IU9 Educators Explore Robotics from Campus to Industry
By Carnegie Mellon Robotics Academy
IU9 Educators Explore Robotics from Campus to Industry
On Friday, March 20th, we had a group of Superintendents and district leadership / administrators from across the Intermediate Unit 9 region visit for a few days to dig into robotics and technology. They came from Elk, Cameron, Potter, McKean counties and spent time getting a feel for what robotics looks like both in schools and out in industry.
The visit was organized by the Simon Initiative and included time with faculty at Carnegie Mellon, visits to the CMU ETC, and a chance to see how this work actually shows up in the real world.
“It was a joy to be able to share CMU resources and opportunities with our IU9 colleagues! The visit highlighted some of the truly unique opportunities that are available through partnership with CMU, and ending with seeing all of the cutting edge and exciting innovations in robotics industry at NREC with the Robotics Academy was the perfect send off. Our educator partners were fired up about innovation and excited to bring information about working with CMU back to their schools and communities.”
The tour wrapped up with a trip to our location at the National Robotics Engineering Center (NREC). Our team walked them through a range of systems, and we talked about what they’re built for, the problems they’re trying to solve, and the different kinds of work that go into making them.
One of the highlights was getting to spend some time with drones. As they flew, we talked through how the sensors work and why the drones behave the way they do.
This was just one piece of a bigger experience for the group, but it was nice to be able to tie things back to real systems and applications. We’re excited to keep working with these educators as they think about what robotics could look like in their districts and how to bring more of this to their students.