CEW Activities

Chicagoland Engineers Week includes several events for current as well as future engineers. Competitions, banquets, luncheons, and regional events all combine to create quite a full week.

• Bridge Building Contest
• Dupage Area Engineers Week Expo
• Future City Competition
  The Future City Competition is one the numerous programs held in conjunction with National Engineers Week. Visit www.futurecitychicago.org for further information.
• JETS TEAMS Competition
• MATH Counts
  
• Chicagoland Engineering Awards Banquet
• Science Chicago EWeek - click here to download flyer.
• Northwestern Career Day for Girls Program
  Career Day is a one-day program designed for female junior high and high school students who have an interest in science and mathematics. The program features a day of team-work building and problem-solving activities as well as lectures and discussions lead by Northwestern University engineers. For more information, click here.
• Argonne's Annual Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day
• AAAEA Essay/Poster Contest -
  The Essay/ Poster Contest is sponsored by AAAEA and is open to all students in the 3rd through 8th grades in the Chicagoland area schools.  Students submit an essay and a poster about an engineer that they admire or have made an impact on their life.  The essay should explain who the engineer is and why the student admires this engineer.  The poster should depict some aspect of the engineer and the engineer’s accomplishment.  The purpose of the contest is to stimulate students to consider careers in engineering by fostering interest in engineering through research, essay writing, creating a poster and interacting with engineers. Click here for a registration form. For more information, visit our website at www.aaaea.org our e-mail us at aaaea@aaaea.org.
• FIRST LEGO League - Click here for picture of the Illinois State Finals of the LEGO League Robotics competition
  In conjunction with the Dupage Area eWeek event at the Rice campus of IIT, there will be a FIRST LEGO League (FLL) demonstration. This event will be similar to a true FLL Competition, but will be non-competitive. It will feature various middle school competition teams from Illinois. There will also be exhibitions by Junior FLL teams (ages 6-9).
• FIRST Robotics Programs -
  RoboTIP will feature FIRST robotics programs at the Museum of Science and Industry Saturday, February 24 - Saturday, February 25th. The exhibit will not only feature the various robotics program offerings from FIRST, but guests will get a chance to experience robot building and programming in 'hands on" robotics stations. The Robotics Competition is an opportunity to reach most of the teams participating is coming on January 5, 2008 when the 2008 FIRST Robotics Competition kickoff is being held at IIT. This event will feature 38 high school teams (mostly from the Chicago area) who are coming together to learn the 2008 challenge, to receive their robotics components for 2008, and to do some initial brainstorming. I have no budget or facilities to print brochures or flyers, but if you send me hardcopies of the brochure and/or flyer, I can make them available to the over 400 teens and adults who will be present. Brochures can be dropped off at IIT (3241 S Federal, Digital Media Center/Suite 115) or mailed to my home address (IIT is closed until 1/2 with limited mail delivery until 1/7). If you prefer to mail them, contact me privately and I'll provide my mailing address. Alternatively, if you let me know where I can pick them up, I will pick them up late next week.
  As exciting as the middle school FIRST LEGO League competitions are (Bob's photos below), they pale in comparison to what high school teams create and compete with at the FIRST Robotics Competitions! Many of these teams could use engineers to serve along side them as mentors. Most do not know of your organizations, nor of the many different engineering disciplines that exist. This is a great target audience to reach for your own pipeline efforts. Won't you consider attending this event, not just to promote your banquet, but to learn more about FIRST, the teams who participate, and to see what role (if any) you could play in exposing a teen to the fun of engineering? Team registration begins at 8:00, the global kickoff is at 9:00.

• “EWEEK Expo at IIT-Rice Campus”
  Structural Engineers to explore engineering with students
  

DuPage Area Engineer’s Week Committee has scheduled an Open House for Saturday, February 20, 2010 [11:00 A.M. –3:30 P.M.] at Illinois Institute of Technology’s Daniel F. and Ada L. Rice Campus at 201 East Loop Road, Wheaton. This program includes activities that are free and open to the public. You are invited to explore engineering with members of the Chicagoland engineering community. The theme for this year’s program: Turning Today’s Play… Into Tomorrow’s Career.

The Expo will feature interactive displays and presentations that are fun and educational, designed to enhance children’s interest in math, science, and of course engineering.

The DuPage Program, now on its 26th year, is a joint effort among professional engineering and scientific societies, area national laboratories, businesses, educational institutions and community organizations. Displays and presentations this year will focus on Children’s Toys and how they might result into careers in engineering.

Structural engineers Bob Johnson, Carol Drucker, Terrance Lindsay, Jeremy Kirk and others are expected to once again introduce budding young engineers to standing room only at the SEAOI (Structural Engineers Association of Illinois - www.seaoi.org) exhibit.

Mr. Johnson’s structural engineering models and ‘toys’ provide an enriching hands-on practical application of structural engineering principles.

Ms. Drucker’s display on bridges provides students and adults insight into the design of bridges. Expect a discussion on the failure/reasons for the tragic 2007 Minneapolis bridge failure.


Buildings to Shake- Rattle and Roll!

For this upcoming EWEEK, in addition to our usual “bag of tricks” Structural engineer Larry Novak will exhibit an earthquake shake table for LEGOTM buildings which allows the students to utilize their own creativity to build and test their designs to destruction (one can actually see the model buildings sway and osculate under the earthquake simulation). The concept is to utilize the application of creative hands-on demonstrations to encourage young minds to pursue math, science and engineering. At the conclusion of this very special presentation (LEGOTM) gifts will be presented to those attentive listeners.

This ‘EXPO’ is the extraordinary opportunity to introduce students of all ages and their parents to the current state of technology and advances being made throughout engineering industry. For more information, please visit www.dupageeweek.iit.edu or call the IIT-Rice Campus Office at (630) 682-6040.

The event is open to the public and free of charge.