There’s nothing quite like real world experience for engaging students. And engineers, notorious for their passion to work hands-on, know this better than anyone. That’s the motivation behind the Real World Design Challenge sponsored in part by PTC. Every year RWDC presents high school students across the US with an actual design challenge being faced by real organizations- then sets them to work.
According to RWDC Director Dr. Ralph K. Coppola, “the Real World Design Challenge is a public-private partnership dedicated to sustainably increasing the STEM workforce – that’s really our goal”.
This year the competing teams must tackle the complex design challenges of the aerospace industry. In a nutshell, the students must design an efficient, low-carbon-emission and environmentally friendly personal light sport aircraft.
The industry of focus and design project for the contest vary every year but the objective remains the same – encourage and inspire the next generation of problem-solving engineers. RWDC “keeps it real” in five key areas:
REAL PROBLEMS – Provides a practical application of classroom curriculum
REAL TOOLS – Inspires students by showing them what is at their fingertips
REAL ROLES – Requires teamwork, leadership and problem solving skills
REAL DESIGNS – Fosters creativity, critical thinking, and innovation
REAL CONTRIBUTIONS – Students can make a difference
Amongst other solutions provided, participants will design their proposed “green aircrafts” within a complimentary edition of Creo . Using commercial-grade professional tools like Creo is one of the cornerstones of the competition. These teenagers get to access the same design tools being used at some of the top companies in the world. To help them along the way PTC also provides connections and access to mentors from its partner organizations across America.
The winning teams from the participating states will receive all expense paid trip to Washington, D.C. to compete at the National Challenge Event in April 2012. For additional information contact Dr. Coppola at rcoppola@ptc.com or check out the Real World Design Challenge website www.realworlddesignchallenge.org.
I received a hot tip that I should interview English-teacher-turned-engineer Steve Chinosi at nearbyNewton North High School. Steve has started up some amazing engineering programs over at NNHS that are receiving national recognition. Being the friendly neighbor that we are, PTC contributes to these programs both monetarily and with free software like Creo. I went to talk to Steve in person and didn’t regret it – he has a contagious passion for the engineering programs and accomplishments of his students.
The Innovation Lab
Housing the organized chaos that is all things engineering at Newton North High School is the Innovation Lab (also known as Newton’s Lab because it serves all Newton Public Schools). The Lab, which opened December 2010, holds that its mission is to be a place “where educators, students, business and community stakeholders can explore and pilot new educational initiatives and partnerships designed to link students and learning to the world around them and address and create solutions for 21st century social, economic and environmental challenges.”
Steve (aka Mr C for those in the know) told me about a number of initiatives living within The Lab. They tend to fall under either environmental engineering or mechanical engineering, or both!
Green Engineering
“Greengineering” is a program Steve started over 4 years ago, around the Design Thinking principals of IDEO, in an effort to transform his classroom into a multi-discipline Think Tank. The club tackles a number of impressive projects:
Making biodiesel from the waste vegetable oil of a nearby fast food restaurant
Making reusable bags from plastic shopping or food storage bags.
Growing algae for biodiesel use
Solving the glycerin composting issue
Innovative ways to make NNHS a greener school
With awe I followed Steve as he explained how the water heaters in the lab are reverse-engineered and reconstructed every year into bio-fuel creating machines. The program is the first of its kind in the US. Greengineering has won a number of prestigious grants and awards including the Governor’s Award, Secretary of Engineering’s Award and a Green Schools Award.
CAD Software for Students
The engineering organization at NNHS also involves students in CAD-centric programs that have been covered before on the Creo blog like FIRST robotics and the Real World Design Challenge. In these exciting design engineering competitions, both sponsored in part by PTC, students are able to get hands-on experience using professional design tools like Creo.
I learned that beyond the programs for which NNHS has been supplied complimentary seats of Creo, they are using the design suite for other projects and competitions as well (even testing out adirondack chair designs before creating them in woodshop!).
Innovation Lab students familiar with Creo are also using it for 2D sketching, concept design and eventually simulation to give them a leg-up at UMass Lowell’s Assisted Technology Design Fair. ATDF asks high schools to team with a disabled member of their community and produce an assistive technology that meets their unique needs.
