BlueFletch and YEGA: Project IdeAction
More than 20 Grady High School students gathered at BlueFletch on Thursday, March 2, 2017 to present final projects for the BlueFletch challenge. BlueFletch teamed up with Youth Entrepreneurs Georgia to give students a glimpse into the world of application design & development. YEGA seeks to give students hands-on learning experiences, inspiring them to create a business idea & develop a real-world plan.
The challenge BlueFletch posed to students was a response to the real need for a proactive approach to preventing food borne illness. The problem: Every year in the United States 48 million people get sick, causing 3,000 deaths & costs almost 16 billion dollars.
The concept of BlueFletch working with its clientele in retail & prepared foods, is to ensure that food is stored & sold at the correct temperature. What devices & processes could be used to more easily monitor & prevent contaminated food reaching consumers. Distributers, like grocery stores relying on this app would be protecting its customers from harmful foods.
“We challenged the students to think about existing technologies that they could partner with to create an application that would monitor & detect change in temperature over time,” said UX/UI Designer Nicole Gatlin. BlueFletchers met with Grady students twice before the final projects were presented, walking them through the stages of research, design, prototyping, development, & deployment. BlueFletch developers, Earl Ferguson and Chaz Clark spoke to students before revealing the winners. They emphasized that this challenge did not have to be just another school assignment, but that these applications can be created. Empowering students to go out and pursue their dreams.. Making aspirations into a reality, not just an idea.
The BlueFletch employees deliberated and selected winners based upon a polished presentation. The winners’ presentation focused on partnering on existing sensor technology to detect change in food temperature before it reached dangerous levels.
BlueFletch and United Way: STEMFest
Students, parents, & faculty gathered at Rodan High School for STEM FEST on Saturday, March 4, 2017 excited for an engaging & educational learning experience. BlueFletch provided two tables of interactive activities for children in grades sixth through twelfth. The activities were created to reflect what BlueFletch does daily.
The first challenge were photos of design fails. Students had to brainstorm a solution to the problem, how to improve the failure to make its use simpler.
The second task was programming mini robots, Sphero & Ollies by coding from handheld devices. Students were rewarded with candy & pens by BlueFletch for their outstanding achievements.
