Outreach

Visit to Rotary Club

Date: Friday, January 23rd, 2026

We presented to the local Rotary Club to share our team’s mission in FTC and highlight the benefits of robotics in developing STEM skills and teamwork. We discussed our team structure, achievements, and showcased our robot to demonstrate student commitment and creativity. Our team performed a live robot demonstration, explaining its design, programming, and functionality. We also discussed sponsorship and partnership opportunities to support our team. The presentation concluded with a Q&A session that left attendees excited about future collaboration.

Strongsville Middle School Automation and Robotics Classes Outreach

Date : Friday, December 5th, 2025

For the fourth consecutive year, our team visited Strongsville Middle School and engaged over 250 eighth-grade students during their robotics classes. We introduced students to FIRST Robotics and shared opportunities for future involvement in FIRST programs. Our team led hands-on activities that allowed students to drive our robot, explore its mechanisms, and gain firsthand experience with real competition hardware. We also guided students through CAD design and basic 3D printing concepts, helping them understand the engineering design process. Through these interactive experiences, we inspired interest in STEM, teamwork, and participation in future FIRST programs.

Parker Facility Visit

Date: Monday, November 10th, 2025

Parker provided an exciting behind the scenes look at how their team brings cutting-edge engineering to life. Touring their modern production floor and meeting the specialists behind their innovations gave us a deeper understanding of the craftsmanship and technology that drive their work. The experience showcased Parker’s dedication to excellence and sparked new ideas for future collaboration.

Bring a Friend to FTC Week

During build season, our team runs a weekly outreach initiative designed to introduce new students to the FIRST Tech Challenge. Each week, a team member invites a friend to fully participate in our meetings, observe the robot build process, and experience FTC firsthand. Guests attend both general and member-only meetings, gaining insight into teamwork, engineering, programming, and competition strategy. The following week, participants return to reflect on what they learned and share their experience. Students who express interest are provided with information on how to join the team in future seasons, helping us grow participation and spread enthusiasm for STEM.

Industry Experts/Career Talks

We hosted an engaging event where an industry expert visited to share insights about their career and experiences in the field. Students had the opportunity to learn firsthand about real-world challenges, career paths, and the skills needed to succeed in today’s industry. The session offered valuable guidance, inspiring discussions, and a deeper understanding of how classroom learning connects to professional opportunities. It was an inspiring experience that broadened our perspective and encouraged us to think about our own future careers.

2025-2026 SMTA Business Expo

Date: Thursday, August 24th, 2025

Description: The SMTA expos provide an excellent platform for connecting industry professionals and giving attendees access to global technology at a local level, while also offering valuable educational opportunities for engineers who may not be able to attend SMTA International. The Stemstangs attended the expo to gain firsthand insight into real-world machining and product development, as well as to gather feedback from industry experts on how they would approach challenges or test new parts for improved efficiency. We were also given dedicated space to showcase our state championship robot, giving businesses and attendees the chance to experience our work up close.

2024-2025 SMS Polaris Palooza

Date: Friday, March 14th, 2025

Description: Strongsville Middle School will compete in two robotics challenges against Polaris Career Center’s partner middle schools: North Olmsted, Olmsted Falls, Brooklyn, Berea-Midpark, and Fairview Park. The competitions are "Mad Grab" and Dragster. The STEMstangs attended their build sessions to help SMS students learn how to make different robot mechanisms. For example, we’ve taught them how to use gear ratios to adjust speed and torque for their robots. At the event, we’ll have a section of the venue to display our robot. Students got the chance to drive it and experience a more advanced robot firsthand

Expanding FIRST at the Marathi Mandal

Date: Sunday, September 15th, 2024

Our team attended the Northeast Ohio Marathi Mandal’s annual Ganpati Chaturthi program, where we showcased our previous work and demonstrated our robot to inspire young children to explore STEM. We engaged with both children and adults by explaining the competition process and the fundamentals of robot design and building. Through these interactions, we reached approximately 100 people and shared our knowledge of science and robotics within the Marathi community.

2022-2023 SMS Outreach Event

Overview

Date: Friday, January 13, 2023.

This season, we wanted to focus all of our outreach efforts on highlighting the importance of STEM to young minds. With this in mind, we collaborated with 130 eighth-grade students from Strongsville Middle School's Automation and Robotics class and introduced them to FIRST. We hosted an in-person outreach event at Strongsville Middle School. This event consisted of a rotating activity at four different stations, where we led engaging discussions and activities. After the event concluded, the students had the opportunity to fill out a reflection sheet about their experiences and express whether they were interested in joining FIRST. Overall, this outreach event was very successful, sparking interest in numerous students. For those who were unable to attend the event, we created a video presentation that provided an overview of FIRST, an introduction to Team STEMstangs, a description of this year's challenge along with our strategies, in-depth discussions about our team's hardware and software sub-teams, documentation of the Engineering Portfolio, information about community service, and a summary of the lifelong benefits of being actively involved with STEM activities. As a bonus, we included a video recording of our robot in action!

Station 1: Introduction to FIRST

At this station, Aryana and Sanjana introduced the middle schoolers to FIRST and explained the importance of STEM!

Station 2: Driving the Robot!

At this station, Ryan and Rahul created a little obstacle course for the kids to drive the robot through. We timed the kids and made a little friendly competition!

Station 3: Hardware and Software

At this station, Param and Ben broke down the design process of the robot and explained how the software and hardware is integrated together.

Station 4: Engineering Portfolio

At this station, Aayus and Anaya explained the importance of documenting your design process as well as community service opportunities. The middle schoolers also got the chance to ask questions about high school!

Conclusion

This outreach event also served as an excellent stepping stone for future recruitment. As we consider our team composition, we have three members graduating this year and four members graduating next year. By reaching out to middle school STEM students, we are fostering relationships with them to continue sparking their interest in FTC. Our hope is that they will be inspired to join the team next season and carry forward the legacy of Team STEMstangs. At the conclusion of our outreach event, we asked each student to fill out a reflection form, providing us with valuable data about their experiences. This helped us gauge interest levels, understand their favorite parts of the event, and identify areas where our team could improve our presentation skills. Each student had the opportunity to ask about a concept they wished to learn more about, to which we then emailed responses. Upon analysis of the reflection responses, out of the 130 responses, seven students expressed a high level of interest in joining, while 52 showed a general interest. We are extremely motivated to continue interacting with these students, which is why we invited them to our previous competitions and are mentoring them for their own robotics challenge in March. The eighth-graders have the opportunity to participate in Polaris Palazzo, where they are tasked with designing their own robot or dragster that will ultimately compete against robots from other middle schools. This will provide an excellent setting for us to continue collaborating with them!

Expanding FIRST to the public at the Cuyahoga County Library

At the Cuyahoga County Library, we had conducted a presentation on what FIRST is and the current season game challenge to people of various ages. The presentation focused on our skills, challenges, and accomplishments throughout the season. At the end of the presentation, we had a Q+A and opened the robot up to the public so they could try driving it. We also brought our parts and tools so when the guests walked around they were able to see each one and ask questions. This outreach event impacted the public because many curious people came up to us and asked how they can start a team of their own because they saw the power FIRST and STEM had. The younger ones who were interested were encouraged to start an FLL team so they can grow their skills and move up to FTC when they meet the age requirements. Overall, the outreach event was extremely successful and inspired many visitors.

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