Exploring GCAD: Our Gruss Center for Art & Design

Like if I try to describe it, I don't think many people understand what's going on. I mean, I could talk about my speakers that I just made.

I'm gonna talk. I mean, I'm gonna talk a little bit about.

You know, having the the engineering classes being held here in qcad, in the multipurpose room?

Yeah.

And so maybe when I start doing that.

I mean, I can kind of.

Kick it off to you and you can maybe talk a little bit about what it is you've been doing in the engineering classes.

Yeah, definitely.

OK.

It looks like we're live here.

Alright.

For those of you that are logging on, thank you so much for joining us this evening. We're excited to talk about our growth Center for our design here at The Lawrenceville School. Have an awesome panelist of four students and our very own, Mr Brody here Director of Design and fabrication. And just to get us started here in the chat feature, if you could just just double check, make sure everyone can hear us if you can just just put a.

And note that you can hear us in here and chat.

Perfect mean while we were waiting for a couple more people to to show up here. Let us know where you're coming in from. It's always really nice to see the different States and countries representatives people trickle their way in here. Where is everyone coming in from tonight?

New Jersey

New York City, of course.

South Jersey

India.

New Zealand Long Island.

Right down Rd Princeton, NJ.

New Mexico

perfect. We'll just get everyone here and that's another 30 seconds or so.

Andrew Zane.

That's perfect.

Alright, well my name is sucker Major. I'm the assistant director of admissions here at The Lawrenceville School. Going into my second year.

This is kind of an interesting webinar for me because Qcad was the first building I ever set foot in here at Lawrenceville, so we did our new faculty orientation two years ago, so this was a very much my introduction to Lawrenceville. Was this space, and so I'm very excited to introduce our panelists tonight.

Hopefully we can see everyone from I think everyone used the same here, so we'll start with Allison with yourself.

So hi everyone, I'm Allison Howarth. I'm a current senior. Sounds crazy to say that because I feel like my four years has gone by so fast. But I am from Southern New Jersey near Mount Laurel. If any of you know where that is, it's about an hour South of Lawrenceville. I'm a boarding student and I entered Lawrenceville as a freshman.

And for me, I've always been interested in design and I'm visual art and things like that and creating things. So knowing that Bruce was in the middle of being constructed when I was applying was definitely something that set Lawrenceville apart from me. And also just like stepping on campus and getting to meet everyone and knowing that everyone was so friendly. I just really felt at home from the first time that I spent foot on campus, and I feel like I'm.

Like I really can't imagine my high school experience being any other way, so that's definitely why I chose Lawrenceville.

Hello.

Wonderful dining I see you in regard Hollywood squares here I see you in the next. The next one.

Awesome, I'm delay Musgrave. I am a fifth former or also a senior like Allison here Lawrenceville. I am from Atlanta, GA. I am in the McClellan house. I'm a border and I came in as a new sophomore and I chose Lawrenceville because of the house system coming in as a new sophomore. It was really comforting to know that everyone kind of knew in their dorm sophomore year. It's kind of similar to Harry Potter. Here we're all sort of different forms in different houses. We have different activities that we do at the end of the year. We have House Olympics. It's a great time to bond with your house.

And it's been such an integral part of my normal experience. My afternoon Co curricular might say right now is managing the varsity boys basketball team and having a lot of fun doing that. I'm really involved in visual arts here at Lawrenceville. I'm currently taking advanced studio art and I am on student council this year I'm vice president, Social life and I just play Morticia Addams. This festival in the Addams Family musical.

Now I have an issue here. You're next in the right here.

Alright hi I'm in Russia I'm a junior in the Carter House. I've been at Lawrenceville since my freshman year. I made a student from West Windsor, NJ and I chose Lawrenceville. Definitely because as a day student at first I was a little worried about integrating with the borders on campus. But after coming to Lawrenceville, I saw just the diverse community and how welcoming everyone was. I've gotten to meet people from all around the world and it just feels like.

I'm so part of this community umsom cocurricular's that I do. I am the current Co captain of the robotics team alongside Ethan who's also here. Uhm I. I'm also a Hutchins scholar, which is basically this summer research program that FLORENCEVILLE conducts where you get to go to different universities and conduct research at different laboratories, which I think is really cool. I'm super passionate about research as well, and I'm also the captain of debate.

Yeah.

Awesome, thank you. We weren't, you know we were kind of surprised here. We weren't sure Ethan was going to make it had a hit away hockey game today and so you screaming on a whim. But we're glad to have him here. Ethan introduce yourself.

Hi everyone, I'm Ethan came and I'm from Houston, TX. I'm I'm a senior border here.

