Last month, we visited Boze Elementary to be a part of the Technology Access Foundation’s mentoring program that puts 5th graders on project teams with the goal of designing a product to be sold in the school store. 

Organized by Shoshanna Cohen of the Technology Access Foundation (TAF)  we – along with IT students from UW Tacoma - had the honor of sharing what we do for a living to a room of attentive 10 and 11-year-olds, from Boze Elementary.

By researching past inventions, delving into the history of selling and buying, studying engineering designs and more, the students were tasked with taking a product from "idea" all the way to "product manufacturing".  

The PCS team that was a part of the Technology Access Foundation’s mentoring program took turns rotating between the project groups to evaluate and support their designs. 

“You can’t say no to such a great program.” Said Scott Thielman, CTO of Product Creation Studio. “The development process they are going through is what we help our clients through. These kids are engaged and their design thinking is great.”

Are you tired of traveling old school?

Last week, we returned to Boze Elementary to provide constructive feedback on the students’ prototypes and offer pointers on the commercials they had prepared.

Creativity ran wild with these kids. Projects included: 

• The Magic Cooker, a portable microwave for heating your pizza on-the-go, obviously.

• NSB, the sleeved backpack team that is interested in looking into patenting opportunities.

• The GoPack (better than a backpack), for those of us who have grown tired of "traveling old school".

• The Mighty Cap Eraser team talked with Scott about the cost-effectiveness of adding a heart-shaped lock/alarm because you know, we've all had that one peer that just keeps stealing our erasers.

• The blue, green and hot pink Dox organizes your school supplies and dispenses the appropriate items to you when you need.

• The SLG, short for the Super Lightening Glove, is a "flashlight in your hand". Their commercial, admittedly, needed a lot of work as the main presenter asked Justin "How do we sell this? Because I'm reading from my paper and it's just not cutting it."

• The Fun, Friendly, Food Company - inspired by a combination of sweet treats and school supplies - had an initial Root Beer Float Pencil Holder prototype with plans in the works to expand their line.

• Other products included the Magic Cursive-writing Pencil, B-Pack (aka the Binder Pack), Extendable Desk and Color Grips which are pencils with built in grips.

Exhibition Night

The Boze Elementary students plan to present their final projects at an Exhibition Night in mid-December. We will update the blog with product images and results post-event.