The University of Houston will welcome 50 of the state's brightest high school students to participate in the fifth annual Governor's Science and Technology Champions Academy June 24-30, 2012 on the University of Houston campus.
Sponsored by Governor Rick Perry and the Texas Workforce Commission, the five-day residential summer camp brings together winners from the ExxonMobil Texas Science and Engineering Fair (EMTSEF), which was in March at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center in San Antonio.
Throughout the action-packed week, participants will see how humans are exploring the depths of the seas, the far reaches of space and remote, hostile environments right here on earth.
Using robotics, the young scientists will explore a variety of extreme environments ranging from aerospace to ultra-deep water oil and gas operations.
Throughout the week, the campers will take impressive field trips to the NASA Johnson Space Center, the NASA Sonny Carter Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory, Space Center Houston and the Weiss Energy Museum at the Houston Museum of Natural Science.
PetroChallenge will take place on Tuesday, June 26 and Wednesday, June 27, from 8:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., in the UH College of Technology Buildings 1 and 2. During PetroChallenge, students will form teams to act as a virtual petroleum companies. They will perform simulation of the various upstream value chain events, from exploration through construction and first oil.
On the final day, Friday, June 29, participants will demonstrate what they have learned by designing and building an underwater robot that will follow direction and complete tasks under water. The underwater robotics challenge will take place outside of the College of Technology from 10:00 until 11:00 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. until 3:30 p.m. Each team of students will spend the day designing, building, and fine-tuning their remotely operated underwater vehicles (ROV). Their robotic vehicles will compete by maneuvering through various challenge courses in large water-filled pools.
Organizers of the Governor's Science Academy at UH include Dr. Raymond Cline, associate dean of research, College of Technology Jack Christiansen, director of the Petroleum Technology Initiative, and Karen Cohen, College of Technology Coordination of Robotics Education (CORE) program manager.