Who can put $4,800 into Mr. Chretian's robotics class?
Ken Gracey
Posts: 7,392
Hey all,
Somebody match this instructor's effort with some funds. Quickly.
Parallax will give him $500 if you guys can boost this to $4,300 in the next couple of days.
https://www.donorschoose.org/project/creative-robotics-materials-for-our-engi/2434673/
Pony up for STEM education! Who's in?
Ken Gracey
Somebody match this instructor's effort with some funds. Quickly.
Parallax will give him $500 if you guys can boost this to $4,300 in the next couple of days.
https://www.donorschoose.org/project/creative-robotics-materials-for-our-engi/2434673/
Pony up for STEM education! Who's in?
Ken Gracey
1020 x 544 - 372K
Comments
Count me in for $20. PayPal?
Fifty years ago I went to one of the poorest high schools (Secondary school as we called them then) in England. In a back water of nowhere. Certainly deprived compared to the "grammar schools" where the "smart" kids went. Nobody had much money being in agricultural and coal mining area.
But hey, we had a full up, almost industrial scale, metal shop including lathes, mills, shaping machines etc. We had a pretty good wood work shop. We could make almost anything. We were not begging on the net for money. Though we did have some local fund raising events.
Not sure about sinking- maybe only shifting.
All the schools in my area had regular fundraising efforts- May Day Fair, Summer fete, Christmas fair, seemingly perpetual jumble sales, etc.. etc.. Without which they could never have funded all the practical learning we can now appreciate.
Even the grammar schools!
Can't say I miss being drafted to sell loads of fair brochures door-to-door in the borough, but I do miss some of the dubious fair events- pin the tail, drench the master, bash the rat! All those joys- and not forgetting the "sneaking round the beer stand" challenge.
Those events seem to be lost in favour of more direct fundraising campaigns. Sign of the times, or liberal safety concerns- who knows!
A shift in campaign tactics perhaps, but still the same needs. Sadly the support for schools has always been "sunk" low.
(And yes- the removal of the old CDT workshops was a monumental travesty.)
2011–2015: Estimated median annual income for a household in the county was $71,244, and the median income for a family was $85,966.
Hillsborough County average $4,839.00 in tax per year per property, probably half of that goes to schools (yes that is how they are funded in USA)
But I guess this robot class is a outside regular curriculum and the annual budget,
Charity and fundraising is an American culture, instead of paying 5% more in taxes and let the "government handle it."
My high school (in Sweden) had a full wood work shop and also a full metal shop, school never did any fundraisings or allowed advertising.
Hope not to political post, just information.
Times have changed, Heater. Do a quick search on DonorsChoose.org for "fully funded" projects and use Parallax as a keyword in your search. You'll come across many schools who regularly raise money successfully.
The largest robotics program in the USA is FIRST, using VEX hardware. While they are an alternative to Parallax (our model is one-to-one; there model is one-to-many) I receive requests at least once a week for donations for FIRST teams. A FIRST team must raise a minimum of $10,000 every year just to get started.
I wouldn't call it begging, exactly. It's fundraising. If you want to see what fundraising really looks like go visit a Girl Scout cookie sale. They'll take 40 cents a cookie and trade you twenty bucks for a cup of high fructose corn syrup.
Ken Gracey
Jim
parallax site:https://www.donorschoose.org/
and came up with quite a few hits. Most around $1k. The way it works is all-or-nothing. If they don't reach the full funding, they get nothing.
I can't help thinking though that the wish list is rather long, quite ambitious. I see that Mr. Cretian wants to have lots of sensors and parts around to stimulate a variety of projects. Its too bad they can't set intermediate goals in case the full amount doesn't come through. A good start would be the activitybots alone, which Parallax currently lists at $150ea.
I remember a monster 60 page Stamps-in-class thread from a few years ago, a middle school in New Hampshire near Manchester, participating in the ARLISS program. (Rocket Launch for International Student Satellites.) That team sure got involved on the forum, and I wonder what a lasting impression that effort had for the youngsters. That thread was migrated to the Blockly forum.
Local man saves the day! Hometown hero!
I noticed they immediately issued a donation receipt/tax receipt, so refunding donations would kinda undo that, but it might get sticky.
Only partway there, we need some big corporate boots to step in and clo$e the gap. Where's Radio Shack and Hobby People again?
Maybe I'll get a colorful thank-you card from Ndugu!
You guys are sending gift cards to a school in England?
Like there are not schools nearby that could also use support?
Or even more around the world that need support even more?
Manchester NH, not England. Anyway, I was willing to help because Ken asked us as grateful foumistas I guess and said they would throw in a wad if we all throw in our collective crumbs.
Do you wonder the same thing when individual charity cases get singled out and showered with outrageous donations? I do. Probably hundreds of house fire every day, but if one of them happens to make the news, the entire world donates and makes that family rich. ALS Ice Bucket Challenge: everyone focused in on one disease for an entire summer.... were there no other worthy diseases that deserved our money that summer?
I typically just accept it. I figure, 99.9% of the people doing this aren't making a choice between a gift card for school A and gift card for school B, they're making a choice between gift card or no gift card. Is it logical? No. But I'm not about to encourage anyone to stop donating, even if they're not donating to the folks in the most need.
Sorry, yes, I missed the "NH". Never occurred to me that there is a Manchester that is not, well, in Manchester. Next you will be telling me there is a new York some place
And someone moved my home town, Canterbury, to New Zealand.
As in Greenwich OH.
For example:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Greenwich#Pronunciation