Prototypes and Breadboards and Broadcasts, Oh My!
Welcome to 2024!
It’s been a busy January to start off the new year, with many meetings, after-school and weekend work sessions, and evening Discord and Zoom calls. We’re going strong with rapid development, news interviews, team meetings, and more! We seem to be progressing faster and faster each month, keeping the ball rolling with breadboards, soldering, blueprinting, and fabric cutting throughout January. Our sensor garment designed specifically for Search and Rescue teams is beginning to take shape, and we’re excited to show off what we have and get feedback at our Mid-Grant Technical Review (MGTR) in early February.
Our Communications team has been as busy as ever this month. They started the year by organizing a televised report on the team by a local news station, which can be found here. On top of this, they’ve been making connections with public figures from our community, including Massachusetts House of Representatives legislator Mindy Domb. The Comms team has also taken up duties related to MGTR planning, writing and sending out invitations, mapping out event spaces, writing presentations, and making slideshows.
January has been our most successful month so far in regards to making hardware and software progress. This month, our Technical team has been kept busy by blueprinting, breadboarding, and building. After taking a focus on breadboarding last month, the Hardware team has directed their attention to garment design. They’ve built the “Mark I” prototype, taken the lessons learned from that, and begun construction of Mark II. In the meantime, the Software team has begun planning how to consolidate and concentrate the data, meeting with SARTopo developer Matt Jacobs to discuss possible integration methods. A month of seamless contribution has led to some amazing progress!
Our Admin and Financial teams have had an equally busy month. The Finance team spent January promoting our GoFundMe, sorting out banking, and managing our budget. They’ve worked hand-in-hand with our Admin team on planning for EurekaFest in the spring, ordering InvenTeam polo shirts, and ensuring everything stays documented. On top of that, our Admin team has been fantastic in organizing our massive team to meet regularly and efficiently.
In February, we look forward to our Mid-Grant Technical Review on the 11th, which will be live-streamed on our YouTube channel. We also look forward to completing our Mark II prototype and moving on to Mark III. You can check out our Instagram page to follow our progress through February until our next blog. We’d like to take the opportunity to thank Lemelson-MIT for giving us the opportunity to work on this project, and we’re excited to continue! Go team!
The ARHS InvenTeam
