On Thursday, June 12th, Dominique and I traveled to Mergenthaler high school affectionately called “Mervo” located on the east side of Baltimore. Our goal was to talk with Mervo’s robotics instructors and a student leader of the Mervo robotics team.
Before the meeting, Mervo indicated that their robotics team was very enthusiastic about joining the JURBAN team and extremely excited about building a craft to travel to the Moon.
We were unaware of what would transpire next.
Not only did the Mervo robotics team join the JURBAN high school team, but we met an impressive student and also the Director of robotics curriculum for Baltimore City Public School system, Mr. Tom Mortin.
The Mervo student we met was Deion Gillis. Deion expressed interest in building robotics, autonomous navigation, and even C++ programming.
I am very proud of Deion’s accomplishments at his young age, and equally excited about him joining our JURBAN team. His stats include:
• Rising senior entering the 12th grade.
• Expert on the Vex robot.
• Lead the Mervo team in both VEX and US First robotic challenges.
• Interested in going to college IMMEDIATELY after graduation where he can study robotics.
• Interested in working with NASA on a robotics internship.
• Studying C++ programming during the summer.
He was also interested how to apply the physics and algebra that he has learned in class on the building the robot and charting the JURBAN craft from earth to the moon.
Mr. Tom Mortin was so impressed about the Google Lunar X PRIZE and about JURBAN’s direction that he would like to make this X PRIZE a focal vision for Baltimore City Public School’s robotic program. Hence, exceptional students that showed exceptional performance on their robotic activities may apply to the JURBAN team and prepare for the technically advanced workforce in science, technology, engineering, and math.
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