Colorado Springs What If festival an inspiration to children of all ages
Kids who weren’t afraid to get messy made art projects by the dozens Saturday, and they learned quite a bit about science, agriculture and architecture while doing it.
Countless children who attended the What If … Festival of Innovation and Imagination in downtown Colorado Springs were fascinated by a fuzzy duck, built cardboard box houses, explored an environmentally friendly tiny house, experimented with robotics and more.
Amanda Bauer and her 5-year-old daughter, Heidi, spent at least four hours What If-ing on Saturday. Heidi built herself a “mobile” home out of cardboard boxes, running around for a while wearing it after it was finished.
Bauer is a graphic designer and said she can tell her young daughter loves to create and build things, too. They spent a lot of time making art projects, and Heidi spent 15 minutes driving robotic cars.
“She’s a little girl that loves ‘boy stuff,'” Bauer said. “It’s great.”
Not too far from the cardboard box creations, other children about Heidi’s age waited in a long line to use an Xbox controller to maneuver a robot made by a team of high school students.
“We really like working with younger kids,” said Jessica Mills, a 16-year-old junior at Air Academy High School. She’s the CEO of Rocky Mountain Robotics, which spans six high schools in Academy School District 20.
She and others on the robotics team want to inspire kids early, so they’re stoked to pursue engineering as soon as the opportunities are available to them. Rocky Mountain Robotics students at the festival showed off a robot that moves boxes and another that shoots T-shirts.
Mills said they go to quite a few festivals, and one time a student who had gotten a T-shirt at one of the events joined their team. That was great – they’re always excited to meet people who want to pursue the sciences.
One small child went up to Jessica Saturday, face painted from another booth, and was disappointed to hear he was too young to join the high school team. Jessica encouraged the boy to look for other opportunities. Younger kids can build Lego robots at some elementary schools, she said.
Jessica hopes to one day go into engineering and business marketing. She’ll make cool stuff and market it well so consumers know it exists and want to buy it. A lot of engineers aren’t so great at the marketing part, she said.
“Everyone says they’re not smart enough to do it, I hear that all the time,” she said.
But she insisted that’s not the case – anyone can get into engineering. “We teach you how to wire a robot or program it.”
–
Contact Kassondra Cloos: 636-0362
Twitter: @Kassondra Cloos
Heidi Bauer, 5, runs with the cardboard box “house” she made at the Concrete Couch exhibition area of the What if Festival of Innovation and Imagination Saturday, September 19, 2015. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette
Remedy McCoy, 4, tries her hand at making a clay sculpture at the Clayfest booth Saturday, September 19, 2015 at the What if Festival of Innovation and Imagination. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette
Seven-year-old Talynn Bagley helps build a cardboard sculpture along with Concrete Couch board president Leah Lowe at the What if Festival of Innovation and Imagination Saturday, September 19, 2015. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette
Mark Wong helps eleven-year-old Keenan Masters learn to throw a clay pot on a wheel at the Clayfest booth at the What if Festival of Innovation and Imagination Saturday, September 19, 2015. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette
Volunteers for the What if Festival of Innovation and Imagination parade as a Chinese dragon during the annual festival Saturday, September 19, 2015. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette