The Chrysler Foundation Energizes 2014 FIRST Robotics Season with Nearly a Quarter-Million Dollars in Grants
Submitted by Tommy Cornelis on January 3, 2014
Grants will help students to ready robots for run at FIRST Robotics Championship
AUBURN HILLS, Mich., Jan. 2, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- The Chrysler Foundation today announced grants totaling $229,000 to support FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Robotics teams and organizations in Arizona, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Ontario, Canada. The grants will enable more than 1,000 middle and high school students to discover the rewards of science and technology as they compete in the annual international robotics competition.
VIDEO: FIRST Robotics: Killer Bees, Bionic Barons, More Martians and The Chrysler Foundation (2013): http://youtu.be/IppTdkRcoXs.
The Chrysler Foundations' funding announcement coincides with the official start of the 2014 FIRST Robotics' design and build season on Jan. 4. During this phase, teams have the opportunity to meet at local FIRST kickoff events to compare notes, get ideas, make friends, find mentoring teams, learn the design challenge, pick up the official parts kit, and get geared up for the exciting competition season. Last year, FIRST teams were tasked with building robots that were capable of competing in a high-tech version of disc golf.
"The FIRST program provides students with invaluable real world engineering experience," said Mark Chernoby, Senior Vice President, Engineering and Vice President - Product Committee Coordinator — Chrysler Group LLC. "We hope that by engaging students at an early age, we can provide the spark that inspires them to be future innovators and problem-solvers."
Each of the following 41 high schools will receive a $5,000 grant from The Chrysler Foundation:
Arizona
Kingman High School (Kingman)
Illinois
Belvidere, Belvidere North and North Boone High Schools
Indiana
Northwestern High School (Kokomo)
Western High School (Russiaville)
Michigan
Ann Arbor Huron High School
Birmingham Seaholm and Birmingham Groves High Schools
Bishop Foley Catholic High School (Madison Heights)
Bloomfield Hills High School
Capac Community Schools
Cardinal Mooney Catholic (Marine City)
Center Line High School
Chelsea High School
Dundee High School
Genesee Robotics Area Youth Team (Fenton)
Golightly Vocational Academy (Detroit)
Goodrich High School
Grand Blanc High School
Hartland High School
Lake Orion High School
Linden High School
Macomb Academy of Arts and Sciences (Armada)
Notre Dame Preparatory (Auburn Hills)
Oakland Tech Northeast (Pontiac)
OSM Tech Academy at Clarkston High School
Oxford Community Schools
Pontiac High School
Rochester Adams and Stoney Creek High Schools (Rochester Hills)
Romeo Community Schools (Washington)
Skyline High School (Ann Arbor)
Southeastern High School of Technology (Detroit)
Henry Ford II, Stevenson and Utica High Schools (Sterling Heights)
Walled Lake Schools
Warren Consolidated Schools
Waterford Kettering High School
Ontario, Canada
Assumption College School
Harrow District High School
Holy Names Catholic High School
Maranatha Christian Academy
Sandwich Secondary School
Vincent Massey Secondary School
Walkerville Collegiate Institute
Ultimately, teams sponsored by The Chrysler Foundation that qualify for the FIRST Championship (April 23-26) in St. Louis, MO will receive a share of a $15,000 booster fund that will support the teams during the championship.
"The Chrysler Foundation and Chrysler Group are proud to help students discover the rewards and excitement of education and careers in science, engineering, and technology," said Jody Trapasso, Senior Vice President - External Affairs, Chrysler Group LLC and President - The Chrysler Foundation. "We are equally proud of our employees who generously mentor students and serve as competition coordinators."
The Chrysler Foundation also announced a $7,500 grant to FIRST in Michigan to support district and statewide robotics competitions, and grants of $750 each to support FIRST Tech Challenge teams in Fenton and Linden, Mich.
