Inspiring next generation of engineers through service-learning robotics outreach and mentorship programme

Abstract

This article describes the organization of a service-learning robotics outreach and mentorship programme in an engineering department of a developing country. The programme is designed to tackle the problem of lack of integrative courses in engineering programmes and the lack of interest in science technology engineering and mathematics subjects among primary and secondary school students. Under the programme, a robotic team is formed consisting of undergraduate engineering students as mentors/coaches and primary and secondary school students as team members. The team members are taught how to design, build, and program robots to solve challenges by their mentors. The programme is intended to foster creative problem-solving abilities of students in science technology engineering and mathematics subjects at all levels of education in the context of a resource-constrained teaching and learning environment. The impacts of the programme are also reported.

Introduction

To engineer a product in a developing country is a challenging task for a host of reasons. Some of the reasons include capital scarcity, lack of trained workforce, inadequate access to technology, politicized legal systems, underdeveloped supporting services, limited consumer markets and so on. Such an environment requires engineers who are ‘problem solvers, decision makers, adept negotiators and thinkers who are at home with open-endedness, flexibility and resourcefulness’. It is not enough for these engineers ‘to have acquired a store of non-transferable facts: they must understand and internalize important concepts in subjects such as mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, and economics sufficiently to make it available spontaneously, appropriately, and in many different contexts’. ¹ To develop such engineers is critical for the technological development of a developing country and it is the responsibility of the educational system at all levels. Most students admitted into engineering programmes have, to use the words of Reif, ² ‘significant misconceptions, fragmented knowledge, and inadequate problem solving skills’ in science technology engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects and therefore lack the motivation for sustainable learning required by engineering disciplines. As a result, these students become passive learners who only see education as acquisition of facts and information merely to be received into the mind. The few motivated students have no opportunities to connect their knowledge with real-world applications, and therefore their interests are not sustained. These are some of the reasons why engineers produced are not effective problem solvers. Of course, there are exceptions to these descriptions. The blame is not entirely that of the student but also that of other players in the education systems at all levels. The education system applies a model of engineering education that emphasize, depersonalized and decontextualized learning, uses mere recitation of concept as a means of assessment and suppress creativity. Such a model cannot produce the kind of engineers required to innovate in a challenging environment existing in developing countries. ³ Developing creative engineers requires large doses of divergent thinking skills rather than rote learning techniques.

A robotics mentorship and outreach programme was conceived with the goal of tackling some of the problems described above. Robotics is selected as a platform for achieving this goal because robots have a wide appeal across all age groups, and this appeal ensures the motivation needed by students to participate in the programme. In addition to general creativity problem described earlier, the programme intends to solve two other major problems simultaneously.

The first problem is lack of an integrative course at the introductory level in engineering programmes most of which consists of smorgasbord of specialized courses giving the students a mole vision rather than a birds eye view of respective engineering disciplines. A situation aptly described by Skolnik. ⁴

Typical EE courses cover topics related to circuits, components, devices, and techniques that might make up an electrical or electronic system; but seldom is the student exposed to the system itself. It is the system application (whether radar, communications, navigation, control, information processing, or energy to which we might add robotics) that is the raison d’etre for the electrical engineer.

Nisan and Schocken ⁵ and Ward and Halstead ⁶ in their textbooks described similar situation in computer engineering. The outreach programme thus provides opportunity for the engineering students to synthesize all their fragmented learning into a holistically engineered system such as a robot.

The second problem addressed by the outreach programme is the lack of interest in STEM subjects by younger students because of unavailability of materials for hands-on teaching. Under the programme, undergraduate engineering students volunteer to conduct robotic outreaches to primary and secondary school and to encourage the students to form robotics club. The members of the clubs are introduced to NXT LEGO Mindstorm and are taught how to design, build and programme robots to solve the given challenge tasks. The activities of these outreaches provide appropriate context for hands-on learning and teaching, and also provides opportunities for the synthesis of both technical ‘hard’ and people ‘soft’ skills, since the students are required to communicate and demonstrate technical concepts within the dynamics of a team in a real-life and authentic performance situation. ⁷

