{"id":9477,"date":"2018-05-09T08:08:25","date_gmt":"2018-05-09T15:08:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.autodesk.com\/products\/fusion-360\/blog\/?p=9477"},"modified":"2018-05-09T08:08:25","modified_gmt":"2018-05-09T15:08:25","slug":"girls-steel-tackle-design-challenges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.autodesk.com\/products\/fusion-360\/blog\/girls-steel-tackle-design-challenges\/","title":{"rendered":"Girls of Steel Tackle Design Challenges"},"content":{"rendered":"

At the East Barnet School<\/a> on the outskirts of London, design teacher Steve Sadler once made a friendly bet with the dance teacher that he could recruit new members of his robotics team from among her dancers. \u201cI kind of lured them from dance, going there every lunchtime,\u201d he says. His message: \u201cYou girls can do this as well. It\u2019s not just the boys.\u201d At that time it was VEX Impact, mentors to the younger all-girl robotics team.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

East Barnet\u2019s additional all-girl robotics teams \u2014 the Girls of Steel<\/a> \u2014 haven\u2019t just done it, they\u2019ve excelled, becoming VEX national champions in the U.K. and also traveled to the U.S. to compete in the world championships<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A School Geared for Design and Technology<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Sadler says that East Barnet has the largest design and technology faculty of any secondary school in the U.K., with a mix of 20 teachers and technicians on staff. They offer a range of learning options, including industrial design, product design, engineering, graphics, textiles, food, and photography, to the school\u2019s 1,350 students. Sadler, an alumnus of the school himself, has now served on the faculty for 16 years.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

His own involvement with robotics started in 2011, when he was researching new and fun ways to add an enhance the design and technology curriculum for all the students at East Barnet School. When he first started Robotics at EBS he had one iMac desktop to work with CAD, and eventually the faculty acquired a laser cutter and eventually a CNC machine. Through another connection, he was introduced to VEX Robotics<\/a>, which offers robotics kits for STEM education. \u201cIt was very, very new,\u201d he says. \u201cI knew nothing about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sadler built two VEX robots on his own, driving them up and down the EBS corridors of the school to drum up interest from students. Soon he had put together a couple teams of four students to compete in the VEX national competition for the U.K. Even though they had only three months to prepare, he says, \u201cTo my surprise, we end up winning the event.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

CAD Classes for the Masses<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Today, Sadler has scores of students signed up for the Autodesk Design Academy<\/a>. In the program, each student takes several tutorials to build their expertise in CAD. Meanwhile, the school is also taking advantage of an enrichment program that allows courses to diverge from the national curriculum three afternoons a week, so long as the students are learning. That means that a total of 600 students in grades 7, 8, and 9 will rotate through CAD training that teaches them to use Autodesk applications and other types of professional-grade software, and also mobile design and collaboration apps.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

At the same time, the 25-member robotics club continues to raise funds to cover the costs of equipment, competition fees and even travel and accomodation. \u201cWe\u2019re quite good as a school at scrounging what we can,\u201d Sadler says.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Autodesk as an Educational Resource<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The students are also active users of Inventor and Fusion 360. Sadler himself has been using Fusion 360 for two years. When he started using it for surface modeling, he says, \u201cI was amazed at how quickly I \"\"could do it\u201d in comparison to his experience using Solidworks.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

One of the girls from last year\u2019s team had previously worked only in 2D modeling, but she took to Fusion 360 so quickly that she was able to build a portfolio that helped her win admission to university. Sadler has gotten similar responses from former students of his already attending university; as he puts it, \u201cThey\u2019ve been jaw dropped at how quickly they can create something.\u201d Many students that have moved on from A Level to design universities have even found themselves except from their 1st<\/sup> year CAD modules as they have covered everything within their A Level courses. The new A Level Engineering students are also taking advantage of Autodesk CFD for analysis to help them improve in areas like molding, additive manufacturing as well as to optimise general project product performance.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He also got permission from the girls\u2019 parents to miss three days of school so they could attend Autodesk University. It was a rousing success. \u201cThey absolutely loved the three days and found the time invaluable in such a way that they could have never have been taught those skills in the classroom\u201d Sadler says. \u201cThey look at things in a completely different light now. They are SO buzzed up from it and motivated in such a positive way.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Building Life Skills Through Design Education<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Sadler says that the VEX competition enables him as a teacher and mentor to try new things with his students and for them to develop advanced skills. As the students learn to use Autodesk products and \"\"other software, they are also learning better teamwork and communication, as well as acquiring skills in marketing and seeking sponsorships. That means getting on the phone, learning to pitch to companies, learning sell their brand, setting up meetings and collaborating through Office 365 and other many skills that will prove to be useful in later life.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the things we try to do is push confidence among the students,\u201d Sadler says. Recently this has included having the girls on the team present to C-level executives on the importance of robotics in education.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The success of East Barnet\u2019s program is easy to see. Beyond the trophies the teams have brought home, five former students have now gone into do degrees and even careers in robotics and mechatronics. But even the younger girls impress Sadler with their maturity.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cThey can quite confidently now stand in a hall in a convention center,\u201d he says, \u201cand I can quite comfortably sit in my chair knowing that they\u2019ll do great.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Girls of Steel, an all-girl robotics team is proving girls can succeed in robotics. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":894,"featured_media":9488,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-9477","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fusion","dhig-theme--light"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nGirls of Steel Tackle Design Challenges - Fusion Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Girls of Steel, an all-girl robotics team is proving girls can succeed in robotics.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.autodesk.com\/products\/fusion-360\/blog\/girls-steel-tackle-design-challenges\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Girls of Steel Tackle Design Challenges - 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