March 26th EYE

Educating Young Engineers has continued work on their March 28th “Engineering Athletics” Saturday Program at Ballard Elementary. Registration is almost full and all preliminary logistics have been completed to ensure the success of another program in our partnership. Ballard Elementary’s first LEGO Club session is drawing to a close after many weeks of teaching the young engineers through problem based and teamwork challenges. During the second session EYE will not be in attendance so that the parents can run the LEGO Club for many years without the assistance of EYE. Geyser Road Elementary’s Science Extravaganza introduced students to EYE while they designed their own slow racer on a peg board.

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March 19th EYE

EYE is continuing the mission to create interest in STEM fields in elementary students through LEGO clubs and Saturday programs.  EYE is also working with high school students to create an EYE club and working with Dorothy Nolan to integrate WeDo LEGO technology into the fourth grade curriculum.  A new session of LEGO club has started at Dorothy Nolan and EYE continues to support the club in teaching engineering through teamwork and problem solving.  LEGO clubs have also been started at Ballard Elementary School as well as Geyser Road Elementary School.  EYE has continued to work with Ballard Elementary on the second Saturday Engineering Program the school will be running, and planning is in the final stages.  At the high school, volunteers are being recruited for the first EYE club meeting on March 19th, where students can become involved in designing and testing activities as well as working on the logistics of the EYE website and getting involved for the future of EYE.  This club will hopefully allow the continued expansion of EYE Saturday programs and LEGO clubs to other school districts and get the future leaders of the organization started early for the coming years.  EYE is also working with Dorothy Nolan fourth grade teachers to integrate LEGO WeDo programming software into the curriculum to teach the simple machines unit, which will allow students to get an early idea of how circuit design works.  

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March 19th EYE

EYE is continuing the mission to create interest in STEM fields in elementary students through LEGO clubs and Saturday programs.  EYE is also working with high school students to create an EYE club and working with Dorothy Nolan to integrate WeDo LEGO technology into the fourth grade curriculum.  A new session of LEGO club has started at Dorothy Nolan and EYE continues to support the club in teaching engineering through teamwork and problem solving.  LEGO clubs have also been started at Ballard Elementary School as well as Geyser Road Elementary School.  EYE has continued to work with Ballard Elementary on the second Saturday Engineering Program the school will be running, and planning is in the final stages.  At the high school, volunteers are being recruited for the first EYE club meeting on March 19th, where students can become involved in designing and testing activities as well as working on the logistics of the EYE website and getting involved for the future of EYE.  This club will hopefully allow the continued expansion of EYE Saturday programs and LEGO clubs to other school districts and get the future leaders of the organization started early for the coming years.  EYE is also working with Dorothy Nolan fourth grade teachers to integrate LEGO WeDo programming software into the curriculum to teach the simple machines unit, which will allow students to get an early idea of how circuit design works.  

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March 13th, EYE

 

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March 13th, EYE

 

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March 3rd, Nitinol

The nitinol group has realized that nitinol is extremely difficult to work with, both theoretically and experimentally. We have decided to use a stirling engine instead of a nitinol engine to increase the efficiency of a car. Car engines (internal combustion engines) are at best 20% efficient. The energy that’s not used to make a car move is left over in the form of heat, which exists the car as exhaust. Using a stirling engine, we hope to turn this waste heat into electric energy. Stirling engines have shown to work better than nitinol engines, but still use a temperature differential to generate kinetic energy. This kinetic energy will be switched to electric, which will be used to power electric heaters. If all goes well, people will be able to get into their car on a cold morning and get blasted with heat as soon as they start their car, as well as have an increased efficiency of their car engines.

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Mach 3rd, HydroGarden

As a group we recently constructed the walls for our grow-tent by cutting the Panda Film and mounting it on a PVC frame.  We would have liked to have moved past this step by now, but we were forced to special order our PVC fittings due to lack of local availability.  We are juggling our proof of concept model and aesthetically pleasing model, so we were able to keep ourselves otherwise occupied.  For this second model, we are working on designs that will target people in urban areas that wish to grow plants with their limited resources.  The goal  is to be non-intrusive and aesthetically pleasing while still being able to grow a plant.  We realize, if we wish to make a high-quality product, we have to  establish a relationship with the consumer.  As a result, we are planning a trip to New York City.    On this trip, we will visit florists, hoping to find answers to our questions regarding marketability of our product.  We hope to gain some valuable insight from experts in plant growing industry.  In preparation, we have been reaching out to individuals who live in urban areas and asking them their opinions on our product and if they believe that it would be a marketable product.  If you have any valuable information about living in an urban area that may be helpful, we would greatly appreciate your input.  Please contact our Project Manager, Rob Szpak at, robszpak@aol.com. 

This is some of the information we are looking for,

 

Would you like to have plants in your home?

Do you have available windows for natural lighting?

Would you like to have plants in your office?

Would you rather have plants if they were lower maintenance?

Were they difficult to keep alive and healthy in relatively confined spaces?

What would make having a plant easier for you?

Is there anyone you can refer us to who has an interest in growing plants in an urban setting?

 

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