Uhm, I play hockey and soccer. And as Anoushka said, I'm also the Co captain of the robotics team and one of the cofounders of the Lawrenceville Business Enterprise Club.

I think something about Lawrenceville that really attracted me was that everyone has like a space on campus to pursue their passion. So for me it's qcad but for a lot of students it might be the Clark Music Center or even on the soccer fields of the hockey rink. Everyone has a place to express themselves.

Awesome, thank you and last but certainly not missed our very own Mr Brody.

Well, welcome everybody Mr Brodie, I'm the director of design fabrication here at the Lawrenceville School.

In addition to teaching art and design, I oversee and maintain the makerspace here at the Group Center for Art and Design. I started here at Lawrenceville in the fall of 2018, when G CADD was just being started construction.

So this will be my 4th year teaching here at Lawrenceville and my 19th year teaching altogether. Prior to joining Lawrenceville, I taught at a number of boardings and day schools.

What brought me to Lawrenceville was the opportunity to put together an amazing makerspace and oversee it, which is the group center of Art and Design. And it's really is an incredible place and the opportunity to to work with some really talented.

Students which we're going to hear from this evening.

Well, thank you.

Let's dive right on in now, Mr Brody, if you wouldn't mind to kind of walking us through how we've arrived at this at this moment in time here, and sort of the mission to Jake and and and and sort of your role in creating this space.

OK yeah, well, so you can give me right? So well really G cat is really meant to be an extension of the Harkness table and it's really learning by doing. It's a place where your ideas can come to life and it can take an idea from.

Concept 2.

Final.

Product

so it's a really amazing facility.

It's really a college level makerspace, so we have a fully equipped woodworking studio, fully equipped metal shop, a wide range of digital fabrication technologies, CNC routers.

Laser cutters, 3D printers.

On the second floor we have the flex space, which is a really interesting space for ideation and brainstorming. It's also once where Mr. Campbell holds his design for social change classes. Downstairs we have the clubrooms, a computer room, and it's the the home for the big red robotics. It's where we make and build robots and design them.

And here on the first floor where I'm currently located, is the multipurpose room.

And it there's plenty of space for for assembling projects, and it's also where the engineering classes and the tech design classes are held.

Yep.

So Ethan, you know you're in the in the engineering class. I see here who he recorded frequently. You want to talk about what it is you're up to there and then.

Yeah, definitely. So I took tech design and advanced tech design with Mr Birdie and this year I'm taking mechanical engineering and electrical engineering in qcad.

So those classes, I think CAD really fits that space very well for what we're doing in electrical engineering and mechanical engineering. We did Fusion Fusion 360, which is a 3D design platform and we kind of take those ideas that we build off infusion and we're able to really implement them using things such as like the laser cutter and the 3D printers that we have right there at our disposal. So that's something really special and unique, because I mean I think just being able to see your ideas or a lot of students go from like a 3D model on your computer to something you can hold in your hand.

It's just I don't know it's there's something special about that.

Yeah it is. It's the first year that the the engineering classes are being held here in G. CADD and and the the multipurpose room is really centrally located so that the students and faculty have access to to the shops and to the print room with a 3D printers and.

Laser cutters and it's also the first year that that I'm been made available during the day to help out in the engineering classes, which is which is really nice.

Wonderful, wonderful. Let's go down the line here, Allison. Tell us about a class that you've you've experienced in G. CADD member in and for you, like what that experience has been like.

Yes, so as you might know already, as an incoming student into Lawrenceville, one of our graduation requirements is fulfilling some type of art, whether that be visual or performing or musical. Something in that realm, you would need to pick one of those three tracks. Of course I'm biased, so I say, definitely take the visual art portion, because that prerequisite sets you up for all of the fun things that happen in qcad as well.

So I took foundations of art my freshman year, which is that prerequisite, and then my sophomore year. I chose to take design and digital fabrication, which is, which was like, really, my.

Like I guess, like feeding into my passion for creating things and helping to see like what I can. What I can make and what I can discover about myself and making those things just because I've had a background of robotics and 3D printing and things from my middle school. And I want to see how Gcad could help me build on that. So that class definitely helped build that. And then I was hoping to take advanced design my.

Sophomore spring, but COVID unfortunately made me have to postpone that. So I'm really, really hoping to take that this spring. So that would be one of my goals.

Awesome, excellent I. I guess one of the questions I have for the for the whole group here is, you know I have always heard the saying Mr Brody. I apologize if I if I mess up with this here, but I've always heard that if it can be built it and built at qcad, is that right?

And and and so I I what I'm curious to see is I don't think.

Almost almost everything.

Yeah.

