{"id":38064,"date":"2018-06-29T08:00:15","date_gmt":"2018-06-29T12:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/?p=38064"},"modified":"2018-07-26T10:54:29","modified_gmt":"2018-07-26T14:54:29","slug":"solidworks-women-in-engineering-series-danielle-boyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/2018\/06\/solidworks-women-in-engineering-series-danielle-boyer.html","title":{"rendered":"SOLIDWORKS Women In Engineering Series: Danielle Boyer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Danielle
Danielle Boyer and EKGAR<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If you converted passion into fuel, Danielle Boyer could easily solve an energy crisis. Talking to her about her FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC<\/a>) team, Team 4384 Benzene Bots<\/a>, her team\u2019s incredible special project, EKGAR, and her commitment to STEM accessibility and affordability, you\u2019d never know she\u2019s just seventeen. She discusses \u201cmy students\u201d with pride and excitement, and her mix of bubbliness and professionalism when discussing EKGAR and its future is infectious. A recent high school graduate, Danielle is taking a gap year that eschews the normal post-high school, pre-college fare like traveling. She is staying in her home town of Troy, Michigan, where she will mentor her FRC team, along with coaching local FIRST LEGO League (FLL)<\/a> and FIRST LEGO League Junior (FLLJ)<\/a> teams, and she wants to start 30 FLLJ, FLL, and FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC)<\/a> teams in Troy before the year is out. And that\u2019s just what she has planned FLL for this year\u2014it doesn\u2019t include everything she\u2019s already done, and her plans for outside of FLL.<\/p>\n

SOLIDWORKS ran into Danielle at the FIRST Robotics World Championship in Detroit this past April. There, she introduced us to EKGAR (E<\/strong>very K<\/strong>id G<\/strong>ets A<\/strong> R<\/strong>obot), her team\u2019s special project. EKGAR, the brain child of Benzene Bots team captain and FIRST Dean\u2019s List winner Sanket Nayak, is an affordable alternative to the LEGO Mindstorms kits FLL and FLLJ teams have to buy, and its name is a constant reminder of the project\u2019s goal: increase STEM accessibility, interest, and skill among children in the larger community. And EKGAR works. While a LEGO Mindstorms robot and EKGAR are both buildable, programmable, and fun to use, a single LEGO Mindstorms robot can cost upwards of $500. EKGAR costs less than $50.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"EKGAR
EKGAR (Every Kid Gets A Robot)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cLast year I started our business team and I was coming up with our mission statement,\u201d Danielle explained. \u201cI was thinking about how we can have constant touch points with students, because I\u2019ve seen a lot of outreach where you see the student once and you never talk to them again, you never see them again. So it\u2019s kind of my passion to have these constant touchpoints with students, which is something the EKGAR is.\u201d EKGAR is a way to connect underserved communities with STEM, and make STEM programs like FIRST accessible and sustainable for everyone. Designed in SOLIDWORKS and controlled via an app Sanket created, the majority of the robot is 3D printed with files that can be found publicly in Benzene Bots\u2019 Github page.<\/a>\u00a0Using Github is a way to share EKGAR with the larger community, and allows students on the team to collaborate and perfect the robot\u2019s design.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have more kids who are interested in CAD as a whole,\u201d Danielle said when I asked about her team\u2019s experience with SOLIDWORKS. Benzene Bots brought in professional CAD users to help them understand SOLIDWORKS and allow everyone on the team to train and have experience with the software. Their use of SOLIDWORKS relates to the larger themes of accessibility, sustainability, and outreach: \u201cI think everyone should have basic skills in everything relating to robotics. Presenting, programming, that type of thing,\u201d Danielle explained. Benzene Bots underclassmen lead the design for the Oakland County Competitive Robotics Association (OCCRA)<\/a>, and by utilizing CAD they were able to complete the 2017 design in one week, and finish the entire robot a week early in their six-week schedule. And with the majority of EKGAR\u2019s components designed in SOLIDWORKS, it\u2019s easier to save time in manufacturing and introduce it to new communities.<\/p>\n

Danielle has managed to spread EKGAR\u2019s reach far and wide\u2014her job as business lead, after all, is outreach. When she created Benzene Buddies, an after-school tutoring and STEM education program at her local elementary school, she brought 30 EKGAR robots with her. \u201cThe students themselves have said how much they love it. Not just because of the low cost, but because they learned a lot,\u201d Danielle said. \u201cAnd so the Troy school district reached out to us, and they were like, \u2018We want one EKGAR in every single Troy school this year.\u201d According to her, the school district wants to help fund the EKGAR project and its production.<\/p>\n

\"Danielle
Danielle working with Benzene Buddies<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

EKGAR\u2019s reach won\u2019t stop with schools in Troy. Danielle plans to take it to children\u2019s hospitals so kids there can learn about robots \u2014 \u201cOur FRC robot is way too big to [be in a hospital],\u201d she said; EKGAR is about the size of a Roomba \u2014 and she wants to use EKGAR to expand the reach of Benzene Buddies, and the reach of STEM education in general. \u201cI\u2019m an Ojibwe\u00a0Native American, and on our reservations there isn\u2019t a lot of access to STEM, or even to good education. In the future, I want to see EKGAR in those reservations with the students, and I want to be able to create an app to train students in how to use EKGAR. That\u2019s my goal for the future,\u201d Danielle said matter-of-factly. \u201cIt\u2019s a big goal, but I think it would be so cool.\u201d This year Benzene Bots is partnering with other FRC teams to get EKGAR into high poverty areas, such as Flint, Saginaw, Detroit, and Pontiac, where they can host camps and train the FRC teams to be able to educate their communities about EKGAR. It\u2019s not just about training the students\u2014it\u2019s also about training the teams, so the knowledge and skills that it takes to build and use EKGAR can continue to spread. Danielle\u2019s goal for the summer is to produce eighty EKGARs for these communities.<\/p>\n

