October provided a wealth of opportunities for students to learn more about making. In addition to the new Maker Playground activities, we hosted two guest speakers who shared their expertise with our community.
On October 9th, Chris Olsen spoke to students about his hobby bringing Halloween decorations to life using microcontrollers. Microcontrollers are powerful tools that combine electronics and simple programming to bring inanimate objects to life to both scare and entertain. Mr. Olsen discussed the uses of Microcontroller controlling lights, sound cards, servos, and pneumatic solenoid valves, as well as presenting examples of Basic stamp control routines for Halloween haunting applications. 
Students enjoyed seeing the demonstrations and were excited to learn that Mr. Olsen’s house welcomes 200-300 trick or treaters every year. Clearly, he knows how to create a Halloween Haunt! We hope students are inspired to "make" using the microcontrollers available to them in the Maker Lab.
On October 19th, Peter White shared career advice for students interested in software engineering. To begin, he asked students to participate in a dot voting activity so he could identify what students were most interested in learning. A day-in-the-life of a software engineer was #1. 
In addition to learning about day-to-day activities, students learned about the diverse employment opportunities available in the software engineering field and the pros and cons often affiliated with each. Most all students in attendance raised their hand when asked if they were planning to major in CS. In his slide deck, Mr. White provided a number of resources that are available (and mostly free!) to help students grow their programming skills. The Maker Lab has many opportunities to learn programming - check out the Maker Lab website or stop by to learn more!
