Precollege Academic Campus Experience (PACE)

The PACE Program is located on the beautiful UW Madison campus. Our students eat lunch at Gordon Commons, located on the SE side of campus (770 W Dayton St.) and classroom locations are within walking distance to Gordon Commons. Badger Precollege works closely with UW Central Campus Reservations and individual building managers to secure space. This process takes time, as there are many other campus departments and programs scheduling space during the same blocks of time each summer. Individual classroom locations are not confirmed until late May at the earliest.

Yes, lunch for your student is provided as a part of the cost of tuition. Gordon Avenue Market is an undergraduate residence dining facility serving cafeteria style options that offers many food choices each day. Badger Precollege staff will be supervising your child and assisting them in making healthy food choices. If your child has any dietary restrictions or allergies we need to be aware of, please be sure to include this information in your CampDocs online health profile. If a student has severe food allergies or a very restricted diet, they are welcome to bring their own lunch. (Tuition is not prorated in cases where a student brings their own lunch.) A good resource that includes daily menus may be found here.

In addition to any field trips planned during the morning and afternoon instructional blocks, PACE students also participate in field trips around campus throughout the week, both as part of our large group and also often as part of specific courses. This affords students the opportunity to further explore the UW Madison campus. Field trips are supervised by our educational assistants and Badger Precollege Admin staff. Please keep in mind that ALL field trips are walking field trips around campus. Venues are chosen based on their proximity to the SE side of campus to accommodate students walking, as well as being mindful of the very hot temperatures which often occur during PACE.

We also schedule “field trips” that occur at our afternoon location. Past examples would be visits from the UW Insect Ambassadors and presenters from the Wisconsin Institute of Discovery.

Similar to securing classroom locations as described above, Badger Precollege partners with many other campus departments to secure field trips. Scheduling is complex, and many venues do not begin taking reservations for summer until the beginning of the Spring Semester (late January) or much later. Venues need to secure staffing (typically UW undergraduate students) first to accommodate larger groups and this often does not occur until later in the spring. Past field trips include: UW Madison Campus Tours, The UW Geology Museum, The Chazen Museum, and more.

Requests for late drop off and early pick up should be directed to the program manager/program coordinators. Advance notice is greatly appreciated.

While we try our best to accommodate requests, it is not always possible to accommodate specific times. The volume of requests we received increased tremendously over the past year, making this process more challenging. Our staffing numbers are based on a 1:10 staff to student ratio which we must maintain at all times.

Most PACE classes take some field trips during the instructional blocks, so picking up during those times may not be possible. This will vary between classes.

Requests to pick up in the middle of the lunch/field trip block cannot be accommodated, as all staff are needed to supervise, or we may be in transit during those times or already at a field trip location.

As a general rule, if your student has another commitment in the afternoon, we request that you pick up your student up at 11 a.m., following the morning instructional block, or at 1:30 p.m. once students have returned to class following the lunch block.