Science is Rock and Roll

President Obama joined Dean Kamen, will.i.am and a host of celebrities to launch i.am.FIRST – Science is Rock and Roll in the United States last month.

i.am.FIRST was an hour-long television programme that was broadcast on The ABC Television Network to emphasise the importance of science education to spur innovation.

Introducing i.am.FIRST, President Obama said “Here tonight we share a love of Science, Technology, Maths and Engineering, and most importantly the spirit of invention. We need our young people to keep that spirit alive… we need to encourage our kids and invest in their education. We need to give them the chance to become the next generation of scientists and engineers and entrepreneurs.“

Event producer will.i.am wanted the show to “make some noise about the best and brightest students competing in the FIRST® Championships.” Special appearances were made during the show by a number of celebrities including Justin Bieber, Jack Black, Bono, Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears, Snoop Dogg and Justin Timberlake.

FIRST® LEGO® League Food Factor Challenge

Building on the challenge to boost young people’s interest in STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths), and to develop real world skills such as problem solving, team working and communication, FIRST® LEGO® League have launched the Food Factor Challenge for 2011.

The challenge encourages teams build, test, and program an autonomous robot using LEGO® MINDSTORMS® plus research and find a solution to a real-life food safety issue. This year’s theme is ‘Food Factor’, focusing on food safety and how science and technology can help to combat contamination.

Teams of students aged 9-16 are eligible to enter and they have just ten weeks to sign up and complete the first stage of their mission. Regional heats lead to a UK and Ireland final in January, with the winning team sent to St Louis, in the United States, in April, to compete against teams from 84 countries.

For more information and to enter take a look at http://www.firstlegoleague.org/

LEGO® Education builds on the ‘Brian Cox Effect’

Hot on the heels of the nation’s exam results, which revealed that the ‘Brian Cox Effect‘ is causing more students to pursue maths and science, September sees the 2011 launch of  the global FIRST® LEGO® League (FLL) challenge.

LEGO® lovers the world over regularly post and share YouTube videos of crazy and innovative uses for the perennially-popular building bricks and characters. The FIRST® LEGO® League (FLL) moves things on at warp speed by throwing down the gauntlet to 9 – 16 year olds to use their love of LEGO to find a solution to a real-world issue that affects their local community.

FLL’s recently launched Food Factor Challenge gives teams of students aged 9-16 have just ten weeks to sign up and complete the first stage of their mission. The challenge demands that teams build, test, and program an autonomous robot using LEGO® MINDSTORMS®. The challenge is designed to boost young people’s interest in STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths), and to develop real world skills such as problem solving, team working and communication.  As well building a robot, the teams have to research and find a solution to a real-life food safety issue.

Promoting his i.am.FIRST “Science is Rock and Roll” campaign in the The Huffington Post, Will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas, recently blogged, “Most kids are not dreaming of being programmers, scientists or engineers. The ones that are, do not get the spotlight or attention. Instead, they are looked at as geeks or uncool, when in actuality technology is the only thing that is cool today.”

Regional heats lead to a UK and Ireland final in January, with the winning team sent to St Louis, in the States, in April, to compete against teams from 84 countries.

Simon Davenport, from LEGO® Education Europe, said: “For any child or teenager who dreams of being an inventor, scientist or simply loves LEGO, this is the ultimate challenge.” However, Simon  is keen to point out the serious side to the project. “It’s well known that there is a huge STEM skills gap in the UK. Exciting challenges outside the regular curriculum can help sustain the welcome trend that began with ‘cool’ young scientists like Brian Cox.”

This year’s challenge theme is ‘Food Factor’; teams must focus on food safety and how science and technology can help to combat contamination. Using the LEGO MINDSTORMS Education kit, teams also develop a robot to tackle a variety of missions. The teams attend a tournament, present their research, describe their solution and compete with their robots against the clock to carry out the tasks in the sports like FLL arena. Last year’s UK and Ireland winners presented an iPhone app that helped people with diabetes manage their insulin check times and injections.

RM Education, who went into partnership with LEGO last year, is hoping for similar ground-breaking projects this year. CEO Terry Sweeney says: “Too many people think that young people aren’t capable of thinking of the greater good. FLL shows that not only are they capable but that they engage and innovate in a way that can make a real difference. It’s about keeping young people inspired and working together to support the business and technology leaders of tomorrow.”

The 2011 CBI / EDI annual Education and Skills Survey revealed that 43% of employers asked are having difficulty recruiting in STEM areas. Coupled with the fact that 35% of the 566 employers surveyed were unsatisfied with college leavers’ numeracy skills shows that the UK still has a long way to go to make up for years, possibly decades, in which STEM was seen as boring and irrelevant for young people.

Now in its thirteenth year, RM Education expects this year’s FLL to be the biggest ever, with over 200,000 young people taking part in 84 countries across the world.

Watch a video about last year’s challenge:

Budding inventors can apply here: http://www.firstlegoleague.org/