Students in the Waialua Robotics STEM Learning Center in grades 7-8 will participate in a relevant, rigorous, and highly technical STEM Research Digital Media Project that will allow them to 1) engage in the scientific inquiry/engineering design process 2) work with adult volunteers, providing expert mentorship from interested organizations, community members, and higher education institutions 3) and create documentation videos utilizing drone technology to better capture perspective and allow new accessible vantage points to make digital media themes and messages much more powerful.
The VEX IQ STEM Research Project utilizing Digital Media will be offered as a competitive elective and afterschool program platform, during the weekdays and select weekends, including vacation time for middle school students. The project period will be from the beginning of the 1st Quarter of the 2017-18 School Year until the 2018 Hawaii VEX IQ State Championships to be held at the Hawaii Convention Center in January 2018. Should the team qualify for the World Championships, they will continue to work on their projects until April 2018 where the event will be held in Louisville, Kentucky.
Our team plans on participating in local tournaments. At each event, our teams will compete with other local VEX IQ Robotic teams across the State including neighbor islands. At each participating tournament, students will be able to enter their STEM research digital media projects for judge’s review. Student participants will be assigned specific roles on the team, based on student interest and strengths. Student roles may change depending on their demonstrated performances as the season moves along.
In May 2018 at the conclusion of the project and season, the Waialua STEM Learning Center will report the degree to which individual/team project objectives were met using a STEM Research Investigative Report and Presentation Board, and/or Engineering Design Notebook, and/or Video Documentation.