So intrigued was 18-year-old Natasha by the machines
she helped conceive, design, and construct on the set of a kids' TV show slated to air this winter
that she changed her college major in order to continue the work in school.
Natasha is one of eight teens who were
selected for the cast of Design Squad, a live-action science and engineering series produced
by WGBH-TV in Boston. On the show, cast members are filmed as they ponder, brainstorm, experiment
on, and finally build a variety of machines ranging from an automatic pancake maker to a racecar
to a wedding gown that turns into a tent. The series begins airing the week of 19 February 2007 on Public
Broadcasting Service stations around the US.
"I just had a blast," Natasha
said about working on the series. "I did things I didn't think I could. I was interested in political
science, but now, after doing this show, I [also] want to go into mechanical engineering. There's
so much satisfaction in making a machine—and making it work."
"The big idea was to get
kids excited about science and engineering and provide hands-on experience with materials,"
explained Marisa Wolsky, the show's executive producer. "You used to watch your father repair
his car in his driveway, but nobody does that anymore, and most kids today couldn't hammer a nail
in. We wanted to [show how] science and math solve problems. And we wanted to show kids that [science
and engineering] are a really viable career option for them."
In each of the show's 13
half-hour episodes, two four-member teams, guided by two hosts and adviser David Wallace, a mechanical
engineer at MIT, compete to build a real machine or device. In response to a different challenge
for each episode, teams come up with their own designs for each machine, and members are scored for
their ability to think creatively. In the final episode, the top two scorers compete for a $10 000
college scholarship.
Natasha's favorite creation
grew out of a challenge that required teams to design a functional piece of clothing. Based on her
own concept, the resulting product was a wedding dress that could be converted into a pup tent. The
dress concealed fishing rods, which acted as its frame. Metal hoops inside the skirt could also
double as the tent's frame, and the tulle on the skirt was made of mosquito netting for use inside
the tent. The top layer of the dress was sewn out of windbreaker fabric and could serve as the tent
skin.
Natasha also liked a dragster
built from two cordless drills and a tricycle. She and her team used the drill motors to run the tricycle
dragster and raced the other team—which was using a child's wagon as its racecar—on
a track in front of a crowd of 300.
"I raced the tricycle and
I won," Natasha said with a laugh. "I got up to at least 20 miles per hour. That was the most excitement
I ever had."
On the show the teens also
design and fashion a man's business suit that can be converted into a jogging suit; a wind-powered
kinetic sculpture that was donated to the DeCordova Museum in Lincoln, Massachusetts; an automated
soccer-ball-passing machine; and a machine that produces peanut butter from unshelled peanuts.
The series was funded by
the Intel Foundation, NSF, Intel Corp, and Tyco Electronics, with additional monies from the Harold
and Esther Edgerton Family Foundation, the Noyce Foundation, and the American Society of Civil
Engineers. The Intel Foundation also contributed scholarship funds for the grand-prize winner
and bought computers for all eight contestants.
Wallace said series participants,
even the younger teens, were learning and applying the same basic principles he teaches in his undergraduate
classes. He's hopeful that viewers of all ages will find the show inspirational.
"Having kids succeed with
their ideas makes it a lot more accessible," he said of the science, physics, and engineering concepts
illustrated in the series. "Having such a diverse range of challenges highlights how many different
things you can do within the science and technology field—there's a huge range of possibilities.
We want viewers to think, 'Hey, maybe I can do my own project now'—and maybe go into science
or engineering for a career."
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