The unemployment rate for Knott County KY as of October 2018 is 6.8% compared to the statewide rate of 4.1% and national rate of 3.5%, according to the US Berea of Labor and Statistics.  Therefore, it is especially important to involve youth in 4H SET learning opportunities becausedata suggest that at least 20 percent of U.S. jobs require a high level of knowledge in any one STEM field (Rothwell, 2013).  

           The Knott Co Extension Council established in the POW that youth demonstrate new abilities, interest, and engage in the SET curriculum area.  The 4H Lego Robotic program FAR surpassed those expectations.

          Our goal this year was to become competent in the four First Lego League robotic competition areas and compete in a regional qualifying event.  The 4 areas of competition were Core Values, Robot Design, Robot Games and Research project/presentation.

Core values portion pertains to teamwork, teambuilding and inclusivity of everyone’s ideas including those of your opponents. The youth demonstrated their own way of working through decision making among the 10 of them, as well as, how they collaborated with opposing teams.

Robot Design is the building process where each part has to perform a function for the programming of the robot to complete one of 20 missions.  The building process required the youth to experiment and construct attachments based on predictions they make for each specific mission.  Then they had to re-evaluate and make any necessary adjustments.

Robot games sounds fun but is very difficult for the youth to master.  It requires precision coding and programming in order for the robot to complete various missions. The youth were successful through calculating and formulating solutions to each mission challenge.  They had to consider various ways each mission could be accomplished and decide as a team which was most efficient.  

The research project/presentation portion of the competition required the youth to choose a problem that astronauts face after a long duration in outer space.  The youth chose to address mental health/depression.  This exposed our youth to multiple career possibilities where they were required to contact professionals in the field and gather information from to incorporate in their project.  They also had to work as a team to present their problem, identify a realistic solution, and package an entertaining presentation.

This was a very intense program we booked over 50 hours of practice/training from October through December.   We held meetings with other regional teams to build relationships and to allow for collaboration. 

Through this experience the youth went from attaining the knowledge needed to hypothesizing and formulating solutions to each challenge. The had to calculate, formulate, predict and then re-evaluate their progress, critique the changes and do it all over again.Even outside of the traditional STEM job sector, there is a need for STEM competencies and skills. Data show that the set of core cognitive knowledge, skills, and abilities that are associated with a STEM education are in demand in nearly all job sectors and occupations (Carnevale, Smith, & Melton, 2011). 

Our team competed in December at our first regional qualifier event.  We placed second overall in the Research project/presentation.  Thanks to two volunteer leaders, one focused on the technical aspect and the other solely on the project presentation.  Very happy to see this teams many hours of hard work and preparation rewarded.  Next year we hope to advance on to the state level.

References:  

Rothwell, J. (2013, June). The hidden STEM economy. Washington, DC: Brookings. Retrieved from https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-hidden-stem-economy/ 

Carnevale, A., Smith, N., & Melton, M. (2011). STEM. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce. Retrieved from http://cew.georgetown.edu/stem

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Unemployment Rate in Knott County, KY [KYKNOT9URN], retrieved from FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis; https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/KYKNOT9URN, January 4, 2019