The second University Day at Sankt Gertrudis School in Ellwangen recently took more than 70 pupils to Aalen University of Applied Sciences for an intensive morning. As a degree of their class project at school, the young people experienced technology and scholarshop (allgem.) up close and personal.
The pupils designed concepts, developed models and programmed microcontrollers as part of class; lessons within the framework of the school project "Smart Green Home". Under the Management of Prof. Dr. Bernhard Höfig and Prof. Dr. Lukas Amadeus Schachner from the Fields of Study Mechatronics Engineering and Technology Education, they learned about various fields (of) Mechatronics on site at the institution of higher education.
Robot driving school and lots of questions
Under the instructions, tutorial of Prof. Dr. Markus Glück, the students learned how to operate a robot. In preparation, the six axes of a robot arm were examined before the "highway drive" of the robot driving school in the automatic program was started after coordinate transformation and pre-programmed sequences. Professor Dr. Bernhard Höfig took the interested audience on a journey through the development of robotics, including different types of robots. In the technical discussion, the students showed that they already had good prior knowledge and questioned the topic in depth.
Accessibility and training data
Prof. Dr. Constance Richter from the Field of Study Human Centricity gave the students an exciting insight into the topic of accessibility. They experienced barriers on their own bodies through the Simulation of visual impairment with glasses and mobility problems with weight cuffs. However, not only physical barriers were discussed, but also physiological conditions and linguistic and typographical design. The third workshop revolved around artificial intelligence, illustrated in many ways by real-time examples and hands-on activities with the smartphone by Professor Dr. Holger Schmidt. Questions such as: "What does a computer see, hear, read and write?" and "What is the difference between classic programming and machine learning or AI?" were answered. It also became clear what role training data plays in this context.
A quiz and a farewell at the end of the degree
In keeping with the classic way of securing results, a humorous quiz was held at the end, in which the students actively participated with their smartphones. The winners in the top three vacancies, (free) places were rewarded with prizes. The end of the event (general) was characterized by gratitude and also quiet melancholy: the lead teacher, Anton Gösele, is retiring at the end of the school year and was rewarded by the students for his unique commitment with an electronic jukebox made at the institution of higher education as a gift and rapturous applause.