Sea Perch photo credit to MIT.edu
MIT organizes an annual underwater remote-controlled robot challenge (doesn’t everyone?) called Sea Perch. High School teams actually work together, albeit on different project elements, to address whatever the challenge is (last year it was to cap a simulated oil spill in the MIT pool). Although not required, Newton North once again takes advantage of using Creo to problem solve, collaborate and optimize their designs for the competition.
I hope to get back to Newton North High School soon to check out the teams’ progress within this wide array of commendable programs promoting STEM education and a better tomorrow. Stay tuned!
Students from Boston Renaissance Charter Public School—the largest elementary school in Boston—headed to PTC headquarters last month to get some hands-on engineering experience.
The group of 3rd and 5th graders learned how engineers often use nature as inspiration for their designs. The children were asked to redesign either an Adidas sneaker, a Blackberry or a tractor by incorporating elements of a leaf they had studied.
The students grouped into teams and came up with their designs. One team decided to add solar panels to the tractor, like the stoma of a leaf, so that the vehicle could operate on the sun’s energy. Another team took the sneaker and made gutters, like the veins of a leaf, to make the shoes waterproof.
“It is really cool to see some of the technology and some of the things a real engineer does,” said one student.
The kids were then asked to present their designs as if they were presenting to clients.
During their visit, the students got to experiment in 3D virtual worlds and design their own 3D models. They learned about the engineering process from design to sales and were given real-world problems to solve and then asked to present their solutions.
Teacher Joseph Roche spoke about how excited he was to use some of the exercises in his classroom. Since the visit, BRCPS has already implemented biomimicry into its technology class.
You may recall that PTC has an education
program in which we support schools, universities, and students by
providing access to our technology and training. And what do the young people do
with all that Creo goodness? They wreck things. Vince and Alison explain:
In the video, Allison mentions Creo customer Pitzer Consulting as it
demonstrates the use of Creo Parametric to find
weak points in a chassis. What she doesn’t tell you is that Pitzer has a long
history of wrecking things too. In this home video, Pitzer’s Preda Raptortakes on a
Minifridge.
Short and painless, but an undeniable lesson in the value of good engineering
for students of all ages!
My 7-year-old son is always talking about what he wants to be when he grows up. “I want to build spaceships,” he tells me. So when I returned recently from a trip to the National Space Symposium in Colorado Springs with piles of space related swag and a suitcase full of booklets and brochures, he was overjoyed. “I’m taking these to school to show my class what I’m going to do when I grow up,” he said. I hope he keeps up the momentum.
This year’s National Space Symposium focused heavily on how the US needs to step up its game in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education to ensure a competitive edge in space innovation. I sat in on a panel discussion led by well-known industry players—including Raytheon and Booz Allen Hamilton—to hear how they are investing in future engineers.
“We take a multipronged approach to reaching kids,” said Lynn Mortensen, VP of Engineering at Raytheon Intelligence and Information Systems. “We are broadly involved in a variety of programs like MathMovesU and FIRST Robotics. Our Sum of all Thrills ride at Epcot Walt Disney World Resort allows children to custom-design their own thrill ride using mathematical tools, an innovative touch-screen table and a robotic simulator. Raytheon Women’s Network (RWN) has gone into junior high schools in the Dallas Fort Worth area to teach physics classes.”
“We need to grow a workforce that can meet the challenge in math and engineering,” said Philip Marshall, VP of United Launch Alliance Production and Recurring Operations. STEM is the future in so many ways. The US lags behind other countries in math and science and it’s an industry imperative to step up to the plate as cuts to resources are continuing to be made in the classroom.”
Winner of the 2010 Spirit of Innovation Award, high school student Mikayla Diesch sat on the panel. Diesch, together with her sister, came up with a NASA-approved nutrition bar for astronauts. “America is not doing as well as it could,” Diesch said. “All the students in my class think they can do OK and still get somewhere, but that’s just not so. You have to work hard to get somewhere, and in order to inspire kids to go the extra mile you need companies to come into schools and talk to students about their future on a personal basis.”
