Building cars - building the future at SJAM
They say "seeing is believing", so I thought if I shared some photos of high school students building electric cars then more students would get involved, rightly believing that they can do it, too.
Darin White here doing a little guest blogging on the Waterloo Electric Vehicle Challenge site. I'm helping Waterloo Engineering's Peter Teertstra get some more eyes on this great program. There is a ton of info on the main site, but the one thing I want you to know is that May 28, 2016 is race day. Come out to this free-no-pay event on UW's east campus at Columbia and Phillip Streets in Waterloo. Everyone is welcome. Here are details for getting there.
While races happen a few days annually, the actual building of cars progresses intensely in high schools across Waterloo Region throughout the school year. I know this from the conversations around my own dinner table because my daughter Arden is in her second year of car club at Sir John A. Macdonald Secondary School. As a maker and a parent, I see the many positive outcomes from this program. WEVC provides opportunities for design, hands-on fabrication and teamwork. It offers motivation for diving into the math and physics behind the design as well as good reasons for learning to use tools and study material science. It is applied engineering and it all starts in Grade 9.
Pictured above are SJAM Grade 9 students Livia and Helen who are test-fitting the rollbar on car #703. You can click on any of these images to enlarge them.
Tag your social media posts with #WaterlooEVC and follow along on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.
I dropped in for SJAM car club after classes last week. Tech teacher and car club mentor Mr. Bluemke reminded everyone about team shirts, an upcoming race in Michigan and then introduced me and my camera.