The Northern Nevada Chapter was one the eight Chapters from our Region to achieve the K-12/STEM Leadership Award and they are already reaching out to K-12 students this year in the effort to achieve the award again! Here is a write-up from the Student Activities Chair from Northern Nevada, Andrew Huie:
Northern Nevada – Depoali Middle School Career Day
On September 28, 2018 the Northern Nevada ASHRAE chapter began their work for K-12/STEM Outreach and Student Activities. Diane Mitchell (President) and Andrew Huie (Student Activities Chair) participated in Kendyl Depoali Middle School’s Career Day.
The volunteers for Career Day were assigned a classroom, where they would give 3 presentations on their career choices, what education is required to get there, etc. Diane and Andrew did joint presentations for multiple groups of 6th, 7th, and 8th graders.
The presentations included information about HVAC Sales, HVAC Contracting, and then the topic turned to the students and how it directly affects them. With a little bit of history on Depoali Middle School, Diane and Andrew explained “Sick Building Syndrome” and the importance of providing the proper amount of outside air to the classrooms.
The classroom in which Diane and Andrew presented was a classroom notorious for being either way too hot or way too cold, making it easy to segue into the topic of temperature control. The students were able to very easily identify with the issues with focus and learning capacity due to uncomfortable temperatures in the classroom.
At the end of the presentations, Andrew and Diane shared a slide on ASHRAE and strongly encouraged the students to look up ashrae.org for more information and for some fun home activities or science project ideas.
Overall, this career day was very fun and helped get a gauge of what kind of activities should be considered for 6th and 7th grade students. Northern Nevada ASHRAE plans to continue to do STEM outreach in Reno/Sparks and looks forward to the next event!
Sincerely,
Andrew J. Huie