Mikayla Diesch, and her sister Shannon, who together invented a NASA-approved granola bar named the Solar Flare (photo courtesy of MTV Geek)
Asked how to inspire STEM learning, Marshall said: “We need to give kids an immersive education in a non-traditional environment – an opportunity to apply their learning in a hands-on situation and avoid this assembly line approach to education where kids are merely regurgitating facts on tests.”
“Teachers are not valued and sometimes don’t have the skills to teach engineering and science for today’s market,” said Carol Staubach, Senior VP at Booz Allen Hamilton. “We need programs that train the teachers better in order to grow the skills needed for industry.” Raytheon has just such an initiative, allowing teachers to visit Raytheon sites with the goal of obtaining insight into what it’s actually like to work there, and the skills required to succeed.
How can corporations measure whether their programs are working in schools? “It’s really hard for some companies to quantify,” said Mortensen. “At Raytheon we really focus on pushing kids through the pipeline from high school through to 4-year college or technical college. Because we provide scholarships and grants to students, we are able to measure our success. Our programs are working.”
But corporate involvement is only part of the solution, at least for the space industry. The US needs to somehow rejuvenate interest in its space initiatives. Asks Fred Gregory, Former Commander of Space Shuttles Atlantis and Discovery: “How can you talk to a student about STEM when you can’t show there are exciting space programs out there that they can be a part of? We in the space community need to come up with a new mission. The next big idea. Something that the future generation can believe in.”
In today’s celebrity culture it’s easy to appreciate why the average teenager might believe their only options in life are MTV or the NBA. Introducing children to new experiences and perspectives can redefine how they perceive themselves and their role within society.
FIRST Robotics Competition aims to break through cultural stereotypes and put the cool back into engineering and science. Each year high school teams from all over the United States and around the world are tasked with building a robot from a kit of parts that will be able to perform a specific set of tasks in competition. The national playoffs take place late April in St. Louis.
Last Friday and Saturday saw the Seattle Cascades and Olympic Regionals at Qwest Field, Seattle, Washington (right in my backyard). I was lucky enough to be able to get a firsthand look at the competition. Entering Qwest Field I couldn’t help but be taken aback by the sheer number of people and astounding noise level. The competition was well underway by the time I showed up mid-morning Friday and the energy level was high. The field—cordoned off into three sections, two arenas for the Seattle Cascades and Olympic playoffs and one huge pit nestled in between—was teaming with kids and their robots.
Although crowds of spectators gathered in the stands to watch the matches, the real action was in the pits (think NASCAR). Students rapidly refined their bots and fixed unexpected problems in a surprising display of cooperation, comradeship and mutual respect.
“You have to remember that we ship our robot to the event and we might not see it for a week or more, it’s only in the pits that we are reunited and then it’s a time crunch to make final adaptations and fix anything that may have broken en route,” says Jillian Andrews, a sophomore at Tahoma High School and Senior Fabricator on her team called Bear Metal. “It’s really down to the wire, but it teaches us to work closely as a group to get things done.”
Andrews, who wants to go into the medical profession, is one of the many young women competing in FIRST who says the competition has given her a sense of self confidence, leadership skills and the technical knowledge to compete in an area traditionally dominated by men.
Taylor Dowel, on the same team as Andrews, was hands-on in the pit giving directions to her fellow teammates. When prompted, she gave a five-minute briefing on her bot, including how the chassis, lift, claw, deployment system and mini-bot work. “We all have different jobs on the team. I run the CNC mill, I like doing all the machining and the hands-on stuff,” Dowel says.
When asked about her favorite part of the FIRST Robotics Competition Andrews says, “Working with top engineers from Boeing and the like is a privilege and an eye opener. FIRST has taught me that I can do anything—that I don’t have to limit myself because I am a girl.”
Boeing, like PTC, is an industry sponsor of FIRST. Conrad Ball, Washington FIRST Executive Advisory Board Chair and Chief Engineer at Boeing Military Aircraft, attended the Washington regionals. “I see the importance of attracting the best and brightest talent if we are to remain competitive in the global economy,” he says.
Each of the competing teams has mentors—teachers, parents and industry professionals—who volunteer their time to advise and support the kids in building their robots. Mentors believe FIRST is valuable in teaching young people the relevance of science and technology in their daily lives through hands-on experiences and real results. “Kids ask what is this algebra, trigonometry and science for anyway? All we have to do is regurgitate it on tests,” says a Franklin High School mentor. “Well, here they are able to put it to practice on robots.” Franklin High School, sponsored by PTC, was a competition finalist and winner of the Innovation in Control Award at the Washington event.
