with your academic interests and/or aspirations for future careers?
3. How do you expect your participation in the program contributes to your growth and development as a UW Bothell student?
4. Can you tell us an experience or a story you had in the past when you learned/worked with diverse groups of people? What did you gain from the experience? How do you expect to contribute, with your diverse experiences and identities, to a diverse cohort of participants in the Digital Scholars Program?

For the 2023 cohort, the application period is now open, the deadline is Feb 17th at 11:59pm.

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* A First-Gen Student is: 

• A student whose parent(s) or guardian(s) have not earned a bachelor’s degree.
• A student whose parent(s) or guardian(s) have attended but not completed any college.
• A student whose parent(s) or guardian(s) earned a degree outside of the United States.
• A student who, prior to the age of 18, regularly resided with and received support from only one parent and whose supporting parent did not complete a bachelor’s degree.
• A student who, prior to the age of 18, did not regularly reside with or receive support from a natural or adoptive parent.