How is everything right right within reason? You know, I'm always fascinated by as I walk through the building or walk by the building. The sorts of projects I see being built or on display, and so you know, I I for me, I I think it's a stand astounding and I wish we had that when I was in high school. But for the panel I'd like to know, sort of like what are the types of things that you've made or you've seen made in what's brag? A little bit here, no need to be humble.

Well, one of my projects starting during my sophomore design class was actually because this guy cap building was brand new. We were thinking my partner and I were thinking wouldn't it be fun if we built our own bench for to put inside you CAD? So we spent most of the term doing tons of exploration in how to build things in general and then our final project was.

Working on how to design this bench so it's if you can imagine you have to use your imagination here, but if you think of an art palette with like paint and paint brushes, that was our outline for the bench and we actually like sliced it so that it would be. You could look through it and see absolutely nothing from two of the angles, but it would still be.

It would still be able to be sat on, of course, as a bench, so that was our big project my sophomore year and then we unfortunately weren't able to like actually build that in, you know, real life model. Because of COVID we were virtual spring, so I'm hoping to circle back to that when I take advanced design this spring. So that's one of my goals there and I'll let some other people talk about their projects. And then I also have a second project, but I'll save that for now.

Alright, I can talk about something. I did. A new skill can probably cover our robot for robotics, but I'll talk about a personal project I just finished. I can go grab it. It's in my room.

So.

This is something I just finished the other week that I thought was pretty cool. It's a speaker.

If you guys can see it, but.

It's like a little dust speaker. I thought it was pretty interesting. I designed it in Fusion 360 and I 3D printed it and laser cut the sides.

It's just I don't know it was something I worked on for a final for my mechanical engineering class and something that I could use in my daily life and it now sits on my desk so.

Yep, I knew.

Have you have you used it yet? Plugged it in?

Sorry.

Have you used it yet?

Yeah I have. I use it all the time.

Good.

It works quite well.

Yeah, he actually blasted music at our last robotics meeting, which I thought was really fun. But yeah, I can talk a little bit about the robot. And then maybe another project that I've done at the CAD using the different tools available. But about our robot I've been doing robotics for a long time, but prior to Lawrenceville it was mainly just like Lego Robotics. I didn't have many tools to really expand my knowledge of I guess like the 3D design aspect.

As well as the different tools available to create actual like speakers, let's just say. But our robot there's a lot of custom machine parts using the laser cutter, 3D printers, etc. It's a really cool design. We designed it all on Fusion 360 again and then we took that 3D design from online and actually made it a really reality, which I think is super cool. There's a lot of voters that actually make it run different types of wheels. We have these really cool wheels that both go forward.

And side to side, you usually don't think that wheels can make a robot go side to side, but there's this really cool programming that can make that possible and I think just robotics in general has really shaped my experience, especially at Lawrenceville. Meeting new people and just interacting with everyone has been awesome. And then the second project was kind of over this summer with the Hutchins program, which was the research program that I was talking about earlier. We using the laser cutter we created.

Mini boats that could collect data in the pond. So we connected the electrical engineering portion with the sort of mechanical design portion and we were able to collect data and do some analysis with these boats in the pond, yeah.

That's it, that's certainly an impressive list.

In certainly pretty exhaustive, you know, I'm always curious to what extent can different programs and and clubs activities groups use the space Mr Brody. Like for example, what? What sort of programs are using this space may be beyond the academic day.

We are open six days a week and we're open up in the evening so we're open during the academic day and then the evenings as well. And then all day on Sundays. Like I mentioned before, earlier there are very right of club rooms downstairs which students can sign up for in use.

But I mean Sundays, having it open during the day is is a time where like independent projects like Allison Hammock stand right and have some other like Akl is working on a folding desk and so it's a, it's a it's a time for open in the evenings and in in on Sundays for independent projects which is.

Really nice.

Yeah, so I can jump in now that Mr. Brody gave us a little taste of my having project. I can jump in and tell you a little bit about that. So starting last year I guess it was winter of 2020. I suppose. It seems like forever ago, but so his last winter and we were coming back for the spring term. And, you know, because of COVID we wanted people to sit outside more often and find places to gather outside.

So one of our ways to encourage that at the McClellan House. I'm actually a former housemate of Delaney, so for McClellan I was thinking, wouldn't it be awesome if we built a hammock for McLellan because, you know, traditionally, hammocks are put between trees. Unfortunately, we don't have any big enough trees in the McLellan Yard quite yet to hang a hammock, so.

Yeah, solution was to build a hammock stand so I went to Mr. Brody and with his expertise and my knowledge from class from my sophomore year and willingness to learn more from him, we were able to build a hammock stand from scratch with our own designs which were also all created online and then built using bent lamination. Which if anyone is familiar, it's basically a ton of little teeny thin pieces of wood which when they're really thin.

