SAYA has been a Robotics Partnership site for two and a half years. They’re now on a quest to field their FIRST LEGO League team. If you’d like to do this in the future, sign up here!

Family Engagement

Support for new LEGO teams extends beyond the school and after-school day.

CityScience coordinates school outreach and parent engagement that expands support for LEGO by establishing two-way communications with family, hosting family-friendly LEGO events and providing LEGO EV3 robots for kids to use at home.

“I could really see his excitement when he brought his LEGO EV3 home,” says Lizzy, Tarik’s Mom.

Leadership Starts at the Top

“In robotics youth gain valuable experience working in teams and collaborating to solve problems,” says Griselda Estevez, multi-site manager for SAYA, has worked with CityScience for two years. “Without a doubt, robotics is the most popular activity in our after-school program. The kids really enjoyed the trip to the LEGO competition. They all want to compete next year.”

 

Capacity Building

Amna runs a women’s leadership program at SAYA. “Girls aren’t encouraged enough to partake in STEM. I urge the young women in my class to experiment and embrace challenges. When the Robotics program first started we had one or two girls. That grew last cycle. Next year we are shooting for 50% boys and 50% girls. Every week they’re trying something new. It’s great to see them exploring science.”

 

Equity and Access

Maya and Shuhana are rising 8th graders in after-school together. Shuhana hopes her innovations in the field of Robotics Engineering will help the world fight climate change.

Today, women make up 48% of the U.S. workforce, but just 24% of STEM professionals. With CityScience’s support, girls feel encouraged to channel their creativity into robotics and take on leadership roles. In Amna Shams’ robotics class, “girls like Shuhana have emerged as team leaders and talk about becoming engineers.”