National Engineers Week will run Feb. 19-25 -- Massachusetts' school vacation week -- with family events on and off the MIT campus.
Members of the MIT Society of Women Engineers (SWE) will spend much of the week at the Children's Museum in Boston working with young children on fun, hands-on engineering projects.
Monday through Friday SWE will be at the museum from 3 to 5 p.m. On Saturday they will spend the whole day there. "It is going to be great," said Nupur Garg, SWE president.
Since 1951, National Engineers Week has been "dedicated to raising public awareness of engineers' positive contributions to quality of life," according to the National Engineers Week web site.
"Engineers Week promotes recognition among parents, teachers and students of the importance of a technical education and a high level of math, science and technology literacy, and motivates youth to pursue engineering careers in order to provide a diverse and vigorous engineering workforce," according to the web site.
Started by the National Society of Professional Engineers, National Engineers Week is a formal coalition of more than 70 engineering, education and cultural societies, and more than 50 corporations and government agencies.
In celebration of the week, the MIT Museum -- in conjunction with the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (MIT-CSAIL) -- will present "Robots: Past, Present and Future," four days of lectures, videos and demonstrations aimed at middle and high school students.
The MIT Museum will also present "Soap Box: Debating Cutting Edge Issues With World-Class Scientists and Engineers," with Professor Donald Sadoway on Tuesday, Feb. 21, at 6 p.m.
Also at the MIT Museum on Sunday, Feb. 26, from 2-4 p.m., is "Family Adventures in Science and Technology (F.A.S.T.): Off the Drawing Board, Out on the Road." The MIT Motorsports group will bring a Formula SAE car to the museum to discuss and demonstrate practical application of mechanical engineering principles.
For more information on National Engineers Week programs, visit www.eweek.org.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on February 15, 2006 (download PDF).