They've been pretty easily, so we made our basically a mold for the curve of the hammock stand, and then put all of the Super thin pieces of wood together and epoxy them together to make the exact curve that we wanted and that came out really well. So it took the entire spring term and that was my project that I decided to do on my own outside of class. So I was in there pretty much every night scene in my softball uniform scene in.

You know all the all the apparel you know, which is pretty pretty prominent. I guess on canvas you know pretty exemplary of a laurentien and their involvement.

Come across campus. So I was there pretty much every night between like 7 and 8:30 or so. Working with Mr. Brody and it turned out very well. If you visit campus either if you've already visited or if you're gonna visit coming up in the next few weeks. Definitely keep a lookout for it. It's outside the McLellan house in the Crescent, so that was my big project recently and I really hope to continue doing more projects before I graduate.

Yeah, it's it's it's. It's it actually. It's a beautiful object and it's it's.

Looks very much like a boat.

Huge curved and Allison was dogging about finishing the project and she did a wonderful job with it. It really it turned out really nice and then again she had a set her goal and.

Kept me kept me to task right so it's a wonderful project. So yes, if you get a chance to check it out, definitely do.

Yeah, it really is beautiful. I see it every day when I walk out of the house and she even etched like her name on the side and said to my mic sisters, it's just it's so beautiful. I love seeing it every day, but kind of going back to using qcad outside of class. I know is Vice President of social Life this year. We have used CAD in so many ways, definitely on Saturday nights. This past Saturday we actually had.

A community art project. So we had two canvases where our Visual Art Council actually drew out two different images of two different prominent buildings on Lawrenceville campus and students were able to come in and paint, and it was a really great time. We had kids from all across campus, not just kids. You would usually think her visual artists join and it was a really great time. I know my sophomore year, we also had all arts night in Qcad, so we used the upstairs flex room which is a really big room that can be split into four different classrooms or just one really large room.

And we had different performances. We had dance performances, our improv, acting group performed impulse. It was absolutely hilarious. Sogecap can be used in many different ways.

Great, great and and that's something that you use pretty routinely for your visual arts class, right Delaney?

Yes, every day, every day taking advanced studio upstairs. It's a great time.

Is that Mr. Daniels classroom upstairs is that, is that right?

It is not. I'm perhaps it is, but Miss Kellner actually taught back in the fall, but I'm currently working with Mr. Robertson this term. So Mr. Robertson is our artist in residence. He's absolutely incredible. He's working on quite a few art projects himself. He actually has this piece that he showed us. It's going to be displayed in the Smithsonian, which is beyond exciting and it's a pleasure working with him this term. He's just so knowledgeable and I'm excited to see what work I can do with him for the rest of the term.

Well, that's awesome. Before we jump into questions here, Mr. Brody, I'd love to know what is to come for Jacob like as as we go into. This is what year, three or year four now of of this space.

What what do we have on the horizon here? I look forward to?

Uhm?

Well, we're hoping to make it.

More available in the afternoon with some more Co curricular offerings. There isn't talk about maybe?

Having our cocurricular robotics.

Offering as well. So yeah, trying to again the the main goal is to to make it as available as much as possible.

That's wonderful I I have to shed tell alittle bit of an embarrassing story. Mr. Gray. When you give us when you gave the admissions department that tour a couple couple weeks ago I appreciate you for being patient. For me. One of my favorite shows growing up was BattleBots and I asked Mr. Birdie so you know I you know.

When they do, the robot competitions, do they you know you know? Is it pretty, pretty, vicious, right? And Mr Brody was kind enough just to to laugh that one off and say that you would need a fully enclosed bulletproof room for that. And then we don't quite have that yet, so that would be my thing. If you know, maybe build that in the horizon will be lovely but wonderful.

915 Yep.

Well, we're looking to jump into the question and answer here phase of our of our programs, and I know darling. You have to leave relatively soon. Right now I'm 15. OK, we won't hold you to it if you want to leave earlier, that's fine as well. Now we're all busy and understand. So what I would do is I'd welcome people to throw any questions they have, either in the chat or the questions some of you have already sent in some questions ahead of time, so we'll jump right into those and the first one would be, can you know, for the group here?

Can you share some examples of recent projects related to interdisciplinary steam learning at gcad?

Who wants to take that one?

So one example of an interdisciplinary offering that I know, Lawrenceville has, is the Lewis and Clark class actually, which is where it's a history and art. I believe interdisc, so that's.

