Robot Challenge South Jersey - Women in Engineering (IEEE WIE) of Southern New Jersey

2009 – 2010
Robot Challenge South Jersey

Race day: Saturday, April 24, 2010

Naval Air Station Wildwood Aviation Museum
Cape May Airport
500 Forrestal Road
Rio Grande, New Jersey

The Southern New Jersey (SNJ) Chapter of IEEE Women in Engineering (WIE) is sponsoring the
first annual South Jersey Robot Challenge.

WHAT IS IT?

The Robot Challenge is a non-profit project that was initiated by IEEE as a means of encouraging high school students (girls and boys) to become engineers. It is an inexpensive team project designed to engage high school students in an activity that closely resembles the work a graduate engineer would do in the real world. It challenges their imagination and develops their skills.

WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT?

The challenge is to build a robot that will “walk” six feet along a path with a minor obstacle. The robots are built from a kit supplied by SNJ WIE. The kit includes all parts needed to build the robot (except the body covering) and the “how-to” manual. There are also manuals for teachers. Each kit costs $60 – SNJ WIE will supply one free robot kit to the first four schools to sign up and participate. Student teams (3-4 students) build the robot, keep a detailed log throughout construction, prepare a written report about the experience, make an oral presentation to the judges, and compete with other student teams. The project is estimated to take about 2 – 4 months if worked on 3 hours/week.

The Baltimore chapter of IEEE has been sponsoring a robot challenge for 13 years. To view a video of the Baltimore event go to: http://www.robotchallenge.com

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS?

For the teachers: SNJ WIE has pre-designed an experiment to teach principles of science, engineering, and design, at a cost of $15-$20/student.
For the students: Students must work together as a team – each leg of the robot is operated by a different member of the team. The Challenge promotes creativity and innovative thinking.

More about the Robot Challenge

WHERE CAN I GET MORE INFORMATION?

For more info and to participate in the upcoming South Jersey Robot Challenge, contact Heather Tomasello at the following e-mail address: HeatherTomasello (at) ieee.org