By STEM IA
By STEM IA
Promoting innovation and curiosity through robotics.
We, the Sparkans, help the community in various ways, ranging
from gathering interest for robotics at our local science center
to hosting FLL practice competitions. Overall, we aim to increase
STEM-related curiosity in Alberta.
The Sparkans also encourage the creation of FLL, FTC, and FRC teams in Alberta,
supporting the increase in STEM learning through mentorship.
We volunteered at the Sourthern Alberta Qualifier FLL Challenge at Webber Academy from 8am to 1pm, helping enter data for awards, and ensuring every team showed up on time.
We hosted a friendly FLL event at the school. We setup two fields for competetive play, and setup practise fields for teams to use. We worked with teams to ensure the event ran smoothly and to solidify the point of the event: to practice, collborate, and experience the different solutions to this years' challenges.
We ran a FLL drop-in session at Telus Spark, mainly attracting kids between grades 4 and 8. This ran from 9:30am to 2:30pm, 5 groups at a time in 30-minutes blocks. We showcased our FRC robot and gave information of FIRST robotics. We partnered with Wendy, who helped showcase FIRST Explore and FIRST Lego League Discover for younger children.
We hosted a meetup with the Cybertronic PenguinZ, FTC 24135, sharing our experience and guidance on organization, teamwork, and embodying robotics. After this mentorship session, the Cybertronic PenquinZ went hard to work, and made it to provincials.
Using the facilities we have within the Sparkans workshop and our school, STEM Innovation Academy, we contacted Makers Making Change and partnered with them to create 3D printed devices.
Sparkans collaborated with FRC teams in Calgary for a public engagement event at the Maker Faire.
Launched Mygroscopes: A club dedicated to promoting STEM education through the desing and sharing of microscopes with schools.