Recently, the School of Engineering at the Okanagan campus of the University of British Columbia welcomed students from Vernon Community School to participate in a STEM Fair with select participants given the opportunity to have their projects incubated in a UBC Okanagan research lab.
According to School of Engineering Director, Mina Hoorfar, “this initiative was focused on bringing other aspects of university life and education to high school students in the valley.”
The initiative is an expansion on the community connection between UBC’s Okanagan campus and area high schools. Every March, UBC Okanagan hosts School District 23’s science fair.
“Our (Advanced Control and Intelligent Systems) lab does cutting-edge research in the hi-tech sector” says professor of engineering Homayoun Najjaran “and part of that responsibility is to pass along knowledge to others at all levels of education, including the high school students.”
The STEM program has been so well-received that it will be expanded in 2018 to include participants from additional schools in the Okanagan.
Click on the following links to learn about the initiative and some of the projects:
STEM Fair at the School of Engineering at the Okanagan campus of the University of British Columbia
Learning About Diet with the Help of the School of Engineering
Mina Hoorfar, professor and director at the School of Engineering, and her research team assists students from Vernon Community School in incubating their diet analysis STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) project in the Advanced Thermo-Fluidic Laboratory at UBC’s Okanagan campus.
Local Students Learn About Applied Eletro-Magnetics
Inside the lab of Loïc Markley, students from Vernon Community School take their levitating magnet to new levels through the inaugural School of Engineering’s STEM fair initiative.
High School Student Fuels Her Interest in Biomedical Engineering
Using 3D modelling software, a student from Vernon Community School teams up with Ernest Goh, an instructor at UBC Okanagan’s School of Engineering, to build functional in-sole prototypes.
STEM Fair Project Parks Itself
The Advanced Control Intelligent Systems Laboratory played host to the STEM fair project of two students from Vernon Community School. The students built and programmed a self-driving car with guidance from Engineering Professor Homayoun Najjaran and his research team.