Welcome to aSTEAM Village's Mozilla Gigabit Project Blog! Follow us as we utilize next generation telepresence technology to teach computer programming and video game design in a multi-school setting.


We are very grateful to the Mozilla Foundation for looking at our project and proposal to serve 1,380 students this summer and selecting it as one of the proposals that it felt warranted the inclusion in the Kansas City Spring Pilot Program. We would also like to thank GoogleFiber for helping offset the funding gaps by injecting $13,800 into our camps to supplement the $5,000 in Mozilla funding assigned locally. Through the geneoristy of Mozilla and GoogleFiber, aSTEAM Village will serve 1,380 students who will be able to attend coding camps at Benjamin Banneker Charter Academy of Technology, St. Peter's Catholic School, Academie Lafayette French Immersion Charter School and Brull Home School group better known as the Gemini Gentlemen.


aSTEAM Village continues to implement community learning model strategies focused on Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math education as the means to uplift, unite, inspire and strengthen our community by engaging students, parents, educators and businesses at a common spaces. We are especially grateful to Kari Keefe our Mozilla liasion for her support and belief in our efforts and also to the leadership of the schools because without their support and willingness to embrace the aSTEAM Core Values as adopted from FIRST Robotics there would be more barriers to achieving the many successes achieved by aSV students over the past 3 years.


Please be sure to follow the projects of the students that was enabled through the genorosity of the Mozilla Gigabit Community Fund and GoogleFiber at these URLS:


Benjamin Banneker Charter Academy of Technology


St. Peter's Catholic School


Academie Lafayette Fench Immersion Charter School

While on their trip to tour NASA, students partcipating in the SSEP microgravity experiment got a very special audience. The U.S. Department of Education, Office of Innovation and Improvement, invited students to share about their experiences with STEM as well as present their experiment. The senior STEM executives at the US Department of Education were impressed by the aSTEAM Village story and discussed the importance of STEM curriculum opportunities.

​Benjamin Banneker Charter Academy of Technology hosted a Robotics Training for teachers inerested in integrating coding and engineering in the classroom. Teachers participated in two days of building and programming in teams. Gear Tech 21 and LEGO MINDSTORMS applications were used for creating the robots and eliciting desired responses. Logical thinking and problem solving were vital components of meeting each robotic challenge and fun was had by all!

Middle school students from the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) designed a microgravity experiment and a mission patch that are headed to the International Space Station! These students were invited to the launch in Wallops, VA and have spent the last week touring the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport facilities. Unfortunately, the rocket's launch was delayed because of engine trouble but the students' experience on base was invaluable and a once in a lifetime opportunity. These students attend Benjamin Banneker Charter Academy of Technology, Academie Lafayette, Della Lamb, Hogan Preparatory Academy Middle School, and St. Peter's School and were the first students from Missouri to participate in the SSEP program. They raised money for the trip through Kickstarter. Check out their Kickstarter page here and watch their video to get a better idea of what these outstanding students accomplished. 

Students at Benjamin Banneker Charter Academy of Technology entered the 2014 Google Lunar XPRIZE LEGO MINDSTORMS Challenge. The goal is to get kids designing, building, and programming robots to simulate real lunar missions. It is a two phase competition and this video represents the first phase which was to create a video answering the question, "Why should we go back to the moon for good?" 

  
If the students are selected, they will then receive a robotics toolkit and materials necessary to create a lunar landscape. Wish them luck by liking their video!

Our 6th Community STEAM Day Celebration was held on May 10th at Benjamin Banneker Charter Academy of Technology! This was a family day of hands-on interactive fun and learning that ranged from 3D Printing to Flight Simulations. We celebrated community, youth and family with exhibits, games and rides based on science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. We couldn't have done it without our partners who hosted the event: Microsoft, Academie Lafayette, Benjamin Banneker Charter Academy and St. Peter's Catholic School. 

  

Be watching for more information on our next STEAM community event. You wouldn't want to miss it!