Page 8 - SRNS_Today_July_2021

8 | SRNS TODAY | JULY 2021

Meeting the need

Education Outreach programs excel
despite COVID-19 restrictions

Last year, SRNS Education Outreach programs faced daunting
limitations due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but the organization Four-person teams worked together to program a robot and monitor its performance,
saw an opportunity to enhance and extend the reach of their broad at the SRNS sponsored Coding 4 Kids summer camp.
range of initiatives despite these challenges.
According to Kim Mitchell, SRNS Education Outreach, the staff Coding 4 Kids camp
explored and optimally utilized virtual tools in place of
face-to-face communication.
“Adopting a new web-based approach to meet the needs of those ‘Cool’ activities during hot summer
participating in our various programs required a fast and steep
learning curve for us. This was true for the participating educators Some robots performed as programmed, while some went astray,
and students, as well. That said, the end-result was a high level of during the Coding 4 Kids summer camp at the Ruth Patrick Science
success combined with a rewarding experience,” said Mitchell. Education Center (RPSEC). Just the same, participants gained
“By providing new and innovative virtual opportunities to our valuable experience during the week-long SRNS-sponsored event.
schools, we were able to reach more students and educators than The camp’s innovative, hands-on projects and challenging activities
ever before,” said Taylor Rice, SRNS Education Outreach. “Offering taught students how to handle a world where computer chips are
web-based programs allowed schools throughout the region the found in numerous consumer products and industrial equipment. The
opportunity to participate in our competitions and programs, campers learned basic coding skills and applied those skills in various
without travel being a problem.” ways, including programming robotic objects.
Mitchell explained that the benefits found through efforts to work “This year, two of our camps focused on cyber and coding with the
through the pandemic will continue to play an important role in the help of SRNS,” said John Hutchens, Director of Special Programs,
future of Education Outreach. Examples include the creation of a RPSEC, University of South Carolina Aiken. “The overarching goal was
new program, STEMulating Conversations with SRS Experts, as well to inform kids about cyber and coding in a fun and interesting way.
as video and virtual reality programs that bring SRS to classrooms They’re all from local schools, third through fifth grade.”
throughout South Carolina and Georgia. Hutchens explained that a wide array of occupations require some
“Our ‘Wet Wonders’ and ‘Feathers in the Forest’ videos demonstrate coding knowledge, even indirectly. And the need for experience with
the value of this concept,” said Mitchell. “In the past, we brought a coding will only increase, due to the growing number of Aiken and
limited number of groups of students each year to SRS for a series Augusta area organizations and universities moving into the field of
of ‘hands-on’ environmental science experiments and lessons. cybersecurity and technology.
Though I’m confident we will return to this popular method, we According to a 2019 article in the New York Times, there will be an
will also continue to reach deeply into classrooms throughout our estimated 3.5 million unfilled cybersecurity jobs worldwide this year,
region — and beyond — with the current and future videos, plus an increase of 350% from 2014.
virtual reality programming.
The camp provided a variety of games and activities to pique the
“We recently completed and made available a science-based video interest of each student and, hopefully, inspire them to pursue future
on how a mass spectrometer fexperunctions. Students journey academic and occupational opportunities related to cyber technology,
through this highly sensitive piece of equipment by riding on an cybersecurity and coding.
electron beam to demonstrate the spectrometer’s ability to identify
the molecular makeup of a substance. It will soon be added to our “I think this camp has been cool because we got to program robots to
new web-based library as a virtual reality program as well,” move stuff. Not many people get to do that,” said Gunoor Sarmaha, a
Mitchell added. fourth grade student at Stevens Creek Elementary in Augusta.
At this point, the demand for these videos is quickly growing. Ariana Lopez, a Chukker Creek Elementary fifth grader from Aiken,
To date, more than 23,000 students have seen the videos, and was impressed with the high degree of interaction within the Coding 4
educators have received corresponding guides. Kids Camp.
“It’s important to credit the value of this new approach to “I’ve been to other coding camps, and this is the most hands-on one
members of our video production, graphics, laboratory, Research that I’ve ever attended,” said Lopez. “It’s really neat. This is definitely
and Development, engineering and IT groups within SRNS,” my favorite coding camp.”
said Mitchell. “They stepped up and teamed up with us in our hour Lopez stated her dream job was to use concept art to design
of need. None of this would have been possible without characters used in video games, which heavily involves programming.
their assistance.” “This camp is helping me to understand what I need to learn,” she said.