That's where they learn all about Lewis and Clark and their explorations, and then actually towards the end of the term they construct a couple of canoes from also from scratch using the gcad and one of the canoes that they built last year actually is still on display. It's beautiful and that is there and then I know that that class will continue to use the space and take advantage of that. So that's just one example of one of the interdisciplinary.

Options that we have in terms of class work, where classes can use that space to their advantage.

Yeah, the the the the canoe is really a beautiful object and and it was really cool to to watch it. I've never seen a canvas canoe be constructed before so it was really neat to watch the students work with.

Structures to bent laminations. They steamed the wooden and bent the ribs and then what I thought was really quite remarkable is when they actually stretched the canvas on the frame and it as it turns out that there are a couple of columns here in the G CADD building that are spaced perfectly to stretch the canvas and then glue it on. So it was. It was pretty remarkable project in that it really is a beautiful log.

That was one of the things this spring is. I would ride my bike off to practice every day. I would. I would always see this class outside building the canoe in every day. I don't know how regular they met, but it seems like every day I thought, Gee, that looks like the most fun class ever seen. They just they just kind of huddled around this boat. You know all all spring. But I am told there was some learning that went involved that as well and it's certainly really involved process. From what I understand. So I really, really need to to see Allison. Could you just explain a little bit more about?

What interdisciplinary means, sort of in the context of our like of our Lawrenceville, is to explain that language a little bit more.

Yeah, totally. So the interdisciplinary courses are actually also part of our graduation requirements. So in order to graduate, you need to have at least two credits for interdisciplinary. Some of our interdisciplinary options. So for interdisciplinary classes, we have a humongous range of options. If you've had the chance to take a peek at our course catalog online, you'll see just how many options we have, but.

Those are basically showing where our subject areas, which you would normally think of something like English. For example being completely different from something like history or science or something like that, especially when you're comparing the humanities and the like steam related fields. I think typically you wanna think of them as completely separate, but that's exactly what our interdisciplinary classes are for. It's to show you that.

There's so much overlap between those courses and that really broadening your horizons and then you like have these a-ha moments out of nowhere. Like Oh my gosh, the world is all connected, which like sounds so cliche, but like now. As a senior, I am also enrolled in some of these interdisciplinary courses and my English class, for example, and has a English credit and a history credit as part of its interdisciplinary title. So that's where like.

Learning so much about Native Americans and their experience in America and then comparing that to that like it just connects so much to my history class which is learning about women in the American experience. So I'm just like learning about how even something like an interdisc class and a history class or something can't even overlap as well. And so you can have these overlaps between your interdisc class and something else, or even just within that one.

Interdisciplinary class, it just really opens your mind to the world and helps you see new views as well.

Wonderful thank you.

Apple sort of art specific questions about how we use this. This space here and, and Delaney. Feel free to take the point on this one, but you know what sort of specific courses are? Are students using in qcad and and how does qcad and Bridge that learning experience?

Sure, so right off the bat when you come to Lawrenceville and you decide to take visual arts course, you're likely to take foundations and coming as a new sophomore, I actually opted not to take foundations. I spoke with Mr. Daniel directly, the department chair about skipping into drawing class, which is like the next level of course, foundations I know is an incredible course. Allison, are you mentioned taking foundations when you came to Lawrenceville?

And it's a two term course. You learn all about. Of course, the foundations of art you learn about different artists and you learn a lot about like the planning process and you analyze different art. But then when you get into drawing, you get to apply all the things you learn in the foundations of art class. And it was just such an amazing course and it really got me hooked it. Visual art here at Lawrenceville and my software here. They were actually still building qcad, so it wasn't finished just yet. So we were actually in the Clark Music building across from the music class that was banging on the piano keys. It was a little crazy.

But now that I am in advanced studio Art, which is the next level, although there is a painting course that you could also take, I am now in the qcad space. I'm in the upstairs advanced studio art classroom. I have my own space in the corner by the window where I can work on my projects. I am currently working on a portfolio to submit to the AP Board and I know we talked a little bit about Jacob being open in the evenings. I know for me I go quite often during study hall to work on my projects, whether that be a painting I'm working on, a drawing I'm working on.

In my class right now we are all working on skin portraits and it's actually due tomorrow. So I'm finishing that up tonight.

And GT has just been such an amazing space and I'm so grateful that I'm able to create in that space.

And and I guess I follow up question would be in. This could be for everyone here is sort of in in terms of visual arts, what what you know for for computer based or or a graphic design? What do our offerings do we do we have and? And so how do we use the space to support those?