When he rang the doorbell, Zia hadn't planned to step inside. He was there to pick up his fiancee who was babysitting, but she couldn't leave (the parents were running late) so Zia agreed to hang out for a bit. His fiancee said, "Let me introduce you to the kids" — the 2-year-old girl, the 7-year-old boy and, most important, squatting, with no shoes on, surrounded by ants on the back patio, the oldest — the 9-year-old — the one he would make world-famous on YouTube.
Nine is what fourth-graders are. You don't expect them to be wise; they're still boys. When the two started talking, there was no hint of what was about to happen, except for the slightly odd introduction. His girlfriend said he "is interested in cosmology." "Really?" Zia thought, "cosmology?" So he leaned in and asked — just to be a badass — "What do you think about dark matter? Any ideas?"
Wait! I Need To Film This
The boy looked up, started to answer, and almost immediately Zia thought, "Wait!" Zia Hassan is a Washington, D.C.-based musician, blogger, teacher-in-training and video cameraman and he's learned to act on instinct, and his instincts were telling him, "I need to film this." He said to the boy, "Uh, can I film this? Is that all right with you?"
The boy didn't mind. And here, a million-and-a-half views later, is what the boy told him about the universe. I don't know the right words to describe what I feel watching this. Quiet surprise? Joy? Mystery? You should just look for yourself ...
YouTube
We all know smart kids, who are curious, who collect information. "I knew more things in the first 10 years of my life than I believe I have known at any time since," says the writer Bill Bryson. But what Bill knew growing up in Iowa was local: "I knew what was written on the undersides of tables and what the view was like from the tops of bookcases and wardrobes. I knew what was to be found at the back of every closet, which beds had the most dust balls beneath them." Boys gather information by climbing, crawling, inspecting, gossiping.
But this 9-year-old — what he knows is different. It's not local; it can't be found looking under a couch. It's mind stuff, found mostly in books or college classrooms, or by letting your mind run free.
I Could Be Wrong ... I Could Be Wrong ...
Where, I wondered, did he learn about multiverses, free will, the odds of intelligent life in the universe? How does he manage to be so aware of what he doesn't know? "Of course, I could be wrong," he says over and over, offering his opinions in the most unassuming, gentle way. And his brother, talking about how baseball satisfies our need for drama ("We do not have that kind of suspense in our lives."), he's doing it too — thinking, connecting, reflecting — and he's 7!
What's going on in this house? Are these kids outrageously smart? Zia says they're "certainly bright," but not scarily so. Is it something the parents are doing?
"I've gotten lots of questions about how they've raised [their kids]," Zia wrote me. "I don't think they have a particular method or anything like that. They're both excellent human beings and they treat their kids as if they're intelligent young people, and not children who couldn't possibly understand how the world (or universe) works."
This, he thinks, may be the key. These kids are encouraged to think out loud, to say what they think, even if they might be wrong. Each is appreciated. The parents, he says, "are also in awe of their children." And that frees them.
"I think there are a lot of kids who think about interesting things," Zia says. "It's my guess no one really asks them about it."
Maybe that's what this family does: They turn to their kids, and they ask .
Dilapidated Detroit building becomes haven for learning
By Emma Ockerman Special to the Detroit Free Press
Room by room.
That’s how Horatio Williams knew he would have to approach transforming the desolate and shuttered Wayne County Medical Society building just off of I-375 in Detroit into a place where youths can learn, play and grow.
There was water damage and exposed piping. But flaws aside, the building, at 1010 Antietam housed a kitchen, a banquet hall and an auditorium, and the space necessary for the Horatio Williams Foundation to continue its education, music, and dance programs. With a vision in mind, Williams purchased the building for $275,000 in February 2011.
“Once you see it, it’s a hidden jewel in the middle of the city,” Williams said.
With the aid of a $1.1-million investment from UAW-Ford, Williams was able to move his offices and programs from space on East Jefferson. He hosted an open house for the newly renovated Horatio Williams Foundation Center on June 13.