The idea of using university engineering students as mentors and coaches of robotics club is not new. Karp et al. ^8,9 reported similar approaches in engaging elementary school students to high school students in engineering and also enriching the educational experience of engineering undergraduate thereby improving the retention rates of electrical and computer engineering students. One merit of this approach in a resource constrained environment is that undergraduate engineering students, who are more tech savvy and more enthusiastic about robots, are better suited as coaches of robotic clubs compared to primary and secondary school teachers. ¹⁰ In addition, the generation gap between the university students and primary and secondary school students is smaller, consequently both the groups connect easily in a learning situation.

The authors are not claiming that robotic outreaches are a panacea for all the ills besetting engineering education in developing countries. But the judicious use of a service-learning program, based either on robotics or not, is a step in the right direction. Such a programme leverages the advantages service learning as a method of teaching contents, a way for student to connect their knowledge with ‘real-world’ applications and a means to engender interest in and knowledge of STEM fields at the lower education level. All of these benefits are absent in the present education system. The ultimate aim of these efforts is to influence the interest of young students in STEM subjects at an early age. ¹¹ An idea popularly referred to in Nigeria by the phrase ‘catch them young’.

Organization and activities of the programme

The robotic outreach programme is a spin-off from the iLab-Africa project. iLab is a remote laboratory technology that allows remote access to and control of expensive equipment to perform pedagogic scientific and engineering experiments via the Internet. ¹² The technology was developed in Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In Africa, three Universities, Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife Nigeria; Makerere University in Uganda and University of Dar es Salam in Tanzania, collaborated with MIT in the iLab-Africa project funded by Carnegie Corporation. The collaboration involves the design, development and deployment of these remote labs for use in credit awarding science and engineering courses. On OAU campus, the iLab project attracted tech-savvy students whose interest went beyond the classroom. It is from this group of students that the core team of coaches and mentors for the outreach was formed and hence the official name iLabRoC meaning iLab Robotics Club.

The mentorship and outreach programme consists of undergraduate students of departments of electronic/electrical engineering, computer science and engineering, mechanical engineering, physics and microbiology of Obafemi Awolowo University. Admission to the group is based on the interest of the students. There is no formal admission process, only the interest and curiosity of the students count. Membership class varies from freshmen to seniors.

The outreach programme uses various robotic platforms such as Lego mindstorm NXT, EV3 and TETRIX as a platform for teaching the design of robots to solve various tasks. New student members are trained in the basics of putting the kits together and programming it to perform basic tasks. During the training, concepts taught in the classroom that are applicable to robot design are pointed out and emphasized. Concepts from software engineering, signals and systems, circuits and probability are emphasized and their applications are demonstrated. The LEGO platform has been used by various researchers to teach and reinforce concepts such as real-time control, ¹³ control systems laboratory, ¹⁴ discrete-time control systems, ¹⁵ Kalman filter, ¹⁶ fuzzy control, ¹⁷ rotational energy in physics, ¹⁸ programme structures in software engineering, ¹⁹ engineering design, ²⁰ C programming ²¹ and MATLAB programming. ²² Showing students all these pedagogic applications of LEGO kits helps to convince them that LEGO kit is not a mere toy. The process of actually solving a problem using theoretical concepts helps students to organize their thoughts for effective application of theory to other problems. New members are also taught good mentorship skills such as how to teach basic robot design and construction skills, nudge students in the right direction, give students opportunity to learn from mistakes, help solve design and construction problem, maintain proper team dynamics, ²³ encourage and not stifle creativity and most important of all to place emphasis on the educational experience rather than winning any competition at the expense of the learning process. ²⁴ New members also have the opportunity to participate in National Instrument (NI) LabVIEW Associate Developer (CLAD) certification training organized by a certified instructor from NI. LabVIEW is an important system programming language that allows the development and deployment of control and instrumentation-based systems such as robots. Some members are now CLAD certified as a result of these training. This training goes a long way to assist members in understanding the inner workings of the robots.

