Nemesis Team 2590 is an award-winning FIRST Robotics team and non-profit based in Robbinsville High School, NJ. Although building robots and participating in competitions are an important part of what we do, we highly value outreach here at Nemesis. As the community outreach lead, I am always looking for new ways to help spread STEM and inspire future engineers.
Nemesis hosts annual discovery and engineering day camps, where we invite children in our community to complete creative engineering challenges. Since 2017, our team has partnered with Itiah Angels for Learning (IAFL) to take these camps to countries such as Haiti, Panama, and Kenya. Unfortunately, COVID halted our in-person events. However, we didn’t let this stop us. We hosted virtual camps reaching over 70 students in our community. Inspired by our success last year, we began a new initiative for 2022. Our team has assembled 800 engineering challenges. Six hundred of these challenges will be distributed to children in Robbinsville; the other 200 will be distributed to the Ecole Mere Louise School and House of Hope Orphanage through IAFL.
The kits that will be sent to Haiti contain parts for a wobblebot challenge. This is a robot designed like a toy that, when activated, moves in unpredictable directions. Accompanying this is a video with native language subtitles describing how to complete the challenge. These kits encourage creativity, problem-solving, and critical thinking. Nemesis is thrilled to continue working with the children in Haiti, introducing them to STEM and inspiring the next generation. We are also excited to continue working with IAFL in our future endeavors.
Written by Maitri Shah