Two All-Female, OSU Sponsored TECH CORPS Teams to Compete in Regional FIRST LEGO Competition
Girls Rule! That is the motto of TECH CORPS’ WiE TECHie and WiE TECHie Bytes all-girl robotics teams presenting in the FIRST LEGO League regional competition on Saturday, November 23 at Grandview Heights Middle School, 1240 Oakland Avenue, from 7am-4pm.
“As members of these teams, the girls have a unique opportunity to engage in various engineering principles and activities while learning to work productively with other girls,” said Central Ohio Regional Director for TECH CORPS Carla Thompson.\
“It is imperative that they continue this passion for engineering and computer science because we need to increase the female presence in those fields,” she continued.
Each team is comprised of up to 10 girls, ages 9-13 who have successfully completed a TECH CORPS program and live in Franklin County. They represent Columbus City, Hamilton Local, Reynoldsburg City, Gahanna-Jefferson Public, Upper Arlington, and Westerville City school districts, as well Mansion Day School and Columbus School for Girls.
The programs are supported through a partnership between the Ohio State University (OSU) Women in Engineering (WiE) Program and TECH CORPS and are funded by The Ohio State University Outreach and Engagement Office. The teams are also coached by OSU female engineering students.
“The OSU WiE Program and TECH CORPS have a shared mission, to expose girls to engineering and computer science and inspire them to pursue STEM careers,” said Interim Director of Women in Engineering Shawna Fletcher. “Nationally, women represent less than 12% of the engineering workforce. For computer science, it’s much less and we are trying to increase awareness by working within the community,” she continued.
One of the goals of the WiE TECHie Bytes program is to help the girls matriculate to the award-winning WiE TECHie team. That team has competed for the past two years and received judging and research awards in the 2011 and 2012 regional challenges.
FIRST LEGO League (FLL) is a national robotics initiative for kids in 4th – 8th grade. The program is designed to get children excited about science, technology, engineering and math and teach them valuable employment and life skills. The winner of the Grandview Heights regional event will go on to a district event in Dublin, OH.
The FLL team challenge varies from year to year and inspires students to find solutions for real-world problems. This year’s challenge is “Nature’s Fury” and centers on learning about natural disasters that affect communities.