I'll kind of open up about this, uhm. One of the big things I did in my old school that was continued here was the use of Autodesk Fusion. So that's one of the main programs we use here. That, and rhino 3D. So I mean, we use Autodesk Fusion in our mechanical engineering course, which is pretty interesting because I mostly used it for designing things such as my speakers or some other projects I've worked on. But then you really get to see.

Like kind of how it's used in like an interdisciplinary aspect, when you start to like simulations of models, you start to do like stress analysis. That was a big thing. We designed a bridge and we did like a simulation stress analysis and then built them and see how that held up to actual weight.

Uhm?

So yeah, I mean in terms of like 3D design, we use it in robotics. We use it in the classes. It's really a big part of the engineering process.

Yeah, and kind of connecting that to qcad as a space as a whole. I think that taking that 3D design aspect online and then translating it to an actual idea in person is where qcad really comes in because I've definitely done a lot of 3D design, which I think is super cool. But then actually taking that to the 3D printer or the laser cutter and seeing that come alive was just extraordinary for me. I think you can really see how taking something from online and then actually creating something.

Can really make an impact so.

He also said that although we don't have a digital arts class per say, we do use a digital or digital technology in in a lot of the art classes. I know I taught the foundations class for several years and we use Adobe Illustrator Photoshop. So while we're not necessarily a digital arts class, we we definitely use the the technology in the art department.

Yeah, for sure there's a I'm sorry, I mean.

Oh no, I was gonna say Mr Mr Dom teaches us some video and film classes and I know he uses Adobe premiere in those classes as well.

I just wanted to add, I know there's a girl in my advanced studio art class and she's doing part of her portfolio online digital art using Adobe Illustrator and although that isn't something my teacher Miss Kalina, is directly knowledgeable about. She's been very supportive in her endeavors and she's been really helpful. I sit right next to her and she's making some amazing things.

You know a question. I get quite a bit just in sort of general admissions traffic is is about our robotics team and you know and and for you. You know I'm Anoushka and Ethan. How? How does this space first of all? Because if you could give us just a little overview of of you know our robotics team and sort of the competitions you guys go to and then sort of how does this this space help support the mission of that team?

Yeah.

Yeah, definitely.

Go ahead, yeah.

OK, alright, well we can both talk about it so we're in we're in FTC robotics team which is first tech challenge so we're competing against a lot of really good schools up in the North here and a lot of really good teams. And I think coming into qcad, it truly just fits robotics perfectly. So as Mr. Bernie said, we have that downstairs club area where we meet three times a week for 2 1/2 hours.

And just work on our robot. It's amazing to see the things that people bring to the table every single time we meet, whether that be with coding or with design. I think a huge aspect, for me at least, is being able to design something and walk up the stairs in 3D, print it, or build it with Mr. Birdy. I think that's a huge aspect of robotics. Is being able to get like the quick turn around time on parts you design. So having like a fabrication lab just upstairs is super helpful.

Yeah, kind of. My experience with robotics. I did robotics in middle school Prior to joining Lawrenceville, but I have to say Lawrenceville. Was it completely changed my view of robotics before I, as I said before, I only use like Lego parts and I didn't really experiment with 3D design online and kind of translating my ideas into an actual robot. But with Jeff had and all of the tools available, I was able to expand my horizons and actually take ideas that I thought were only possible in my brain and.

Actually make them possible with robotics. We've a great team. I love hearing the different perspectives of all of our Members.

In my freshman year, UM, I was really inspired by the two captains that we had, and then being in captain right now, I've learned so much from my peers, as well as the teachers.

One follow up question that I'm seeing here in the chat here is is.

I'm curious if there were Box team is also developing writing software to run the machines at Ausley.

Yeah, so with FTC there's actually two different periods, which I think is really cool. There's a 32nd autonomous period where it's just JavaScript and you're able to wire the robot to connect to like different programs, and then the robot can run all on its own. And then there's an even cooler period where you can actually drive the robot with game controllers. So it's kind of like a video game, but in real life, and so you can code the robot and.

Drive it around and complete different tasks. So right now we have to put blocks onto this like balance beam type thing. And yeah, so like it's kind of taking that into interdisciplinary aspect of robotics where it's the coding. It's the wiring circuitry, 3D design, the actual build portion, all putting it together and with robotics just kind of connecting that.

Well, I'm glad you answered that one very smoothly. 'cause the the history major Mr Major here was ill equipped to answer that one. So thank you for that.

You know, Mr Brody. I were the questions that I have for for you that we've seen here is is in terms of guest speakers or guest programming at that or the opportunities, and certainly been limited recently due to COVID. What sort of plans or or things have we done in the past in terms of guest speakers or guest programming at the at the Center for our design?