“I was raised up in a facility like that, it was called the Eastside Center. It was a safe haven for the neighborhood. We wanted to get out of our houses because we had nothing to do,” said Williams, who played basketball at Tuskegee University before a car accident ended his college career. “The building reminded me of that. They can come here and get something to eat and be mentored, or just sit down and we can talk to them.”
Outside on the manicured lawn, a gaggle of laughing children engage in a game of Frisbee, tackling one another in a fit of giggles.
Cianna Cooper, 11, has been a part of the foundation’s programs for two years. Her favorite part: learning to play the clarinet.
“My goal is to get a lot better at the clarinet,” Cooper said, looking back to the classroom she had just left. “We just finished a word game, making as many words as we could out of the letters on the board in a couple of minutes.”
For 13-year-old Matika Hill, it was the dance programs that drew her to the program, where she was referred by herteacher. “I like that we can meet new people and get a chance to perform,” Hill said. “I have more training, they actually work with us. In school, they don’t explain as much as the tutoring does here.”
Fit with new floors, new roof, windows, doors, and carpet, the center is now complete. Williams said he’s grateful to Marty Malloy, vice president of labor affairs for Ford, and Jimmy Settles, vice president of the UAW, for sharing his vision.
“Everything he could humanly do, him and his friends did it themselves. He didn’t just sit back in a chair and look at people getting it done. It made the company feel like it was a worthwhile investment, and definitely made me feel like it was one,” Settles said.
The center has aided students with a tutoring program, dance and music classes, as well as helping to raise some students ACT scores by as much as five points.
“With an education, I see their confidence levels up,” Williams said. “If a kid can’t read or write, what do you do?”
Lailah Alquarelles, 10, and D’Ajonay Jones, 14, paint story puppets Thursday during arts and crafts class at the Horatio Williams Foundation in Detroit. The center also has dance and music classes and a tutoring program. PHOTOS BY JARRAD HENDERSON/DFP
Tayla Turner, 10, of Detroit plays her horn during music class Thursday at the Horatio Williams Foundation. PHOTOS BY JARRAD HENDERSON/DFP
FOR MORE INFO
Horatio Williams Foundation Center, 1010 Antietam, Detroit, www.horatio williamsfoundation.org
Horatio Williams, 46, of Detroit bought the building for the foundation in 2011 and is in the process of renovating the Detroit spot after getting a $1.1-million investment from UAW and Ford.
Founder Horatio Williams shows off the brand-new kitchen Thursday at the center. He hopes to begin offering culinary training to students in the future. “Once you see it, it’s a hidden jewel in the middle of the city,” Williams said of the new location.
“We must reimagine middle school science and math not as a way to prepare students for high school, but as a place where students are inventors, scientists, and mathematicians today.”
So say Sylvia Martinez and Gary Stager in this exciting guest article about the Maker Movement and its implications for kids, schools and STEM studies.
Martinez and Stager are the authors of a must-read book, Invent To Learn: Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom. In this informative post, they encourage STEM educators, school leaders and teachers across the curriculum to transform our classrooms into centers of innovative thinking and experimenting. ~ Anne Jolly
InventtoLearn:Makersintheclassroom
by Sylvia Libow Martinez & Gary S. Stager
Sylvia Libow Martinez
The last decade and more has been a dark period for many schools. Emphasis on high-stakes standardized testing, de-professionalizing teachers, and relying on data rather than teacher expertise has created classrooms that are increasingly devoid of play, rich materials, and the time to engage in meaningful projects.
What’s more, the national rhetoric about the importance of STEM subjects (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) has sadly, for many schools, not been reflected in a revitalization of science or math curriculum.
Fortunately, there’s a technological and creative revolution underway that may change everything – the Maker Movement.
