Competition Aims to Boost STEM Interest Among Girls
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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowTeams from three states are coming to Indianapolis this weekend to take part in the second annual IndyRAGE robotics competition. The event, being held at Perry Meridian High School, aims to encourage female students to pursue their interests in STEM-related fields.
IndyRAGE, or Robotics All Girls Event, gives team members the chance to work with professional female role models to build and program robots to perform specific tasks. This year’s event will see teams taking part in the FIRST 2016 game, known as "Stronghold," where teams will try and capture their opponent’s castle.
Julie Boyce, a mentor for Perry Meridian’s Cyber Blue team, says she initially wasn’t sure if the event would have much of an impact on the girls competing in it. "However, as I walked around and talked to the girls during the event, I found out just how engaged they were. They were excited to take control and not have their male teammates looking over their shoulders. They enjoyed the open discussion luncheon with the female engineers. Watching the girls take charge of the robots at the IndyRAGE event was awesome."
This year’s teams include:
- Cyber Blue – Perry Meridian High School – Indianapolis Indiana
- Tech Hounds – Carmel High School – Carmel Indiana
- Pike RoboDevils – Pike High School – Indianapolis Indiana
- Kil-A-Bytes – McKenzie Center for Innovation and Technology – Indianapolis Indiana
- Team THRUST – Huntington County 4-H Robotics – Huntington Indiana
- CyberCards – Southport High School – Indianapolis Indiana
- PhyXTGears (sounds like Fixed Gears) – Home School – Muncie Indiana
- Red Alert Robotics – Center Grove High School – Greenwood Indiana
- Wave Robotics – Oshkosh Wisconsin
- The EarthQuakers – Plainfield High School – Plainfield Indiana
- The Quadrangles – Bloomington High Scholl South – Bloomington Indiana
- CyberTooth – Northwestern Sr High School – Kokomo Indiana
- Ctrl-Z – Champaign Illinois
- Roborioles – Avon High School – Avon Indiana
- GalacTech – Columbus North and East High Schools – Columbus Indiana
- Hawks on the Horizon – Concept Schools and Horizon Science Academy – Chicago Illinois
The event begins at 9:00 a.m. Saturday and is free and open to the public. You can learn more about last year’s competition by clicking here.