As the pre-college outreach and public engagement unit in the Grainger College of Engineering, WYSE offers a variety of summer enrichment programs for pre-college youth from near and far. These summer camps give a flavor of college life while exploring various engineering fields or researching side-by-side with Illinois faculty and students – in Champaign-Urbana, in Chicago, and virtually. Each engineering department held various camp sessions and the HXRI Lab represented the ISE department by holding two summer camps called Discovering Engineering and Exploring Your Options for different age groups.
Discover Engineering (DE) is a week-long residential camp for rising freshmen and sophomores who have a strong interest in math and science. Participants will work on various projects that highlight different engineering aspects. They will tour research labs across the campus, explore the various engineering disciplines offered at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s Grainger College of Engineering, and engage with faculty and students involved in active research. This camp provides an excellent opportunity to deepen your understanding of engineering as a whole and to explore the diverse career paths and fields of study available within the engineering profession.
Exploring Your Options (EYO) is a week-long residential program designed for rising juniors and seniors to discover different fields of engineering. Hosted at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, EYO allows participants to engage with engineering students and faculty through interactive lessons and hands-on activities created by The Grainger College of Engineering.
The HXRI Lab held five sessions (two for DE, two EYO, and one virtual exploratory camp) for high school students joining the summer camps. The sessions included a general presentation of the ISE department, and a demonstration of several real life engineering problems. In order to touch on various research areas in ISE, different interactive tutorials were covered such as the design of a solar house, shortest path problem in a network, and control systems implementation of an unmanned aerial vehicle. Each session was finalized with a Unity Game Engine tutorial.
