Could Robotics Be The New STEM Drivers

More than 15,000 students from about 40 countries brought robots y’ve spent months building and fine-tuning to Louisville recently for a world championship designed to spark ir interest in pursuing careers in fields such as engineering and techlogy.

se students, who span in gres from elementary school through college, are part of around 1,650 teams that have excelled in competitions held across globe, culminating in VEX Robotics World Championship.

This competition was sponsored by VEX Robotics, which makes hands-on educational tools teachers can use in ir classes, and was being held in Louisville for fifth time.

championship, which Guinness World Records has recognized as largest robotics competition, brought more than 25,000 people to town, including students, coaches and parents.

And it gave kids chance to get to kw peers from or countries as y compete to win trophies (and bragging rights) while expanding ir kwledge of computer programming and or subjects, according to event’s organizers.

“It takes you from your zone of comfort to ar level,” said Alonso Montagut, a teenr from Gimnasio Campestre San Sebastian, a school in Bucaramanga, Colombia.

Plus, it gives him a chance to learn base skills that will be useful when he achieves his goal of working in natechlogy.

For his teammate, Guillermo Macho, robotics is more of a hobby than a gateway to a science or techlogy career.

However, his mor, Judit Ferreira, said Colombia needs teens to spend ir free time in productive ways like this.

She also ted that Colombia has a growing need to get more people working in fields of science, techlogy, engineering and math (often referred to collectively as STEM), as does Kentucky and many or states and countries.

“We’re trying to inspire kids to pursue STEM careers through robotics,” said Dan Mantz, CEO of Robotics Education and Competition (REC) Foundation, a nprofit that organizes championship. “Workforce development is so important right w.”

Expanding number of workers who are rey and able to enter STEM fields is a big goal for Kentucky’s state government.

Gov. Matt Bevin often says he wants Kentucky to become a hub of excellence for vanced manufacturing, and commonwealth’s public universities are working to increase number of STEM degrees y award each year.

Michael onan, who is supervising a team of students that came to Louisville from London, said United Kingdom is experiencing a big shortfall in STEM gruates, too.

To dress that gap, he said VEX Robotics competitions and similar programs open up new opportunities in careers like engineering for bright students. “It’s getting m more skilled earlier (and) more interested earlier,” he explained.

From an educational and a workforce development standpoint, Mantz indicated that it’s important to encour more girls to study science, engineering and or technical subjects and ensure y aren’t discourd from pursuing careers in those fields, which have tritionally been male dominated.

foundation and VEX Robotics’ Girl Powered initiative seeks to help students gain confidence in ir skills and encour m to envision a future for mselves in STEM careers, in part by giving m an opportunity to hear from women succeeding in those realms.

And it’s alrey getting results. Over last three years, level of participation by girls in VEX Robotics program rose from 23% to about 37% overall, Mantz said. At elementary school level, 47% of participants are girls w.

Rebecca Harris and Hannah Master, two teenrs from Pennsylvania, competed in VEX Robotics World Championship in Louisville as part of an all-girl team, and y say y’ve seen more girls getting involved in competition each year.

“We’ve h so many young girls come up to us and ask us, ‘How does your robot work?’” said Harris, who is 18. And being able to inspire or students like that has been encouraging for m on a personal level.

Harris plans to pursue a career in industrial design, which melds her longtime love of art with her interest in engineering. Meanwhile, Hannah, 17, said she’s gained valuable skills in creative problem solving.

Teaching students how to solve problems and collaborate with ir peers is an important part of what VEX Robotics competitions are all about, Mantz said.

“We actually believe in failing,” he explained, because that’s how people learn to problem solve.

Students who competed as members of Meyzeek Middle School’s Meyzeek Bear Bots team described work y’ve put into ir robot as a process that involved a lot of collaborative trial and error.

Vicky Johnston, who coaches Bear Bots, emphasized value of stefast commitment her students have developed when it comes to finding fixes for issues that continually pop up when y’re prepping for and participating in competitions like this.

“It’s that perseverance ... even when you have epic fails,” she explained. “And in robotics, you have epic fails all time.”

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