Awards and bursaries for High School Students.

Many companies 'give back' in many ways and if you do then good on you. If you are looking for a way to 'give back' think about this.

If you have made a connection with your local high school Computer teachers and are thinking about ways to help out then here's an idea. You can help encourage students to go on in Computer Studies, Computer Technology or Robotics by offering the school an award or bursary for one of their top ranking students in this area. Right now we offer one school generated award, a plaque, for the top ranking student in Computer Studies. These students often tough it out for 3 or more courses in a room many other students dismiss as a place for geeks. Of course these other students don't realize that the so called geeks will be driving sports cars and setting trends that they will then follow. I think it would be cool if Computer Studies and Technology students got a little recognition and encouragement from the community. A small amount of money every year puts your companies name out into the community.

What do I want to see on the wall when I walk into a company office? A Coop appreciation certificate showing that the company takes on High School Coop students and a picture of a CEO shaking some young persons hand while looking at a certificate and cheque. That's a company that gives back to their community.

Cool use of Smart phones in the classroom

In their grade 12 summative students had to design, build and test a complex (series/parallel) circuit that included 2 IR LEDs. The big question of course was "How do we know it is working." Simple, turn on your smart phone camera and look at the LEDs through the camera. Since modern CCDs see into the near infra red the students could see the magically glowing LEDs on their phones when, to the naked eye, they appeared to be off.

2D LED Matrix Summative challenge

A 2 day independent summative challenge this year was to use an Arduino, Stamp or OOPic to program an LED matrix to show the students' initials.
Good: One initial.
Better: 2 initials, alternating.
Best: 2 initials scrolling.

3x3x3 LED cube.

I always wanted to try this project out. We just followed some of the examples on line and had terrific results. Here you can see one programmed to scan through all the LEDs.

Spartan Robotics team all time best

I spent all day Monday and Tuesday this week supervising a 4 student robotics team at the Ontario Skills competition in Waterloo. This was the culmination of 8 months of work after school helping the students design and build their entry. You can see some of the action on YouTube. The RC robots needed to pick up wooden blocks and place them onto the rolling target, the higher up the more points earned.

Competing in this event taught the students more than they will ever learn in a regular course. Every year, after months of after school meetings full of trials, plans, building and testing I begin to despair in March. It never looks like the robot will be ready, that the team is together, that the robot will fast enough or strong enough to last through even a county trial. I start muttering "never again." But every year now for the last 4 years the students have pulled it off and had their entry ready. Sometimes we are working on it on the Saturday before the first county competition! The students organize into a team, each assigned tasks to do. The equipment is tested, parts, tools and batteries are packed into boxes, and for the last two years we've made it to the Ontario level at Waterloo. The growth and learning that happens during this brief interval is phenomenal to watch. Engineering, troubleshooting, planning, observation and tactics come pouring out making me proud of the students and, maybe, open to doing it again next year. Then, playing against a machine that is far bigger, faster and better engineered the team pulls off a win and I go "Yes!", pumping the air and thinking of course, of course we're going at it again next year. Competing at this level reaffirms my faith that I teach the best students in the world.

How did the team do? On Monday the robot broke down and we went home in last place, 19 out of 19. The top 16 teams would continue to the finals on Tuesday afternoon. The team very confidently rebuilt their robot and returned Tuesday morning to fight back into 15th place. On Tuesday afternoon they never gave up despite a deteriorating gripper function and continued to win 50% of the time allowing them to finish in 7th spot.
Here is some video shot with a smart phone: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xwMO6mb9EE&feature=youtu.be

Who will be our 21rst century heroes?

I took four senior programming students to the ECOO Regional programming competition up at York University on Saturday. 54 teams of 4. Over 200 bright, competent, young people. I know my students are going on to Engineering, Computer Studies and the like in University. I imagine most of the students in that room will do likewise. I thought, "Here was a room full of students with a plan, going forward into decades where they will never want for work. They've made the right choice to learn about the stuff the next few decades will be made of. The right stuff."

Think about it. After WW2 our heroes were the brave young men who flew to the limits of our atmosphere and then beyond to the moon. Remember the movie? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Right_Stuff_(film). Who are our 21rst century heroes? I would argue that they are Microsofts' Bill Gates, Apples' Steve Jobs, Googles' Larry Page and Serjey Brin, Facebooks' founder Mark Zuckerberg and so on. These are the people our students aspire to be like, to use their talent to hit the right moment to take the world by storm with the next big app.

And here I was in a room full of just the people who will do it, will become our next heroes. This was it. The real brain trust that would bring wealth and prosperity to our nation in the years to come. Some one among them would be the next Gates or Zuckerberg.  14 of the 54 teams will go on to the Ontario round. 30 of the teams went home with a certificate of appreciation and an experience they will remember for a long time. And all of them should know that they will be our next heroes.

Druiven's Arduino electronics starter kit

This is the basic electronics kit I order from Abra. It allows grade 10 and 11 students to complete many different labs and challenges with the Arduino.

Kit Part	pt#	quantity	price	sub
push button	PBS-150	1	0.69	0.69
5mm LED, clear		2	0.11	0.22
Bicolor 3 mm LED		1	0.49	0.49
resistor	R1/4 390	3	0.05	0.15
resistor	R1/4 1 k	2	0.05	0.1
resistor	R1/4 10 K	2	0.05	0.1
Variable R	91AR10K	1	1.29	1.29
Red bar display	MV57164	1	1.39	1.39
SIP resistor	4610X-101-391	1	0.59	0.59
Photo resistor	Photo300	1	0.99	0.99

TOTAL 6.01