It won’t be ready until September, but a new maker-space on the nearly completed third floor of Stratford Intermediate school is getting good grades from some of the city’s most technically inclined high school students.
It won’t be ready until September, but a new maker-space on the nearly completed third floor of Stratford Intermediate school is getting good grades from some of the city’s most technically inclined high school students.
“I think it’s an amazing idea,” said Breanna Subject, a senior member of the Stratford District secondary school’s robotics team. “It’s something I wish I’d had when I was in Grades 7 and 8. I’m really glad that this new generation is going to grow up with that.”
The pandemic has slowed renovations at Stratford’s new intermediate school (formerly Stratford Central) but, when they’re done, the Pathways Innovation Center will include various high-tech, hands-on tools available to students across the Avon Maitland District school board.
Think 3D printers, construction equipment, and an area dedicated to robotics – the types of things a student interested in a specialist high skills major might need access to.
“The space looks great and you can certainly imagine what it could be like,” engineering teacher Andrew Bradshaw said. “We’re just waiting for those finishing touches now.”
Members of the robotics club at Stratford District secondary school showed off the space to supporters Thursday evening during a friendly contest between the club’s four competitive teams. Many of those students were looking forward to seeing the space for the first time, especially those who previously attended Central secondary school.
“It’s going to be great,” Grade 12 student Adam Wingert said a couple hours before the competition. “They have a lot of interesting stuff there, a lot of good ideas.”
But Thursday’s event was also a chance for the robotics club to enjoy some competition, something they’ve recently been missing.
After losing an entire season during the first year of the pandemic, live competitions continued to be hard to find this season due to uncertainty about the impact COVID-19’s more recent waves would have on Ontario’s schools. Virtual competitions, meanwhile, often required more space than Stratford-based students had access to.
The club at the Stratford high school made the best of it, though. After putting in hundreds of hours on their competition robots, all four teams entered a virtual Skills Ontario competition that wraps up this week. After submitting video showcasing their robots completing a specific task, they’ll find out Friday how their performances stacked up against hundreds of teams from across the rest of the province.
All four Stratford District secondary school crews were in the top 20 as of Thursday evening.
“Despite that gap year, they’ve done extremely well,” Bradshaw said. “It’s not just about results, but still, it underlines the quality of the students and the quality of learning that they’ve done.”