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Watch the Live Stream of the Event!

Enlighten Us.  But make it quick!

That’s the motto of the Ignite Speaker series.  The premise is that a bunch of presenters go up in front of an audience, and talk about something cool.  Each person gets 5 minutes, and 20 slides that automatically advance every 15 seconds.  This Saturday will be the second Ignite event in Ithaca, NY, and I’m going to be a presenter!  The title of my talk is “Building an Engineer”.

Here’s my blurb:

Engineers are responsible for solving some of humanity’s greatest challenges, from space travel to poverty.  Engineers spend their days building robots, firing lasers, and crashing test cars into walls.  Clearly being an engineering is freaking awesome, and yet America is falling behind other countries in our supply of national engineering majors.  In an age of disposable cell phones, non-user-serviceable cars, and alarmingly small quantities of legos, kids simply aren’t being exposed to an engineering education as early as is necessary to generate interest.  I will talk briefly about how I created my own engineering experience growing up, how I try to educate prospective engineers, and how open source hardware and software could help spur a new fix-it generation.

If that sounds even a little interesting (and you’re over 21… it’s in a bar), be sure to come by the Pixel Lounge this Saturday (November 6th, 2010) at 6PM to check out Ignite Ithaca!  If you can’t make it, don’t fear – all the talks will be filmed and put up online.

You can get more info at the ignite ithaca website, and you can RSVP on the facebook event page.

Hope to see you on Saturday!