Competition Of VEX Educational Robotics to Advance Girls' Education (COVERAGE)

Afrin Naz; Mingyu Lu; Chase Broyles; Isabel Barrio Sanchez

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Conference: 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access
Location: Virtual On line
Publication Date: June 22, 2020
Start Date: June 22, 2020
End Date: June 26, 2021
Conference Session: Computers in Education Division Technical Session 10: STEM Outreach
Tagged Division: Computers in Education
Tagged Topic: Diversity
Page Count: 10
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--34315
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/34315
Download Count: 382

Paper Authors

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Afrin Naz West Virginia University Institute of Technology

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Dr. Afrin Naz is an associate professor at the Computer Science and Information Systems department at West Virginia University Institute of Technology. She is working with high school teachers to inspire the K-12 students to the STEM fields. In last six years Dr. Naz and her team launched more than twenty five workshops for high school teachers. Currently her team is training the high school teachers to offer online materials to supplement their face-to-face classroom.

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Mingyu Lu West Virginia University Institute of Technology

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Mingyu Lu received the B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, in 1995 and 1997 respectively, and the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2002. From 2002 to 2005, he was a postdoctoral research associate at the Electromagnetics Laboratory in the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He was an assistant professor with the Department of Electrical Engineering, the University of Texas at Arlington from 2005 to 2012. He joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, West Virginia University Institute of Technology in 2012, and he is currently a professor. His current research interest includes wireless power transmission, radar systems, microwave remote sensing, antenna design, and computational electromagnetics. He was the recipient of the first prize award in the student paper competition of the IEEE International Antennas and Propagation Symposium, Boston, MA in 2001. He served as the chair of Antennas and Propagation Society of IEEE Fort Worth Chapter from 2006 to 2011. He is currently serving as the treasurer of IEEE West Virginia Section.

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Chase Broyles West Virginia University Institute of Technology

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Chase Broyles is from Princeton,WV and is currently a Computer Science student at West Virginia University Institute of Technology expecting to graduate in Spring of 2020. He has been working with high school computer science curriculum and is an advocate for Computer Science classes in all West Virginia schools. Recently, he has been working with middle school students in an after-school program focusing on exposure to STEM topics and experiences.

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Isabel Barrio Sanchez West Virginia University Institute of Technology

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Isabel Barrio Sánchez is a college student at West Virginia University Institute of Technology. She is currently a Junior pursuing a Mathematics major and Computer Science and Economics minors. She has been working as a middle school and high school mentor for three years. Alongside the Computer Science department at WVU Tech and Dr. Afrin Naz, she has developed and implemented several programs to increase West Virginia's girls' interest in STEM disciplines. She is currently working on the curriculum for STEM projects that will be implemented in Spring 2020 at several middle schools in Southern West Virginia.

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Abstract

Approximately, half of ____ high school graduates are female. Meanwhile according to ACT college readiness data, as low as 14% of the female high school graduates in _____ are college ready for STEM. Apparently, female students in _______ need assistance to become competent and confident in STEM disciplines.

Competition Of VEX Educational Robotics to Advance Girls Education (COVERAGE) is a project aiming to inspire and support female middle school and high school students to pursue STEM careers in _______, funded by the _____ Foundation. Specifically, in the fall semester of 2019 and spring semester of 2020 _____ will assist teachers to organize Girls Robotics Clubs in ______ County, ______ County, and ______ County, which prepare female middle school and high school students in these counties for a regional robotics competition. The regional robotics competition will be held on early 2020 at the _____ in Charleston, _______. It will be _____’s first girls-only VEX robotics world championship. Around 30 teams will participate in the competition. Judges will include faculty members of ______ as well as professionals from local companies/organizations. Winners of the regional robotics competition are anticipated to be highly competitive at the national VEX robotics competition (according to Guinness World Records, the VEX robotics world championship in April 2018 was the largest robotics competition in the world [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VEX_Robotics_Competition]).