Currently we don't have any plans, but that's not to say that we won't in the in the future. Again, we're just. This is really the first year that the the building has been open fully open, so we're just going to getting our.

Feet under us and but maybe in the future. We'll definitely try to have some speakers come in.

Excellent.

And one of the questions I have here is, you know, as a border.

Can some of you guys talk a little bit about your experience using qcad outside of the academic day so you know sort of you know when when's your sweet spot to use qcad? When's? When's the golden moment for you during the day to define space to maybe get away to work alone or work with someone else, and then something that you're passionate about.

Alright, come I can talk about this. I think Mr Birdie can attest. I'm in Qcad quite a bit. It's like 2 minutes away from my house where I live and I think that time for me is from like 6:30 to 9:00. So as a senior I get the freedom of being out until nine and most of that time is spent from 6:30 to 8 on robotics and then that eight to nine period is where I'm working on building stuff such as speakers or just any personal projects I want. But it's truly it's truly just open when you want it to be.

In a sense, I guess when when Mr. Brody is there.

But I mean, I think any any afternoon you go in, Mr Brody will be there. He's always willing to help and work work with you on what you want, so.

And also jumping off of that. I guess gruis is **** CAD I guess is a really great study space as well. I find those couches to be extremely comfy so sometimes I go in there with some of my friends and we work on projects. What did they be related to? Visual art or not? It's still a great place to collaborate and I think that's something that Lawrenceville and general does. A pretty good job job with providing those spaces.

For collaboration, both inside and outside the classroom, so that would be my experience, so I pretty much am in their number of days a week, whether it's stopping by to say hi to Mr Brody and ask him, you know what new projects are going on or hanging out with my friends and doing some homework. It's very accessible to borders as well, yes?

Delaney, how about you just before you jump off here, I'm sorry, sorry, put you on.

No, you're fine. I was just about to unmute myself. I actually I go to Gcash definitely during study Hall. A lot of times to work on my individual art projects, but I also often spend my free period during the day in Qcad, so juniors and seniors instead of taking six classes to fill each and every period of the school day. We only take five. I currently have the E period slot free and a lot of times I'll either go during my E period to work on an art project or somewhere to Allison. I'll go today.

So my friends, I'll hang out on the couch is sometimes I might pop into the drawing classroom, see what they're up to my chat with. Mr Daniel chat with him about my personal portfolio, maybe ask for some advice about what my next project should be, and it's just such a lovely space to be in anytime of the day.

Siding.

I know you have to run, so thank you for for hopping on here this evening.

Absolutely.

Thank you for having me. This is a great time. Thank you, thank you goodnight everybody.

Anoushka certainly last but not least, we know how do you use the space in your in your maybe outside the academic day.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, so I'm actually a day student so I can't speak to the border aspect of it, but I have to say I'm probably there just as much. I can't say that there's really a difference between being a border and a day student other than maybe like sleeping at Lawrenceville. I'm probably there until like eight 8:15 PM. Unfortunately I'm not a senior unlike everyone else, so I can't stay past 8:00 PM. I'm pretty jealous of that extra 9:00 PM slot.

But I definitely spend my time from 6:30 to 8 doing robotics and also even outside of robotics. I come to qcad to hang out with my friends and also it's just a great great space to study and kind of look at the different projects that are there. A lot of my friends do visual arts and I see all their different paintings put up so we love to see their different whatever they're doing in their art classes. The different projects are displayed and it's just a beautiful space.

Great and then I guess my my next question is probably directed more towards Mr. Brody who would be would be you know how many classes related to design do we offer here at Lawrenceville?

Well, I think it depends on how you define design right? So as Ethan and.

As mentioned there, we have the the engineering classes right and then there are my tech design classes. But then we also have two D design class in art class.

So there are about six classes in Indesign that we offer here in chicken.

Gotcha gotcha thank you.

Careful.

What other questions people do you have out there? Feel free to throw him in a chat. One that I see right now is is for Ethan. It's a. It's not necessarily related to art, but sort of clarifying question. Do you think you talk a little bit about the business Enterprise Club?

Yeah, definitely so. Lawrenceville Business Enterprise Club is a club that I co-founded last year with one of my good friends here. It's directed. It's kind of like a Shark Tank, so we take business ideas.

So we have, well, we formed teams so kids come together, they form a business teams and they put together a business plan that's realistic and they kind of find out how every aspect they put together like yeah, a full business plan and it's analyzed by our team here of about five people.

And then and then at the end of the year, we host sort of like a Shark Tank round. We'll have people come in and analyze those business plans and give a pitch, and we'll decide a winner so.

That's something I do on the side of robotics.