The brainchild of Dean Kamen, FIRST Robotics Competition is fundamentally changing the way young people view science and technology. Kamen believes that exposing young people to professional scientists and engineers changes what they do and where they put their time and attention. “The probability that one of [these kids] is going to do something spectacular that they would not have done without FIRST is almost a guarantee.” Kamen says.
Sound too good to be true? Just ask Google co-founder, Larry Page whose dad smuggled him into a robotics competition when he was 12, or ask one of the many students who attended the Seattle playoffs this weekend and who’ll be starting MIT in the fall.
If you keep up with the business press, you know that many are predicting a broad disruption to manufacturing soon. Not a political disruption as world leaders seek to lure factories with incentives. But rather, a technological disruption, as ideas like affordable 3D printing and community manufacturing centers take hold.
Everyone brings a different view to the discussion of how the changes might unfold, but there’s one prediction with which everyone agrees: We’re going to need more designers and engineers. Lots of them. That brings me to John Stuart, SVP of PTC’s Educational Program. His team offers curriculum development, deployment, and support to institutions and students worldwide as we try to inspire and prepare the next generation of engineers. He tells us how it works:
GH: What is PTC’s strategy with respect to education?
Stuart: We look for shared value, where everyone involved in our initiative benefits by participating–employers, schools, and students.
GH: For example?
Stuart: We partner with an educational establishment that delivers engineering graduates to our customers. We work with our customers in supporting the university, college, or school. And we make sure students gain experience in the tools and processes their biggest local employers use.
GH: What are the key tactics behind this strategy?
Stuart: There are really four key tactics. First, we get involved in the top engineering initiatives between education and industry. Second, we develop a strong presence in universities, colleges, and training centers. Third, we involve ourselves heavily in schools and with STEM programs. Fourth, we simply provide students access to our software products.
GH: You’re involved in some well-known student engineering competitions ….
Stuart: We work with existing educational-industry initiatives like STARBASE, Real World Design Challenge, FormulaSAE, and FIRST. These engineering initiatives attract the best students, challenge them with real engineering projects, and provide industry mentoring from some of our largest customers. Our goal is to ensure that if a students take part in these challenges, they have access to the best software tools and training available. Each year, we try to add more student teams and more customer participation too.
GH: You’re also in universities, colleges, and training centers?
Stuart: Of course. There’s a lot of activity at that level. In countries like the US, Germany, India, and China, demand for engineers outstrips supply by at least 2 to 1. In some countries, it’s 5 to 1. Governments everywhere are investing in programs to encourage more young people into engineering by adding technical colleges and advanced training centers. So, we work with both existing universities and these new colleges and training centers to make sure PTC products play a key part in the curriculum.
GH: What about high schools?
Stuart: With 9- to 13-year olds we have our best opportunity to inspire young people to become engineers and scientists. Our key initiative here, again, is to involve PTC in the design competitions–FIRST, Real World Design Challenge, STARBASE, and so on.
GH: What about individual Students?
Stuart: Students can access free versions of our software, for example, Creo Parametric, Creo Direct, and Mathcad. We also provide access to libraries of free tutorials to help students become familiar with the products.
GH: What’s unique about PTC’s educational program?
Stuart: The program provides the broadest range of software technology and support tools out there, including 2D and 3D design software, engineering calculations, product lifecycle management. It’s what I call a 360-degree approach to education. Take Creo. We offer a stair-step curriculum. New students work with 3D using a direct modeling approach. For students with more experience, we provide training on projects developed with Creo’s powerful parametric modeling tool, Creo Parametric. We also include a rich set of curriculum materials, professional learning managements tools, and PLM as a service on the cloud.
GH: How would you summarize your success?
Stuart: Literally tens of thousands of students graduate each year having taken part in the PTC educational program. And with Creo, and the new 360 approach, we offer one of the most comprehensive programs on the market. [Ed. In future articles, we’ll look more closely at Stuart's educational initiatives and activities going on across the world.]
