Creator: Nicole Heller
I chose to submit a few pictures that were taken throughout the semester at the service-learning sites. I also provided a description of the class and the service, as well as some quotes from students in the s-l class.
This service-learning Cornerstone of Engineering class partners with the Timothy-Smith Network to teach robotics and STEM concepts to children in the neighborhoods surrounding Northeastern. Northeastern students are assigned to different sites in the area and go every week, making them a consistent source of guidance and mentorship to the children. The children spend the semester building and coding a robot, and various STEM challenges are also woven in to build teamwork and cooperation skills. Not only do the children gain valuable experience with coding and engineering design challenges, but they also gain a friend and mentor. Northeastern students also make meaningful connections to their community and gain many skills that apply to the class such as teamwork, leadership, and patience.
Quotes from Northeastern students regarding their semester:
“At the end of the day, both girls in my group said they really enjoyed what we did in class and wished we had class every day. It was awesome to see them excited and engaged in the material.”
“I was very proud when one of the kids I was working with got his color sensors to work and follow the line. He came up to me after to thank me on helping him figure out what was going on.”
“I was working with two kids that started speaking a language that I didn’t recognize. I asked them what language it was, and they said it was a language from a set of islands off the coast of western Africa and they had moved to the US in 2015. I thought that was really amazing because their English was perfect and they still spoke their native language fluently. “
“I was really happy to make a connection with one of students. She has a little brother in the Parent University program so her mom could not stay with her at our program and I helped her with the KitKat challenge instead. She wants to be an emergency doctor so she can help victims of gun violence.”
“Today we passed out all the LEGO kits and started building the robots. One family shared pictures of their LEGO Harley Davidson with me that’s in the Harley Davidson Museum in Revere. They talked about how the smallest details matter and related it back to the engineering design process!”