June 2010

COMMUNITIES: EDUCATION
Can Classroom Competitions Build Better Engineers?

What's the best way to get more teenagers interested in engineering? Project Lead the Way, whose science, technology, engineering, and math curriculum is used in almost 3,500 schools across the county, believes the answer lies in competition and leadership training.

In March, Project Lead the Way joined with the Technology Student Association and SkillsUSA to start a program that will make online competitions and leadership activities a regular part of the student experience in schools that use the Project Lead the Way curriculum.

Project Lead the Way began in 12 New York high schools in 1998 to help address the shortage of engineering students in colleges and universities. The program's curriculum for middle schools and high schools emphasizes critical thinking, creativity, innovation, and real-world problem solving. Today, more than 300,000 students take the courses.

For high school students, the competitions include a virtual quiz bowl that tests the students, understanding of basic design concepts and a competition in which students have to rank possible solutions to a real-world design problem. In a third competition, students have to solve a local design problem and deliver a presentation.

Middle school students also have three competitions: a quiz bowl, a presentation in which students identify a design problem at their school, and a challenge in which students use pictures and statements to identify automation and robotics systems.

The leadership activities that will become part of the Project Lead the Way curriculum will emphasize communication and presentation ability, time management, goal setting, organizational skills, continuous improvement, teamwork, and diversity issues.

Bolstering the Project Lead the Way curriculum with competitions and leadership activities "puts aspiring engineering students on the path to becoming leaders in the engineering field," says Rosanne White, executive director of the Technology Student Association.

Schools can access the online competition and leadership activities for $300 per year, with discounts for multiple schools within a school district.

Learn more at www.engineeringalliance.org.