Vision: Institutionalize Robotics in the curriculum as a tool to teach STEM concepts to better prepare students for the workforce.

(Build the market, not the market share = student-centered, not product-centered.)

Mission:  Identify, train, and support teachers who want to use robotics in teaching.

• Create a virtual community to provide support to educators who use robotics with students
• Create training centers throughout the country to provide training and support to educators
• Support information on the development of Training Centers
• Provide information on how to put on an event/competition/league
• Maintain a channel of communication between vendors and educators
• Create meaningful feedback for research in education
• Create meaningful feedback for supporting vendors
• Create and maintain a free source of curriculum for educators
• Support the development of at least one Robotics Education Center in each state

• Established a network of educational institutions and educators (RoboEducators Listserv has over 2000 members.)
• Created an interactive Website with information and opportunities to interact with a virtual community of educators interested in robotics as a classroom activity
• Created a one year robotics-themed curriculum for science and math teachers.
• Established a network of Centers (8 State Centers with many waiting in the wings)
• Hawaii Training on Curriculum and Vex Platform (20 educators)
• Support of 8 centers summer training ($3,000 for one week training for at least 10 teachers at each center)

What we plan to do:

Eight regional centers, located in Massachusetts, Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, Kansas, Colorado, Arizona, Northern California, and Southern California, will provide teacher training workshops for highly-motivated educators who promote learning in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). These workshops will expose the educators to the Vex robotics kits and the RoboEducators curriculum. They will prepare them to mentor teams to successfully participate in robotic competitions beginning in the fall 2005. Use of the RoboEducators curriculum, and participation in an initial competition, will kick off the formation of Vex competitions at these eight regional centers. Furthermore, we intend this standards-based curriculum to be adopted by participating schools in the 2006-2007 school year.

The RoboEducators Website will provide a distribution mechanism for the RoboEducators curriculum. The Website will also serve as a way to register and communicate with the teachers participating in our regional centers. Teachers will be able to post messages on the Website that will be answered in a timely fashion by members of the RoboEducators Executive Board and other experts.

With the eventual adoption of an effective high school curriculum and support through both the regional centers and national Website, the number of participating schools and students impacted by the program will increase. With increasing participation, we anticipate growing the number of regional support centers that conduct teacher training in the RoboEducators curriculum and Vex competitions.

The RoboEducators currently consists of a network of over 2000 educators from around the world. For the past 5 years the group has been growing and sharing resources and information via a listserv and website. The RoboEducators Website is currently being updated with new tools and curriculum to support each center and its members. The new site will require free member registration. Each center will have access to a regional member database, an interactive calendar, a regional listserv, and forums for each curriculum module.

Who we are (2005 Training Locations): Arizona, California (Northern), California (Southern), Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Massachusetts, Ohio, Wisconsin. 

Partnership Benefits

• Partner with RadioShack to minimize direct materials costs to educators.
• Support an annual RoboEducators Conference
• Provide ongoing curricular support to educators through monitored web forums, training, and Website.
• Develop a long term sustainability plan for the RoboEducators and State Centers, through an affiliate program. The affiliate program will provide accountability to RadioShack to keep track of the impact of each center and the overall organization. The affiliate program will generate income to sustain productive centers. We will mutually promote each other’s products through this system and other marketing mechanisms.
• The centers will act as beta testers for Vex accessories and software.
• RadioShack will benefit from educational materials that we develop, e.g., CAD models for Vex components, free curriculum, potential kit part designs.
• Establish and sustain educator training and competitions in our respective states.
• Support research efforts to determine impact on student learning

• During this school year, we need to build a critical mass of educators using robotics as a teaching tool. Our centers have committed to providing training to 186 educators this year. These educators will mentor student teams for a fall competition. Table 1 summarizes the needs of individual centers.

Kits= Basic Kit, Batteries and charger, Crystals, Programming kit.