Amazing new tools, materials, and skills turn us all into makers. Using technology to make, repair, or customize the things we need brings engineering, design, and computer science to the masses. Hundreds of thousands of adults and children are frequenting Maker Faires, hackerspaces, and DIY (Do-It-Yourself) websites. A growing library of literature inspires learners of all ages and experiences to seize control of their world.
Gary S. Stager
Online communities serve as the hub of a digital learning commons, allowing people to share not just ideas, but the actual programs and designs for what they’ve invented. This ease of sharing lowers the barriers to entry as newcomers can easily use someone else’s code and design as building blocks for their own creations.
Fortunately for educators, this maker movement overlaps with the natural inclinations of curious children and the power of learning by doing. It holds the keys to reanimating the best, but oft-forgotten learner-centered teaching practices. The magic of the middle years, where students can shift seamlessly between childhood play and preparation for serious academics are the perfect place for these engaging, transformative new tools and materials.
TheMakerkids
The maker movement celebrates the talents of young people like Sylvia (aka Super-Awesome Sylvia) who has a web-broadcast program, Sylvia’s Super-Awesome Maker Show, where she sings, plays, and teaches her millions of viewers about electronics, Arduinos, and other fun projects.
Eighth grader Joey Hudy is a young maker and entrepreneur who surprised President Obama with a homemade marshmallow cannon at the White House Science Fair. Here’s the raw video footage, with the President providing some muscle power.
Caine Munroy is a young man who made an entire game arcade entirely out of cardboard and tape. A neighbor fell in love with Caine’s ingenuity and asked his father if he could make a video about the arcade. Not long after,Caine’s Arcade lit up YouTube. Caine and his arcade have inspired millions of people around the world. He’s received invitations to visit other countries, a scholarship fund was created for his college education, and a foundation was created to nurture creativity in kids across the globe. Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa even gave Caine a cardboard key to the city! (See Caine’s TEDx appearance here.)
Of course these are extraordinary young people — but there are extraordinary young people in every city, every school, and every classroom who deserve the same opportunities to express themselves by inventing, creating, and making.Artandinvention
Awesome Sylvia Todd
Children’s seminal learning experiences come through direct experience with materials, especially in STEM subjects. Digital fabrication devices such as 3D printers and physical computing, including Arduino, MaKey MaKey andRaspberry Pi expand a child’s toy chest and toolbox with new ways to make things and new things to make. For the first time ever, childhood inventions may be printed, programmed, or animated with interactivity.
While school traditionally separates art and science, theory and practice, such divisions are artificial. The only reason we are even discussing STEAM (adding Arts to STEM) is that so many schools removed art from the curriculum. The real world just doesn’t work that way! Architects are artists. Craftsmen deal in aesthetics, tradition, and mathematical precision. Video game designers rely on computer science. Engineering and industrial design are inseparable.
Children naturally invest their own inventions with an esthetic component when given agency over their own creations. The maker community brings children, hobbyists, and professionals together in a glorious celebration of personal expression with a modern flare. There is no reason that schools cannot do the same.
Themakerrevolution
Three game-changers should be on every school’s radar:
Computer controlled fabrication devices – Over the past few years, devices that fabricate three-dimensional objects have become an affordable reality. These 3D printers can take a design file and output a physical object. Plastic filament is melted and deposited in intricate patterns that build layer by layer, much like a 2D printer prints lines of dots that, line by line, create a printed page. With 3D design and printing, the ability for students to design and create their own objects combines math, science, engineering, and craft.
Physical computing – New open source microcontrollers, sensors, and interfaces connect the physical world to the digital world in ways never before possible. Many schools are familiar with robotics, one aspect of physical computing, but a whole new world is opening up. Wearable computing – where circuits are made with conductive thread – makes textiles smart, flexible, and mobile. Plug and play devices that connect small microprocessors to the Internet, to each other, or to any number of sensors mean that low cost, easy-to-make computational devices can test, monitor, and explore the world.
Programming – There is a new call for programming in schools, from the Next Generation Science Standards to the White House. Programming is the key to controlling this new world of computational devices and the range of programming languages has never been greater. Today’s modern languages are designed for every purpose and every age.