Students conduct robotic outreaches during the semester and vacation period. Outreaches are conducted in primary and secondary schools and other tertiary institutions. The outreach activities involve teaching robot design, organizing the robotic teams, coaching and mentoring the robotics team for competitions at the local, national and international level. These activities are carried out on volunteer basis. During the training, relevant concepts from STEM subjects are emphasized and demonstrated by using them to solve problems encountered in the robotic design activities. As a results these concepts are brought to life in the mind of the students.

In the early stage of the programme, the group collaborated with the African Regional Centre for Space Science and Technology Education in English which is a United Nations affiliated agency responsible for the promotion of space science and technology education in English-speaking African countries and is located on OAU campus. The outreach programme was called the Robotics Education Program (REP) under this collaboration. REP has two broad objectives: to inspire creativity in learning STEM subjects among secondary school students and, to foster mentorship skills, volunteerism, and team-based problem-solving skills among tertiary school students. ARCSSTEE has over 600 Space Clubs in primary and secondary schools all over the country and it sponsored most of the outreaches to schools where its space clubs were already established. Competitions were also organized for schools that were trained under the programme.

The pilot phase of the REP started in March 2011 with some iLabRoC students serving as mentors and coaches. Thirty students from the three selected secondary schools received 6-week training on how to build and programme robots using LEGO Mindstorm robotic kits. One student from a home school also participated in the programme. Each team was given a robotic kit donated by NIs. Each team practiced for atleast 2 hrs each week for a total of 6 weeks. During the training, the students learn to conceive, design, assemble, program, and test their robots. After the 6 weeks training, the teams were given 2 weeks to prepare for the competition and come up with designs in line with the theme of the competition ‘Applications of Robots in Society’. Assessment of the pilot phase of REP by the participants indicated realization of the objectives of the program. Three of the REP teams also participated in a National LEGO Mindstorm competition where two teams won and went on to represent the country at the 2011 World Robotic Olympiad that took place in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirate.

The iLabRoC team has participated twice in the World Robotic Olympiad (WRO) in 2013 and 2015. In 2013, the group participated in the GEN II football category of the WRO, which took place in Jakarta Indonesia. In 2015, the group participated in the University category of the WRO, which took place in Doha, Qatar. Although on both occasion the team did not win, it was an experience that really affected the technical outlook of the members and was a boost to their self-esteem and morale.

Impacts of the programme

The impact of the programme is assessed by personal experience of and testimonials of students and other participants.

According to testimonial from students participating in the programme, the programme has enriched their educational experience by equipping them with the systems view of engineering. As the saying goes “the best way to learn something is to teach it”. Giving the students the opportunity to teach robotics in a real-world context is a very strong motivating force for learning and applying both the technical concepts and other soft skills. For example in crafting lesson plans for teaching the robotics teams, the group adapted the understanding by design templates developed by Wiggins and Mctighe. ²⁵ This has helped the mentors themselves adopt such an approach to reframing and designing intended learning outcomes by themselves for the courses in their engineering programme. A lot of these courses do not have well-defined and articulated intended learning outcome to guide student’ learning.

By teaching robotics, the mentors have been encouraged to take proactive stance in their own education and also to take responsibility for the application of acquired knowledge. Majority of engineering students in developing countries resign themselves to the view that the education they received only allows them to be mere technicians with only the ability to install, maintain and operate systems designed and built outside the country. They see themselves as mere technicians with no opportunity to get involved in the design and manufacturing aspect of their discipline. A lot of students on the iLabRoC team have started to think otherwise. They have started to design products.

The outreach programme has helped the participating coaches to hone their entrepreneurial skills, for example, fund raising. As part of their activities, the coaches engage in fundraising activities for the purpose of sponsoring the participation of their robotic teams in national competitions. This opportunity gave the mentors practical experience in art of pitching for projects they believe in. Some of entrepreneurial projects embarked on by the mentors are the Humane project; ²⁶ Raspberry Pi-based web access close circuit camera and Wi-Fi student class attendance systems. As an interesting sidelight, one of the iLabRoC team leader is organizing an annual anime convention tagged Aniwee which brings together geeks and anime fans and it’s the first of its kind in the country. Presently, the room allocated for the activity of the group has turned into a kind of geek haven, where students are engaged in technical activities of all kinds and it is opened 24/7 to the students. ²⁷ One of the students who took part in the programme was able to leverage her outreach experience during a job interview for a position in a multinational company.