Through attending the robotics clubs and competition, female middle school and high school students are expected to become more knowledgeable and interested in STEM disciplines. The primary merit of this project is establishing mentorship relationship between female university students and female K-12 students. Specifically, 6 female undergraduate students of ____ with STEM majors will serve as the mentors of female middle school and high school students. The mentors started their university study recently; in other words, they are just a couple of years ahead of the female middle school and high school students. As a result, it would be natural for them to become the role models of middle school and high school students. The mentors will work closely with female middle school and high school students in the robotics clubs on monthly basis. The mentors will also help female middle school and high school students with their math and science coursework. In addition to monthly in-person meetings, virtual meetings will be held in which the mentors post videos online for middle school or high school students.

In this project we are analyzing if the utilization of robotics clubs, robotics competition and mentoring has impact in changing the female students interest in STEM. Through online survey, we are collecting data on female student’ confidence in the use of technology and its impact to stimulate their interest in STEM. Data indicated that female students demonstrated a statistically significant increase in confidence to (a) use technology and (b) improve learning. Implications, limitations, and future directions will also be discussed.

Citation
Format

Naz, A., & Lu, M., & Broyles, C., & Barrio Sanchez, I. (2020, June), Competition Of VEX Educational Robotics to Advance Girls' Education (COVERAGE) Paper presented at 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual On line . 10.18260/1-2--34315

TY - CPAPER
AB - Approximately, half of ____ high school graduates are female. Meanwhile according to ACT college readiness data, as low as 14% of the female high school graduates in _____ are college ready for STEM. Apparently, female students in _______ need assistance to become competent and confident in STEM disciplines.

Competition Of VEX Educational Robotics to Advance Girls Education (COVERAGE) is a project aiming to inspire and support female middle school and high school students to pursue STEM careers in _______, funded by the _____ Foundation. Specifically, in the fall semester of 2019 and spring semester of 2020 _____ will assist teachers to organize Girls Robotics Clubs in ______ County, ______ County, and ______ County, which prepare female middle school and high school students in these counties for a regional robotics competition. The regional robotics competition will be held on early 2020 at the _____ in Charleston, _______. It will be _____’s first girls-only VEX robotics world championship. Around 30 teams will participate in the competition. Judges will include faculty members of ______ as well as professionals from local companies/organizations. Winners of the regional robotics competition are anticipated to be highly competitive at the national VEX robotics competition (according to Guinness World Records, the VEX robotics world championship in April 2018 was the largest robotics competition in the world [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VEX_Robotics_Competition]).

Through attending the robotics clubs and competition, female middle school and high school students are expected to become more knowledgeable and interested in STEM disciplines. The primary merit of this project is establishing mentorship relationship between female university students and female K-12 students. Specifically, 6 female undergraduate students of ____ with STEM majors will serve as the mentors of female middle school and high school students. The mentors started their university study recently; in other words, they are just a couple of years ahead of the female middle school and high school students. As a result, it would be natural for them to become the role models of middle school and high school students. The mentors will work closely with female middle school and high school students in the robotics clubs on monthly basis. The mentors will also help female middle school and high school students with their math and science coursework. In addition to monthly in-person meetings, virtual meetings will be held in which the mentors post videos online for middle school or high school students.

In this project we are analyzing if the utilization of robotics clubs, robotics competition and mentoring has impact in changing the female students interest in STEM. Through online survey, we are collecting data on female student’ confidence in the use of technology and its impact to stimulate their interest in STEM. Data indicated that female students demonstrated a statistically significant increase in confidence to (a) use technology and (b) improve learning. Implications, limitations, and future directions will also be discussed.

AU - Afrin Naz
AU - Mingyu Lu
AU - Chase Broyles
AU - Isabel Barrio Sanchez
CY - Virtual On line
DA - 2020/06/22
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Competition Of VEX Educational Robotics to Advance Girls' Education (COVERAGE)
UR - https://peer.asee.org/34315
DO - 10.18260/1-2--34315
ER -