STEM-In-Action Fall Follow Up: Steampunk Hedgehogs

Hello again! It's time to check in on our STEM-In-Action Grant winning teams! Over the next few months we will see posts from each of our winning teams to find out what they are up to this fall. In case you're just now tuning in, the U.S. Army Educational Outreach Program (AEOP) STEM-In-Action Grant awards eCYBERMISSION teams up to $5,000 to develop their projects into mature and scalable solutions in their community. Typically we award this honorary grant to five teams, but this year ten teams took home the prestigious award. The next team we're catching up with is Steampunk Hedgehogs!

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We are the Steampunk Hedgehogs, a coalition of human being friends who enjoy STEM and want to make a difference in the community. We’re all homeschooled; we met at a homeschool co-op when we were all very young and have been doing stuff together ever since. We all live all around Massachusetts and get together every week to work on various STEM projects. Some things our team members like to do are: bake, ski, build, code, dance, read, listen to music, cook, drink water, and breathe oxygen.

While we were working on a project for First Lego League (another STEM competition/program, also known as FLL), we discovered eCYBERMISSION, and decided to try it out, not expecting AT ALL that we would get so far.

Our project addresses health related issues in young people with Down Syndrome. People with Down Syndrome have lower muscle tone and a harder time staying fit. Our project, Blitz Buttons, helps young people with Down Syndrome stay fit while having fun. Blitz Buttons is a long-distance game of memory and skill, similar to the game Simon in which players press colored buttons repeating a series of flashing colors and musical tones, using eye-catching, freestanding buttons that can be placed around a room or outdoor space.

Our proposed solution is to use the product within the Down Syndrome community - at Mass Down Syndrome Council (MDSC) teen and tween events and through the Down Syndrome Clinic at Children’s Hospital in Boston, where there is an exercise program for people with Down Syndrome.

A nice aspect of the game is that it can be used by people at very different skill levels without modification. For example, it can be used by anyone from a baby in a sitting position to older children and adults capable of running significant distances. We hope to change the world and help the community by getting occupational therapists, clinics, and health clubs to one day use this game to help young people with Down Syndrome stay fit while having fun.

We recently had articles written about our project both in the MDSC newsletter and the Foxboro Reporter.

The STEM-In-Action Grant is enabling our team to improve the Blitz Buttons in many ways. First, by making the lights brighter and the sounds louder, the grant enables us to improve the quality of the Blitz Buttons. Additionally, we will use the grant to produce multiple copies of the Blitz Buttons to give to MDSC and the Boston Children’s Hospital Down Syndrome Clinic for use with their members and patients.