SeaPerch Goes to School

I’d like to take this opportunity to add my personally thanks to Mr. Rick Riccardi, Silicon Valley AUVSI Chapter Vice President for all of his hard work and dedication with this education outreach project. His efforts have furthered the chapter’s ethos giving back to the community by inspiring future generations of engineers. Rick has truly raised the bar with Sea Perch, undoubtably applying lessons learned from his many years of participation with the First Robotics program. Patrick

The Silicon Valley Chapter of AUVSI and the Northwest YMCA of Silicon Valley have partnered in a STEM educational outreach relationship to provide an underwater robotics experience to 6 classes of Cupertino elementary students in 16 week sessions. The Northwest YMCA (Cupertino, CA) has included the SeaPerch ROV (remotely operated vehicle (managed by SVAUVSI) into the ‘Specialist’ Program activities at Murdock Portal Elementary School in Cupertino. The SeaPerch organization of the AUVSI Foundation has awarded over $5000 in grants to fund the materials for the program in support of enhancing the hands-on robotics experience of approximately 186 students in 4th and 5th grades who will be fabricating the ROV frame, thrusters and control assemblies.
Working in teams of 5 or 6, each student will experience the design and build of an underwater remote controlled vehicle (ROV). They will cut and assemble the basic frame, wire and waterproof thruster motors, assemble and solder the control box and then balance the ROV for buoyancy before operating the ROV underwater in exercises to understand the difficulties encountered in the underwater ROV environment.

This program, SeaPerch, has been developed by MIT in conjunction with the Office of Naval Research (ONR) and the Society of Naval Architects & Marine Engineering to promote robotics education and awareness in youth. Rick Riccardi, Silicon Valley Chapter of the Association of Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI ), comments: “This is a youth education outreach program that is very synergistic with the goals, objectives and facilities of the Silicon Valley YMCA as well as an innovative STEM activity for students at Murdock Portal. It’s the first of its kind in the bay area and it is reaching the youngest audience of the program, nationally. It is a tremendous technical educational stimulus for the students.”

Using trained facilitators from both SeaPerch and YMCA to initiate this innovative program; the first of its kind in Northern California, these students are also some of the youngest and brightest to participate. Marcella Quinn, a student at San Jose State University and a SeaPerch facilitator, comments: “I’m so glad to be a part of this program to involve these kids with robotics so early in their lives. Programs like these are what got me into mechanical engineering. It really provides that hands on aspect that you can’t get in a classroom and these kids will benefit from it.”

Links:

http://www.seaperch.org
http://www.siliconvalley.auvsi.org
http://www.auvsi.org
http://www.auvsifoundation.org
http://ymcasv.org/