All of this relates back to sustainability. It\u2019s one thing to create a $50 robot that\u2019s comparable to LEGO Mindstorms. It\u2019s another thing to equip future members of the team with the ability to improve that design. Students will age out, the Benzene Bots team will change, and as a former-team member, future-mentor, Danielle wants to make sure new students can continue to sustain their momentum, both in robotics competitions and in outreach. She\u2019s trying to facilitate relationships with local companies so there can be an actual location for EKGAR camps and new FIRST teams. \u201cYou don\u2019t want to just rent a place,\u201d Danielle said. \u201cYou want to actually partner with people in each area, so that you can help them and help the people they\u2019re helping.\u201d That\u2019s also her plan for Native American reservations. Right now she\u2019s focusing on local communities, but the spread outwards towards reservations and other parts of Michigan will hopefully take place within the next two years.<\/p>\n

\"The
The Benezene Bots winning the Engineering Inspiration Award at the Gibraltar District Event<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

With all of her plans and accomplishments, it\u2019s easy to forget that Danielle is part of the demographic with the lowest representation in the STEM fields: women. She\u2019s at the age when girls move away from STEM focuses, and it\u2019s something she\u2019s very aware of and trying to fix. \u201cLast year [Benzene Bots] had one girl,\u201d she said. \u201cThis year, we had ten.\u201d Though the number of members on the team hasn\u2019t changed (35), the amount of girls is growing, along with their responsibilities\u2014girls are now becoming team leaders, and one female Benzene Bot, Tele Ocansey, will be nominated for Dean\u2019s List next year, perhaps following in Sanket\u2019s footsteps and winning. Danielle believes there should be more STEM programs for girls, like FRC Team 2834 Bionic Blackhawks<\/a>, that can help girls feel more at home in the STEM community. And she thinks that having more female mentors will help girls feel comfortable as well. \u201cWhen girls come into the club and the see almost all male mentors, it\u2019s kind of discouraging. I want [girls] to be able to look forward and think, \u2018I could be doing this\u2019 or \u2018I could be helping people this way,\u2019\u201d Danielle explained. She is becoming a mentor herself, but she has a goal of recruiting as many girls as she can to diversify her FRC team. Like most of us, she wants to see more women in STEM.<\/p>\n

And where will this woman in engineering be in the future? Danielle doesn\u2019t have set plans for after her gap year ends. She\u2019s thinking about attending the University of Michigan, but wants to feel out collegiate possibilities. What she does know is that she wants to pursue both business and electrical engineering, and she wants to create better programs for students. Danielle was homeschooled until her sophomore year of high school, and she\u2019s well aware of the lack of STEM education in the homeschool curriculum. She\u2019s also very interested in branding, and wants to keep connected with FIRST in all of its forms.<\/p>\n

\"Danielle
Danielle at the Benzene Bots workshop<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Danielle\u2019s love of robotics and her community is reflected in her dedication to FIRST and spreading the gospel of STEM. She loves seeing her students in Benzene Buddies and her teammates in Benzene Bots work together, she loves seeing them improve, knowing their futures are going to be that much brighter. She is rightfully proud of her work and her peers, and she\u2019s proudest of EKGAR. \u201cI think it has the largest scope to be able to help people. And I think it really has a future in the world of STEM, and even in the world of FIRST,\u201d she told me. \u201cAnd we can help so many people who don\u2019t have access to STEM, who don\u2019t have the funding, and even the people who do.\u201d This past year she hosted a presentation on branding at the FRC Championships, where her team won the Pit Safety Award and added that to their Entrepreneurship Award, Imagery Award, and Engineering Inspiration Award from earlier in the season. And with so many plans and goals for the coming years, it\u2019s clear we\u2019ll be hearing more from Danielle and the lives she\u2019s touched.<\/p>\n

Thank you to Danielle Boyer for taking the time to talk about herself, EKGAR, and Benzene Bots. All images in this article are courtesy of Danielle Boyer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you converted passion into fuel, Danielle Boyer could easily solve an energy crisis. Talking to her about her FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) team, Team 4384 Benzene Bots, her team\u2019s incredible special project, EKGAR, and her commitment to STEM accessibility<\/p>\n... Continued<\/a>","protected":false},"author":409,"featured_media":38063,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2402,3,26,17,18,113],"tags":[40,449,1638,2806,2809,133,2059,2805,2802,2803,2700,2804,2808,19,2510,1420,2807,487,2084],"class_list":["post-38064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-3d-printing","category-community","category-customer-stories","category-education","category-solidworks","category-women-in-engineering","tag-3d-cad","tag-customer","tag-customer-story","tag-danielle-boyer","tag-ekgar","tag-engineering","tag-first","tag-first-inspires","tag-fll","tag-fllj","tag-frc","tag-ftc","tag-high-school","tag-solidworks-2","tag-steam","tag-stem","tag-stem-education","tag-student","tag-women-in-engineering"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/409"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.solidworks.com\/solidworksblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}