One might try to marginalize robotics or 3D fabrication as having nothing to do with “real” science, dismissed as play, or as just a super-charged hobby. However, today’s new low-cost, flexible, creative, and powerful materials should be viewed as building blocks for today’s children and their STEM interests.
This is much more than just “hands-on” crafting – these tools bring electronics, programming, and computational mathematics together in meaningful, powerful ways. We must reimagine middle school science and math not as a way to prepare students for high school, but as a place where students are inventors, scientists, and mathematicians today.
Challenging“hardfun”throughtinkering
The tools and ethos of the maker revolution offer insight and hope for middle schools. The breadth of options and the “can-do” attitude is exactly what students need, especially girls as this is the age they tend to opt out of science and math.
But hands-on making is not just a good idea for girls; all students need challenge and “hard fun” that leads to big ideas and inspires them to dive deeper.
Making science interesting and fun is not pandering to young sensibilities; it honors the learning drive and spirit that is all too often crushed by endless worksheets and boring vocabulary drills. Making is a way of bringing engineering to young learners. Such concrete experiences provide a meaningful context for understanding abstract science and math concepts.
Tinkering is a powerful form of learning by doing, an ethos shared by the rapidly expanding maker community and many educators. Tinkering is the process of design, the way that real science and engineering is done. We owe it to our children to give them the tools and experiences that real scientists and engineers use, and the time is now to bring these tools and learning opportunities into real classrooms. There are multiple pathways to learning what we have always taught, and things to do that were unimaginable just a few years ago.
Startwiththeresourcesathand
Even if educators don’t have access to expensive (but increasingly affordable) hardware, every classroom can become a makerspace where kids and teachers learn together through direct experience with an assortment of high- and low-tech materials. The potential range, breadth, power, complexity, and beauty of projects have never been greater thanks to the amazing new tools, materials, ingenuity, and playfulness found in today’s maker materials. Turning every classroom into a makerspace and every child into a maker is the path to creating truly personal learning for every student.
Additionalresources
• Invent To Learn: Making, Tinkering, and Education in the Classroom - This website is the home of our groundbreaking book. It gives educators a practical guide to bringing 21st century tools, technology, and pedagogy to any classroom. We also include recommended books and hundreds of links to resources and professional development for making, tinkering, and engineering in the K-12 classroom.
• Video– Making in Education – Gary Stager’s interview with Steve Hargadon at the 2012 San Mateo Maker Faire.
• Constructing Modern Knowledge – a premier event for teacher professional learning with the tools and materials of the 21st century.
• Learning by Making: American kids should be building rockets and robots, not taking standardized tests, aSlate magazine article by Dale Dougherty.
• Make magazine – The bible of the Maker Movement, for adults and young people.
• Why I LOVE My 3D Printer (and you will too!) is a video of a passionate talk by 12-year-old Schuyler St. Leger.
• Sylvia’s Super Awesome Maker Show is a video series produced by Sylvia Todd, an 11-year-old maker, and her father. Her videos are youthful and vibrant examples of playful technology. The New York Times recently wrote a profile that will interest educators.
___
Sylvia Libow Martinez is President of Generation YES, a non-profit with a mission of empowering young people to improve their schools and communities with modern technology. Sylvia holds a B.S. in electrical engineering and a master’s degree in Education Technology and works in schools around the world to bring the power of authentic learning into classrooms, particularly in STEM subjects. In earlier careers, she was an aerospace engineer and senior scientist researching GPS navigational satellite systems.
Gary S. Stager is a leading expert and advocate for computer programming, robotics and learning-by-doing in classrooms and a pioneer in developing online learning systems. In addition to being a popular bloggerand keynote speaker, Gary is a journalist, teacher educator, consultant, professor and software developer, and founder of the Constructing Modern Knowledge summer institute for educators.
