Summer Transportation Institute conclusion 2015

Summer Transportation Institute conclusion 2015

On July, 31, the Summer Transportation Institute (STI) had its end of summer closing ceremony. Thomas Materday, the director of the program, shared some final thoughts on the program’s success this summer which was largely due to the institute’s expansion to a four week curriculum, allowing more opportunities for students.

Students got the opportunity to present the research projects which covered topics like the psychological effects of sea captains who deal with long  trips and how this problem could be resolved. A few participants also demonstrated the robots they learned to build, which really impressed the crowd.

Thomas also introduced guests to a drone by allowing students to show off its programming. The program ended its successful summer with a quick Q&A session, and a final goodbye.

This summer I’ve seen things that I never would’ve imagined like being able to talk to people from NASA live to learn about space. I also saw a curiosity in students about all the topics covered that I think was amazing, which shows the  initiative of not only students for learning in the summer but also the mentors for conveying the  information in an interesting way. Personally, STI’s format is something I see as a model for other scientific summer programs to follow in order to succeed.

 

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