Yeah, actually last year I participated in that and me and my friend won one of the challenges and we created this app. I did the business plan side of it and she did the coding for the app and it was basically an allergy tracking app so it would connect you to restaurants that were allergy friendly for your specific allergen. And it could also detect if a food had a certain allergen and it was just really interesting to see the connection of technology and business and participate in that.

But that was just also a side thing for me as well.

That's wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, you know. I guess as as we move to to close here, you know if we could all just kind of share just a favorite moment we have of qcad. Here, Alice will start with you.

That is certainly a really tough question because I've spent a ton of time in qcad over my last two years when it's been open.

I would say that the one moment that like I'm gonna remember for a really long time, is for the last time like putting that big ham extends and hoisting that up onto the the little carts with Mr. Brody and then somehow trying to figure out how we're going to fit it out the doorway. So it was certainly a challenge, but we figured it out and I think that that whole experience was pretty eye opening for me.

And I'm really grateful for Mr. Brodie and all the time he spent with me over the years in my various endeavors. And you can.

Yeah, I like to jump in here like I for me it's it's. It's impossible to say that there's one moment 'cause I really enjoy working with everybody and helping them see their ideas come to fruition. But I must say that that one of the highlights was definitely walking my dog by the dorm and seeing the girls outside using the hammock and then just they were just having a great time and it's just delightful to see them using it and enjoying it. So much of that was.

Probably one of my other highlights.

I have to say for me it was probably my first time seeing the laser cutter turn on. UM, it sounds a little weird, but I like hadn't used these tools before and like just seeing like the laser cut a piece of wood. I was so shocked I was like that's so cool. It can go from like a laptop program to just like being cut out perfectly and just seeing all my friends also be so excited about something that I'm passionate about was just great.

Yeah, I gotta jump in here like I've watched that laser cutter like hundreds if not thousands of times and it still is. Amazes me as well. It's just it's remarkable how accurate it is and the.

In the end, what allows you to do? You know, it's really quite amazing.

Yep.

Ethan froze Ethan, your favorite singular moment.

Uhm, I think one of my favorite moments was it was like about a month ago. We had a we had about 12 or 13 seventh graders come in from a French school in the area and they were beyond excited. Seeing like all the things we had there, we built little model F1 cars that were fan powered and for me like as Mr. Bernie said, I've I've seen these things run 1000 times. I've seen 3D printers run and laser cutters run but to see their faces and to see.

Like 'cause they've they may have not seen these things before and to see them in this space it was something truly special. 'cause I mean I, I know myself as a six or seventh grader. If I saw that I would be.

Mind blown.

So.

I love all the stories you hear about how qcad can positively affect like our immediate Lawrenceville community. Like for example the hammock and then you know, one of my first weeks at Lawrenceville.

It all of a sudden I look over and there's a tent and people are drilling these portable tables for to help densify the COVID customs. It was it was, you know, maybe some child labor laws you know broke in there but but it was amazing to see. Sort of these Mr Bernie. How many chairs or tables did you guys make? Help help help me with that story though I didn't.

Yeah.

There are, there are. There were a couple hundred I believe and yeah it was kind of a last minute project to like you. Sadie densify that the classrooms and sort of discovering that we the students needed somewhere to set their laptop in their in their books and and and so it was too. It was about two weeks prior to the to the start of school and we came up with a design and had a shop in in in Rochester NY. Cut the parts out for us.

And then when the parts arrived here on campus, the students assembled them and brought them to the individual classrooms. And I think they they worked out pretty well. The design of them was was quite nice.

Yeah, that was a really cool moment. I think anytime you can you positively affect your own community with the the space that you built it. That's a really, really neat.

Well I wanna thank all of our remaining panelists in and certainly Delaney as well for for your hard work and dedication to. I know it's just, you know, as we as we move closer to winter break here is there. These are precious study hall hours, so thank you so much for taking time out of your busy day and Mr. Brody, you're you're obviously very busy day as well to be here this evening, so you know, thank you so much to our panelists for for hopping on here and and certainly I couldn't have carried this for an hour. So thank you very much.

Greatly appreciated indebted to your for your service and and through those of you that have stuck around and and hopefully had some questions answered today and and I come away with a better understanding of what about Qcad is and and how it supports our mission here at Lawrenceville. But thank you all so much and a couple reminders to our participants here. Our application deadline is quickly approaching January January 15th will be here before you know it so make sure to to get those applications in and throw a couple commas in the.

Gold essay there and if you have any questions about today's or sorry tonight's presentation, feel free to shoot me an email.

If it's not here readily, it's read the website team measure at lawrenceville.org. Thanks again to everyone for for tuning in tonight and have a great evening.

Thank you.

Bye.