Rowan student section's engineering seminars focus on FIRST involvement

Brandon Chase
Mechanical Advantage

As the ASME student section at Rowan University in Glassboro, N.J., is demonstrating, there is more than one way to support a high school FIRST robotic competition team while fostering an interest in engineering.

The fledgling Rowan section — chartered in April 1998 from a mechanical engineering department then in its second year — stepped up to the plate by offering a series of engineering seminars aimed at introducing basic design principles to high school students who were preparing for the 2001 FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) competition.

FIRST, which promotes engineering among high school students by challenging them to build robots that will compete in a sports-event-style contest, has grown exponentially since its inception in 1992.

Mike Resciniti, a Rowan University junior, peers down a pneu-matic tube during a seminar that is formulated to introduce high school students to basic design principles.

This year, some 500 teams — high school students working with college students and professional engineers — are participating in regional competitions throughout the United States. The winners of the regional competitions, which conclude this month, will move on to the national event next month at Epcot Center in Orlando, Fla.

While universities often contribute to the FIRST competition, they usually work jointly with a single high school team to design and build a robot. (See the September 2000 issue of The ASME Mechanical Advantage.)

What makes the Rowan University Student Section's effort novel is its offer of support to multiple teams by holding seminars that are open to any high school group interested in participating in the FIRST competition that is willing to travel to Rowan's campus, 20 miles east of Philadelphia.

"We had been contacted by several area high schools about helping them out with the FIRST competition," said Mark Seidman, a mechanical engineering senior and former ASME student section chairman. "Rather than picking one school and devoting all our efforts to that, we thought it would be a good opportunity to help out everyone at the same time by having an overall seminar addressing engineering issues that they would be facing in the design of their robot."

The result was six workshops led by Rowan Student Section and faculty, covering topics such as the design process and problem-solving skills, linkages, pneumatics, motors and electrical controls.

Upward of 25 high school students, representing six area schools, attended the workshops, which were spread over three Saturdays.

"This is the first time our section has tried doing something outside of Rowan, and it is probably the best thing we've ever done," said Amit Shah, a junior and the student section's chair. "It was a perfect experience."

When designing the seminars, Rowan students modeled their personalized and interactive approach to the education they experience as students in a small department that graduates about 30 mechanical engineering students each year.

The introductory seminar began with a dual-purpose design exercise. Challenging groups to construct a pocket protector with on-hand materials served as an icebreaker as well as a segue into a discussion of the design process. Coincidentally, Shah's pen leaked ink on his pocket, providing comic relief and setting the tone for a fun and informative session.

By the end of the third Saturday session, Shah said, everyone was comfortable and having fun. "We asked all the participants to fill out a feedback form, and the comments we got back were terrific," he said. "Definitely, the experience was valuable for everybody," including those who helped create and conduct the seminars.

The work offered the organizers their fair share of challenges: creating a program from scratch, securing a $1,500 grant from the ASME Philadelphia chapter, compiling an invitation packet, publicizing the seminars and, finally, finding the courage to present concepts that in some cases, Shah said, "we learned just last year and weren't sure of ourselves," to a room full of strangers.

But, said Shah, having to answer technical questions helped solidify engineering concepts in his own mind.

In the first year of seminars, Rowan had a strong response to its offering: inquiries from 13 schools, including a team from Detroit, and a first-time team from Brazil that wanted to know if they should fly up for the workshops.

The number of inquiries, Shah said, shows the need for more programs like this. "I think if other schools and institutions would organize similar seminars," he said, "they would get an equal number of interested schools, if not more."

The Rowan student section responded to the demand by setting up a Web-based version of the seminars and creating a Web-board, which will enable followup discussions and question-and-answer sessions. Both services will extend the section's reach to geographically remote teams that are unable to attend the seminars.

In addition to educating high school students about engineering, "We decided that these seminars would be a good opportunity to spread the name of our school, being a new program," said Seidman, the former section chairman. ASME students at Rowan had been involved with FIRST, volunteering at the Region II event, held at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J., each of the last two years, and informally assisting the local Camden County Vocational Technology high school with the design of their robot.

As this young ASME student section is building a tradition of service, its membership has grown with each new activity, not only in numbers but in the level of dedication. The production of these seminars was no exception, as it proved to be one of the student section's most effective membership recruiting activities to date.

For more information on Rowan's seminars, visit http://engineering.rowan.edu/~asme/asme.html.

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