Following are brief summaries of programs at each location:

After regional training has been provided, educators may purchase a Vex kit. If workshop attendees (186) purchase a kit, the total purchase costs will equal $55,800. We will promote the kits at each of our regional training centers with the potential of each school (151 total) purchasing additional kits. We estimate this could result in the minimum purchase of 3-5 kits per school with the potential to generate the sale of 453 to 755 kits ($135,900 – $226,500).

Additionally, students from each school may purchase one or more kits. This could generate additional sales of $156,300 (40% of 1302 students [Mindstorms numbers for FLL] = 521 students x $300= $156,300).

To summarize, RoboEducators is not only a viable educational resource to RadioShack, but also a viable marketing and revenue resource by providing potential sales of well over 1000 ($300,000) kits.

Centers

In the summer of 2005, nine “Centers” kicked off training workshops utilizing the Vex equipment to prepare educators to use robotics to teach STEM content. The eight centers are located in Arizona, Northern California, Southern California, Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Massachusetts, Ohio, Wisconsin.  Following are brief summaries of programs at each location:

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA

Within the Silicon Valley environment, Contra Costa College (CCC) offers true innovation and leadership in information technology to students of all ages. Located in San Pablo California, CCC is leading Northern California’s participation in the present RoboEducators endeavors. Led by Tom Murphy (Computer Science chair, Robotics instructor, director of High Performance Computing, three-year FIRST mentor) and Eric Reed (Math and Computer Science instructor, six-year FIRST mentor), we will offer a ‘train the teacher’ workshop for twenty schools from August 8th – August 10th. We will provide educators with the tools to lead their students in early robotics engineering. We will produce a culminating competition to motivate and excite the students participating in this program.

Through CCC, we have six years of experience offering in-depth mentoring to elementary, middle and high schools and providing tournament opportunities through the First Robotics Competition (FRC), First Lego League and BotBall programs. We have reached over fifty schools and well over one thousand students.

Our workshop will be directly supported by NASA via our associate, Dr. Yvonne Clearwater, project manager for two nationwide NASA robotics education projects: the Robotics Curriculum Clearinghouse (RCC) – providing peer reviewed Web-based educational materials to educators at all levels -- and the NASA GIRL project (Girls in Robotics Learning) -- to increase the participation of young women in robotics education and engineering.

Contra Costa College
tmurphy@contracosta.edu, 510 235-7800 ext. 4348

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

California State University, Northridge- Michael Eisner School of Education California State University, Northridge (CSUN) is the largest school of education in the country. CSUN has been recognized as a robotics education center in Los Angeles for five years. CSUN has been the site of three Off Season FIRST Competitions in the past three years. For the past five years CSUN has hosted the FIRST Robotics workshops where the 60 Los Angeles FIRST Robotics Teams learn the fundamentals of CAD, drive trains and running a FIRST Team. 

Glendale Community College’s Engineering Technology Division

The primary mission is to provide our students with a well rounded multidisciplinary educational pathway in Science and Engineering technologies.  This pathway will enable a student to acquire skills and certificates through a career ladder program encompassing academic science and applied engineering technology. This approach will prepare students for successful transfer to four year colleges and universities or successful employment in high paying technical careers and careers in emerging technologies.

Computer Integrated Manufacturing 101 is an 8-week introductory course that provides a comprehensive study of the fundamentals of industrial robotics.  It prepares the student for more advanced studies in robotic automation and related technologies.  Specific areas of concentration include power and positioning of robots, robot actuators and motors, motion control, industrial electronics, micro-controller technology, communication interfacing, programming concepts, and industry applications.  Training robots used in this course are the “Scorbot-ER4” industrial robots, installed with individual controllers and computers.  These robots employ the programming language SCORBASE using Microsoft Windows operating system. 

GCC also has a Robotics Club that holds a yearly competition called “Race A R.A.T.”