One area in which the outreach is having positive impact is in the National Service year of alumni of the iLabRoc team. In Nigeria, University graduates are mandated by law to participate in the National Youth Service Corps programme for a year. The graduates are deployed to towns different from their place of origin and are expected to live with people and learn the culture of the ethnic groups in these towns. A large percentage of these towns are remote from major cities where some of the graduates grew up. The aim of the programme is to unite the country by encouraging educated youths to appreciate other ethnic groups and at the same time to encourage them to use their newly acquired skills to serve these towns. In most cases, these educated youths are not motivated and are underutilized in the place where they are deployed. Some iLabRoC alumni have started introducing robotics to schools in these remote regions.

Participating in competitions such as WRO has helped to demystify the complexity of technology and build self-confidence of the mentors in actual design. Seeing others using the same concepts they were taught in the classroom was a boost to their self-esteem in a way contagious among their peers. This is a very important part of the educational experience of the mentors. Figures 1 and 2 show the bowling robot built for the 2016 WRO bowling challenge.

Figure 1.

The bowling robot for WRO competition. WRO: World Robotic Olympiad.

Figure 2.

Block diagram of the bowling robot.

Future directions of the programme

It is generally believed that robots will become a fast selling technological product of the future. ²⁸ The iLabRoC group is positioning itself to exploit this trend by developing the capacity to contribute to that future. The ultimate goal of the group is to transform itself into a hotbed of robotic system research by designing and building robots within the context of a developing economy. A recurring problem encountered by the group in its outreach is the inability of many schools to afford robotic kits to keep the interest alive after the outreach. Presently, the team is conducting research into design of low-cost robotic kits. The group has also identified some kits and is trying to adopt them in its outreaches. ²⁹

One of the future goals of the iLabRoC team is to form, coach and mentor teams qualified to participate in the FIRST Lego league competition. The team sees this as an opportunity to up the ante of its activities.

The Department of Electronic/Electrical Engineering is currently designing an introductory, integrative and hands-on course that uses robotic kits as a platform along the line of course 6.01SC ‘Introduction to Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in MIT’. ³⁰ The objective of the course is to give freshmen engineering students an overview of electronic and electrical systems engineering design concepts and to enhance their general problem-solving skills.

One area that the iLabRoC group is seeking collaboration is in the area of social robots. The area of social robots has not been fully exploited in all our activities because this requires bringing in other domain experts to assist in planning and supervising these activities. Humanoid robots have been employed in English language teaching, ³¹ paediatric cancer interventions ³² and games for autistic children ³³ with impressive results that suggest adoption and adaptation to our kind of activities. Humanoid robots open a whole new programming challenge for the students and more real-world applications specifically in the health sector of the economy.

There is a need to develop and carry out a comprehensive and quantitative study to assess the impact of the programme on the academic and professional life of the mentors and the academic performance of the protégés. One reason this study has not been carried out is that the soft skills fostered by a service-learning programme such as this are difficult to assess in the classroom, though Maloney et al. ³⁴ have developed a new method which can be helpful in carrying out such assessment.

Conclusions

A service-learning robotic outreach and mentorship programme has been designed and implemented by the authors. The programme is designed to improve the systems applications view of engineering students, to increase the interest of students in STEM subjects at all levels and to improve the problem-solving abilities of the participating students. The structure of the programme consists of undergraduate engineering students serving as mentors and coaches to robotics team consisting of primary and secondary school students. The programme is having positive impacts on the educational experience of undergraduate engineering students who are members of the robotic teams. It is also having impact on the curriculum development and delivery of the Department. Till date, over 30 primary and secondary schools in all have participated in the programme all over the country.