Children at an Otara drop-in centre are working on robotics programming that is normally the preserve of second year university students.

 

 


 


"The brillance of these kids outshines the school curriculum."

 

The youngsters, mostly from the local Maori and Pasifika communities, get free access to the latest technology and are encouraged to apply it in ways that interest them. Robotics is one option, but a suite of powerful computers running industry-standard design software allows them to follow their dreams wherever they take them.

Founder Mike Usmar says Computer Clubhouse 274 (CC274), at Clover Park Middle School, equips children as young as 11 with “useful tools they can actually use.

“The brilliance of these kids outstrips the school curriculum,” he says, “and it’s getting them excited and thinking about ‘what can I do when I leave school’. They now have a portfolio of skills, of things they can do.”

Expert volunteers encourage them to “seize the opportunities that access to computer technology can provide”, he says.

“The clubhouse encourages young people to work as designers, inventors and creators. The model puts the learners in the driver’s seat and empowers them to design and create pathways that are relevant to them.”

CC274 is part of a worldwide network of clubhouses set up in under-served communities and licensed to the Boston Museum of Science and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It is the only one in New Zealand, but it has big expansion plans – including a wi-fi internet network so Otara children can take the technology to their homes, empowering communities via information and communication technology.

“We want the kids to go home with technology and breath it into the family,” Mike says. “Rather than providing short-term workshops in basic skills in ways that are prescriptive, CC274 opens up a whole range of activities and programmes that connect people across ages and cultures.”

Project Manager Kane Milne gives a practical example of how the children are applying their skills. Recently the clubhouse expanded its working space “and the clubhouse members were involved right throughout the process.

“In fact, using 3D modeling tools, clubhouse members were able to design the expanded clubhouse and create different layouts and colour schemes. It was based on these designs that we settled on our final layout. Members also got involved in painting murals, walls and our new green screen,” he says.

“This expansion has had real benefits already, allowing us to have multiple teams working in the clubhouse on different things, like our new Robotics group, without having to cram them into tiny spaces.”