WCIT MONITOR WCIT Charity Quarterly Dec 2019

December 2019 Charity Quarterly The latest news from the WCIT Charity I am delighted to have been appointed as Chair of the WCIT Charity over the summer. Looking back, it may seem that the Charity has been consumed by its work with CALM and Missing People, the joint winners of the 2018 Charity IT Award, and the AI/Machine Learning Exchange which was also initiated as a means of maximising the impact of the Award and involving other charities. However, in 2018, your Charity also made grants totalling £207,712 to over 30 charities, including CITA, Gresham College and Thames Reach. In 2019 so far, an additional £115,033 has been made in grants to 16 charities. Perhaps even more interesting is the fact that, while we have made over 45 grants in this period, we received 162 applications, seeking £1.8 million in total! So, there is plenty of demand for what we offer, and, if we get our fundraising right, then plenty more that we can achieve. from the Livery Company, although the aims and objectives of both are inextricably linked in promoting the effective and efficient use of technology to change people’s lives for the better. Looking forward, the Charity will be working hard on its communications to members and the outside world. Led by Freeman Rita W. Bologna, we will be devising a new ‘look and feel’ for our comms which will include a new (and separate) website, consistency across Charity-funded initiatives, and more. After much careful planning, we will also be launching a new legacy giving programme and looking at possible ways in which we could raise more funding from outside the Livery Company to enable us to fulfil more of the unmet need evident from the volume and quality of the applications we receive. This is your Charity, and I will be seeking more views from members on what you would like to see in the coming months – but, if you have any burning ideas or comments, I’d love to hear them, so do please get in touch. I am looking forward to working with you all to make more lives better through technology. Dr Stefan Fafinski, As you know, the Charity has its own independent existence The IET’s FIRST® LEGO® League is a global science and technology challenge for teams of students, to encourage an interest in real world issues and develop key skills that are crucial for their future careers. The students work together to explore a given topic and to design, build and program an autonomous LEGO® robot to solve a series of missions. Chair of WCIT Charity [email protected] varying levels of STEM knowledge and awareness, dispositions and backgrounds. Their task was to complete a series of challenges based upon a real-world STEM theme; this year it was space exploration and involved the team spending weekly sessions after school, comprehending the task, developing their competency with LEGO® and their programming capabilities. The technology and level of problem solving required was highly challenging, however they met the challenge with unwavering enthusiasm and willpower. The Year 8 students embraced their roles as leaders, ensuring that they integrated the younger Year 7 students, some of whom at the start struggled with speaking in front of the group. With the bond that The HA team was made up of a range of developed between the students, during Key Stage 3 students (Years 7 and 8) with the large amount of time they had invested into their project, all of the students were eager and took pride in representing their school. WCIT Charity and Education & Training Committee supported 10 students from Hammersmith Academy (HA) to enter the league in 2018-19 and 2019-20. The tournament day involved a series of presentations on their project and they were rigorously interviewed about how they implemented the FIRST® Core Values; and also discussed the design of their robot with a range of judges. Despite clearly being one of the youngest teams, and new to the competition, they embraced the challenge on the day with even the most initially nervous students, confidently responding to questions from industry experts. “Over the last few months, we have learnt a lot. Not just about space and Lego, but how to work collaboratively as a team. We have done this through the build of the project and we have helped and supported each other where appropriate. When Folco and Ted realised that they did not have access to the ‘if’ command, they had to adapt and we all supported them. Thank you so much to the WCIT for allowing us to take part in the First Lego League competition. It was really fun and educational and we look forward to improving our entry for next year!” Folco, Yosif, Ted, Thomas, Ali, Liyan, Titas, Liza, Leo & Samue l We look forward to hearing the progress from the 2019-20 Lego league.