Dr. Jamie Bracey opened the first session by welcoming everyone, thanking parents for their continued support, and encouraging students. Many of these students, I know at least from the summer, have participated in Temple’s College of Engineering STEM outreach programs for 2 years or more. Each parent was given opportunity to speak on their expectations followed by Dr. Bracey, John Leigh (program coordinator) and the entire team of teachers and volunteers.
Her stated goal is to continue to grow our STEM community in Philadelphia and ultimately see these students enroll as engineering majors at Temple preferably. My goal, likewise, is to build seed programs and nurture students to build a model STEM pipeline from middle school to college. Programs of this type can be an avenue to stimulate the creative innovation that we will need to offset the tremendous numbers advantage emerging foreign economies – China, Brazil, & India – have in producing scientists and engineers.
John Leigh initiated the first activity where the objective was to build a containment unit that could allow an uncooked egg to drop from 10 feet vertically and yet remain unbroken. He divided students into teams of 4 or 5 and gave them household items such as a latex glove, sponge, duct tape, etc. to construct their containment unit. Groups employed parachutes, shock absorbing strategies, and other ideas. But only one was successful. Later Dr. Ryan Baxter introduced students to CAD and its purpose followed by Tariq who discussed RobotC and the Lego NXT Robot. John brought the entire group together again – excluding most of the girls who left to began a separate design challenge with Dr. Bracey – and discussed the overall aim of building a prosthetic arm that is both functional and aesthetically pleasing to a would be user.
Her stated goal is to continue to grow our STEM community in Philadelphia and ultimately see these students enroll as engineering majors at Temple preferably. My goal, likewise, is to build seed programs and nurture students to build a model STEM pipeline from middle school to college. Programs of this type can be an avenue to stimulate the creative innovation that we will need to offset the tremendous numbers advantage emerging foreign economies – China, Brazil, & India – have in producing scientists and engineers.
John Leigh initiated the first activity where the objective was to build a containment unit that could allow an uncooked egg to drop from 10 feet vertically and yet remain unbroken. He divided students into teams of 4 or 5 and gave them household items such as a latex glove, sponge, duct tape, etc. to construct their containment unit. Groups employed parachutes, shock absorbing strategies, and other ideas. But only one was successful. Later Dr. Ryan Baxter introduced students to CAD and its purpose followed by Tariq who discussed RobotC and the Lego NXT Robot. John brought the entire group together again – excluding most of the girls who left to began a separate design challenge with Dr. Bracey – and discussed the overall aim of building a prosthetic arm that is both functional and aesthetically pleasing to a would be user.