During the week of June 24-27, 2025, Team Neutrino hosted the annual Graphics and Website Camp for new and returning members interested in joining the Graphics subteam. During the graphics part of the camp, students leaned the basics of designing posters, taking pictures. They got to know the identity standards for our team, got trained on the cameras, and got to take a look at the gimbal! Also in website camp, they learned basic HTML and creating posts for the website. We’re excited to see these new students learning!
On June 9, Team Neutrino began their yearly manufacturing camp. Incoming students learned the basics of manufacturing. This included learning how to use machines like the drill press, the band saw, and the hole puncher. Students concluded the camp by building their very own box. We look forward to seeing how these amazing students put their new skills to use!
For the past 2 years, Team Neutrino has held a summer camp for 4-5th graders and 6-8th graders to come and participate in a mock 1 week FLL season. This camp is fully led by Team Neutrino. We spend many weeks planning throughout the build season, then dedicate a week during outreach camp to train volunteers and leaders. This leads to a well executed camp where students will learn how to build a Lego Spike Prime robot, and code it to complete missions. This year, we chose the 2019/2020 game City Shaper. In the process of shaping their city’s, the students complete various missions such as moving and lowering a crane, creating buildings out of blocks and placing them in colored circles. The students seem to really love the bridge mission, which creates a unique opportunity to interact with the team opposite to them. The robots can collide, and even fall off! This has led to a effort to create the best mechanism to push robots off, or protect your own robot from attack! On the final day, we run 3-5 actual matches, giving kids an opportunity to seed what a potential completion in FLL could be like. Through this camp, we inspire kids to seek out the various opportunities to join the thriving FLL community in Ames, and to pursue STEM in the future.
At outreach camp, which took place in June 2025, members of Team Neutrino prepared to host FLL Blastoff! This included listening to presentations about the outreach subteam, the schedule, rubric, and curriculum of the upcoming camp, followed by short quizzes and activities to enforce learning. Additionally, members were familiarized with the 2019 CityShaper game, learning the rules, missions, and how to score. Members who weren’t attending FLL blastoff worked on building mission models for the camp.
This year, on May 23rd, Team Neutrino attended the annual CelebrAsian event in Des Moines! Reaching over 200 people, Team Neutrino showcased the robot’s new features to the community, such as the elevator and scoring mechanism. This event allowed our team to get involved with the community and we sparked interest in STEM to an audience of young people. We had a lot fun exploring the event and enjoying delicious food!