This club is in its second year.  www.glendale.edu/robotics_club

Dr. Kenneth Berry
Assistant Professor of Secondary Education
California State University Northridge
ksberry@csun.edu, 818 677-3316

Jennifer Hughes
Instructor of Electronics and Computer Technology
Glendale Community College

COLORADO

Space Education Initiative is creating the Colorado Center for Robotics Education (CCRE) to promote the use of robotics to support science and engineering education in Colorado. Our goals for the 2005-2006 school year include hosting fall state Vex tournament for 30 teams and supporting a Vex robotics leagues for Denver area schools with approximately 20 teams competing six times over a 3-month period.

INDIANA

The Indiana Teacher's Summer Workshop will be held June 6-10, 2005 at IvyTech State College in Kokomo, Indiana.  The stated purpose of this workshop is to introduce science, math and technology teachers to standards-based robotics curriculum.  This workshop serves as an opportunity for teachers to experience a comprehensive, hands-on approach to integrated curriculum in order to develop a deeper exposure to the necessary state and national standards requirements of education in science, math, and technology.

Ivy Tech State College-Kokomo and Daniel K. Ward II will host this event along with Marci Cochran, FIRST Robotics Team Leader of Team 447 from Anderson, IN (447 was the 2005 RadioShack Innovation in Control Award Winner at the FIRST National Championship). We are convinced after spending time at the Vex competition in Atlanta and talking with and observing the participants and key players, that this system is perfect for teaching and understanding the entire RoboEducators curriculum.  Ivy Tech and Team 447 are also hosting a Vex tournament at our annual IRI (Indiana Regional Invitational) Competition on July 22nd & 23rd at which time the teachers from our June workshop will compete with other adult and student mentors http://www.indianafirst.org/archives/category/iri/. Five Ivy Tech counterparts from around the state in addition to the Kokomo campus President and other leaders will also be attending the workshop in preparation for taking it statewide next summer.  We expect, with the promised Indiana Department of Education support, to have well over 150 teachers participating at that time. This allows Ivy Tech's institution to bring in local educators and students to reap the benefits of robotics education and transferable training integrated into their school's classrooms, as well as our strong Indiana robotics teams to benefit from a trained and talented pool of potential team members.

With the cooperation of multiple corporate sponsors, teachers will leave the week-long workshop with a deeper understanding not only of the curriculum, but also parts, products, services, and materials graciously provided for this training.  Because several thousand dollars worth of parts, products, services, and materials have been provided by the corporations for this training, a system of accountability has been created for each of the materials.

The Indiana Workshop will require 27 additional kits beyond what we have already acquired, by June 6 in order to have enough kits to supply this workshop.  This will bring our total to 37 kits being utilized in the workshop.

Contact Information:

Marci Cochran
Elementary Educator, Anderson Community Schools
FIRST Team Leader
mcochran@acsc.net, 765 278-4287 (cell)

KANSAS

The Robotics in the Classroom Project at Wichita State University, http://education.wichita.edu/mindstorms, has numerous components designed to encourage students of all ages (K-12, undergraduate and graduate teacher education students) to explore, experiment, and experience STEM teaching and learning in a hands-on constructionist environment using robotics. 

Robotics courses offered at WSU’s College of Education include:

• Robotics in the Classroom is an introductory graduate course where teachers design, build, and program robots.
• Robotics in the Curriculum is an advanced graduate course that offers teachers an opportunity to develop and practice lesson plans and assessment strategies to integrate robotics into their classroom curriculum.  Teachers work with small groups of students in a summer camp practicum where they use and refine their lesson strategies.
• Robotics in the Early Childhood Classroom is a graduate course that provides preschool-2nd grade teachers with concrete mathematical and problem solving practices using Roamer Robot and Logo programming.
• Robotics Projects is a global online graduate course allowing students from all over the world to collaborate in the design, building and programming of robots.

For the past five years, the College of Education and the College of Engineering at Wichita State have sponsored a Mindstorms Challenge in which fourth-eighth grade students compete in a day-long event.  Each year, over 200 students participate in this event.

Robotics modules are now integrated into the undergraduate teacher education program at WSU providing exposure and hands-on experience to all pre-service teachers.

