Summer Training Intensive
The Summer Training Intensive Program is designed to provide a stipend-supported opportunity for highly motivated learners. All the participants have come directly from outreach efforts or referrals made through partners we have worked with in these efforts.
The result is a unique group of 20 students, aged 16-24. The participants primarily represent City Heights and Colina Park, and come from Crawford, Hoover, Lincoln, MET and Patrick Henry High Schools. We have also outreached to students at Millenium Tech and Monroe Clark Middle Schools. Additionally, we have several students attending a SDCCD Community College.
We have partnered with SD Futures Foundation to provide these program participants with a bi-weekly paycheck while they are attending the course. They are engaged in learning the skills associated with working at a high level of efficiency within a laboratory setting, including safety precautions, documentation habits and presentation skills. This course is designed to be an advanced educational intervention aimed at the focused development of skills related to college preparation and career placement through tangible skill creation as well as confidence development.
The main projects areas are:
Electronics: circuit board design, milling, components and microcontroller programming, as well as alternative energy uses and integration.
Large scale structure: conceptualization, design, 2D and 3D graphical rendering, preparing files for machining, milling on the ShopBot, assembling and installing the final design- a public art piece that discusses ideas about our community.
GPS/GIS mapping: utilizing GPS and GIS-based tools to understand ways in which visualizing information through mapping can provide important information in a way which is accessible and easy to understand. We will work with GPS equipment to create a map of Mission Trails Regional Park trails as an example, then apply this understanding of the technology to uses in our community. Additionally, we are working with a National Geographic expedition team in Mongolia to plat their coordinates in Google Earth and compare uses of these technologies.