Our software programmer, Madelyn, is the president of the Science Club at Western Alamance High School. She gained help of the teacher overseeing Science Club, Mrs. Baumgarner, which allowed Madelyn’s idea to become reality. Her idea included going down to the Western Alamance Middle School to do a presentation about the sciences available to them.

After weeks of planning, this event was lights and action. On January 18th, three members of the robotics team (Madelyn, Preston, and Reid), partnered with science club. This allowed them to be one of the stations for the middle schoolers at an event. There were 4 blocks, and each block had 5 groups. The first two blocks had over 90 students in them, while the last two each had 60. This added up to a total of around 320 students.

We had about 10 minutes with each group. Our presentation included:

• What FIRST is and the different programs beneath it
• Having 2-3 students make paper airplanes to act as drones
• Talking about this years game challenge
• Showing the Computer Aided Design (CAD) objects
• The different skills of a robotics team
• Our different social media they can follow
• Testing the airplanes/drones the kids made
• Letting the kids drive the robot
• Answering questions they had

Later in the week, we received an email from the Science Teacher down at the middle school who helped coordinate this. 

“Hi Kelly,

I just wanted to let you know what an incredible impact the Science Club made on our students last week. We had lively discussions about what they were excited to take when they go to high school. I have bright students who have slacked off, come and talk to me about wanting to change their ways for Q2, so they can be recommended for honors courses. Your visit really gave our students perspective and motivation!

Your science club members did an outstanding job of choosing activities that sparked interest and curiosity! Your brochure really clarified the course selection process. We are so grateful for the opportunity and can’t wait to do it again next year, now that we know what we are doing!

I promise to send pictures soon. Also, our students are writing thank you cards and letters. I will drop them off to you next week. 

Thank you again for all your hard work in putting this together. It was an amazing experience and success!”

This was definitely an inspiring email. We even had pictures of our presentation posted on the Alamance Burlington School System (ABSS) Instagram, as well as the School Website. Both shared what we did with the school, and for the community. It was a great event, and we’re looking forward to it again next year!