In the next five years, Butler Community College’s CAD/Engineering Technology Unit, as a part of the learning college of choice in the region, will engage our students and stakeholders in exceptional instruction by: 

• Preparing students for job placement in the global market place as computer-aided design (CAD)/drafting technicians in graphic arts, architecture or engineering
• Enhancing computer-aided design and drafting skills
• Providing computer-aided design and drafting expertise
• Assessing and evaluating current quality industry standards and practices in computer-aided design and drafting
• Preparing students for transfer to four-year institutions or other vocational-technical related programs in computer-aided design, drafting, graphic arts, architecture, and engineering
• Engaging in ongoing professional development, including outside certification credentials in computer-aided design (CAD) and drafting.

Participating in the college’s commitment to Continuous Quality Improvement and the Learning PACT, the CAD/Engineering Technology Unit will continue to be a performance-based system that evaluates its programs and services by documenting student skills, knowledge, and stakeholder satisfaction.

WSU has entered into a collaborative agreement with Butler Community College to provide robotics training for educators beginning summer 2005.  Graduate level credit is optional for in-service teachers.

MASSACHUSETTS

Background:

• Third oldest engineering university in US
• Charter FIRST Team sponsor (since 1992)

Experience:

• Have been running high school robotics tournaments since 1995—currently conducting 4 major tournaments per year (one based upon FLL, one with FRC, and two with VEX)
• This year’s tournament schedule includes over 150 schools and 1250 students

Educational initiatives:

• Developed and run high school robot education programs at WPI since 1999 (national summer program since 2001)
• Current program “WPI’s EBOT (Education Beyond Ordinary Teaching)” is an exportable “education program/tournament-in-a-box”
• Teacher training workshop materials
• How-to kit for running low-cost tournament
• Based on VEX robots
• Designed to be approachable/affordable to teams that otherwise could not play with high-cost FIRST programs
• Co-authored sections of the RoboEducator academic curricula

Brad Miller
Visiting Research Scientist
Worcester Polytechnic Institute (Massachusetts)
brad@bradhouse.com (508) 366-5546

OHIO

The Youth Technology Academy (YTA), a one-of-a-kind program centered at Cuyahoga Community College (Tri-C), Cleveland, Ohio, is a vital force in Greater Cleveland’s workforce development.

YTA’s goal is to engage Cleveland’s youth in project learning, job shadowing, and internship experiences, all of which will prepare them for careers in an advanced technological workforce using Vex robotics as a platform tool for delivery.  The program is committed to increasing the development of interest in technology among underserved populations.

The YTA program is supported for the academic year (2005-2006) by the Dept. of Labor’s Workforce Investment Act ($1,200.000) to support services for a total of 300 students.  Students will participate in classroom and laboratory work settings with program managers and engineers/technicians in the following skill-building activities:

George Bilokonsky 

Youth Technology Academy

Cuyahoga Community College
George.bilokonsky@tri-c.edu, 216 987-6302   

Jerome Seppelt

Youth Technology Academy
Cuyahoga Community College
jerome.seppelt@tri-c.edu, 216 987-6304

WISCONSIN

Space Education Initiative is creating the Wisconsin Institute for Robotics in Education (WIRED) to promote the use of robotics to support science and engineering education in Wisconsin. Currently WIRED supports 90 FLL teams and a 20 team Vex Robotics League in Wisconsin. Our goals for the 2005-2006 school year include supporting at least 5 regional and 1 state tournament for FLL (100+ teams), one fall state VEX tournament for 36 teams, two VEX robotics leagues (Fox Valley and Milwaukee – approximately 20 teams each), a state level FIRST Vex spring tournament and a FIRST Robotics Challenge Regional Competition in Milwaukee.

Space Education Initiatives has dedicated $55,000 for salary support, team sponsorships, and teacher training costs. In addition, we expect to fundraise $25,000 from corporate donations.

Contact Information:

Eric Brunsell
Director of Education
Space Education Initiatives
eric@spaceed.org, 800 215-1511