The RoCKIn Project

The goal of the project “Robot Competitions Kick Innovation in Cognitive Systems and Robotics” (RoCKIn), funded by the European Commission under its 7th Framework Program, has been to speed up the progress toward smarter robots through scientific competitions. Two challenges have been selected for the competitions due to their high relevance and impact on Europe’s societal and industrial needs: domestic service robots (RoCKIn@Home) and innovative robot applications in industry (RoCKIn@Work). The RoCKIn project has taken an approach to boosting scientific robot competitions in Europe by (i) specifying and designing open domain test beds for competitions targeting the two challenges; (ii) developing methods for scoring and benchmarking that allow to assess both particular subsystems as well as the integrated system; and (iii) organizing camps to build up a community of new teams, interested to participate in robot competitions. A significant number of dissemination activities on the relevance of robot competitions were carried out to promote research and education in robotics, as to researchers and lay citizens. The lessons learned during RoCKIn paved the way for a step forward in the organization and research impact of robot competitions, contributing for Europe to become a world leader in robotics research, education, and technology transfer

Promoting academic excellence amongst the engineering students

This paper describes activities carried out by the College of Engineering at Universiti Tenaga Nasional (UNITEN) in order to promote academic excellence amongst the engineering students and to enhance their academic standings. The issues affecting the academic performance are briefly discussed. The activities involve all students majoring in Electrical, Mechanical and Civil Engineering at UNITEN. The discussions highlight some examples of the orientation and motivation programs, student support system, engineering related enrichment activities and outcome-based education. The objective of this paper is to share the experiences gained when conducting these activities and how they benefit the students

Control Systems and Robotics Outreach to Middle-school Girls: Approach, Results, and Suggestions

We conducted a three-day outreach camp focused on control systems and robotics for 8th grade girls from economically disadvantaged families. The overall objective of the camp was motivating the young girls to consider pursuing a career in engineering and sciences. The main focus of the camp were hands-on labs using LEGO Mindstorms EV3 kit. Students learned about programming, sensors, motors and put their skills to test by creating a mobile robot that took part in three contests: car racing, line following, and parallel parking. A pre- and post-camp survey indicated that although program did not predominantly change the girls’ excitement towards careers in engineering and sciences, it increased the girls’ knowledge and excitement towards robotics and control systems. Our results indicate that short camps help kindle the interests of young girls, but are not able to sway them to take on engineering/science careers. In the latter case, we hypothesize that long-term STEM-based programs (e.g., a quarter or year-long robotics course) might be more effective.Cockrell School of Engineerin

A Study of educational robotics in elementary schools

Every teacher aims to find new pedagogical tools that motivate the students and that are ultimately effective in the teaching/learning process of a broad set of contents. Frequently, novel educational tools are developed that bring new sheds of hope to teachers, parents and students. Some of them are able to survive in the fierce competition, but most disappear in a short span of time. The Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), as a whole, have offered lots of promises to education, and some even talk about a huge revolution. Nowadays, it is certain that its impact on the classrooms is still far from these promises, mainly in what regards elementary education. But, it is undeniable that nowadays there are already a number of tools that can be used by teachers and students. The question is shifting from “Will we use ICT in education?” to “How can we use ICT in education to obtain good results?” In this context, Educational Robotics (ER), the research field that studies the application of Robotics as a pedagogical tool, has been growing in importance in the last few years as an emergent approach to Education. This development has been made possible by the technological advances in ICT and electronics, as well as by the progressive drop of costs

Enhancing Practice and Achievement in Introductory Programming With a Robot Olympics

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