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Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related institutions.
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Hi All,
I am looking for ASTC folks who would be attending the O5 ASTC conference as I am developing a session submission and would be interested in co-presenters on:

"Partnership for Programs and Events" in keeping with the conference theme "Partnerships for Excellence - Seeking Strategic Relationships to Increase our Impact".

I am particularly interested in co-presenters who have brought together groups from the Corporate-Sci-Tech sector and Community groups to offer unique Sci-Tech experiences-programs to under-serviced communities.

If you are interested and experienced in this area and would like to co-present on it please email me with your background and thoughts on this.  It would be great to have a diversity of programs-partnership types...

My background is that I have developed and orchestrated many diverse corporate and  community partner programs and events over the last 8 years at the Ontario Science Centre (OSC) in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.  Previously I developed programs and events for science and technology communications for research, corporate and broadcast organizations.

At the ASTC Conference in 2003 I led a panel session on "Robotics Experiences that Work" and co-presented on a panel "The Best Damn Things We've Ever Done".  I have also led Robotics Workshops and Strategic Partnership sessions at the past 2 CASC Conferences (Cdn. version of ASTC).

-Partnerships re: Robot Building Workshops that I've developed-evolved over the last 4 years. Our next ones occur Oct 30-31, 04 and include 6 workshops for 20 families each who will build a working programmable and expandable mini-robot (from a box of parts in approx 60-80 minutes).  This is done with the assistance of 20 Corporate Volunteer-Facilitators (from Partner-Sponsor Celestica).
Families are also assisted by 6 Community Police Officers and 3 ETF Robot Squad Officers who also help them use their completed robots in 7 activity areas including a Mars Habitat, a Robo-Art area, a Robo-Sumo area, a Robo-Maze, a Robo-Rescue (modeled on ETF Robot) etc...The families also get a demo of the ETF robot with its abilities to examine a suspicious package or rescue a person.  All
families get to keep their completed robots for later use, expansion, programming of at home or for school.  Partner ProAction provides funding for 40 dis-advantaged families selected via our local neighborhood schools to take part in these workshops and the other 80 families are from our Centre Member Families who each pay $75 for this experience.  (80 family space for our June 04 Member
workshops sold out in 6 hours from 1 email to our members and we are doing 80 more families from this initial waiting list now in Oct, 04)

There is a very large culture of hobbyists, students, families and other public, ranging from children thru aerospace engineers interested in pursuing hobby robotics activities.

Other Robotics activities & partnerships I am also doing at OSC include:
-Space robotics events with NASA, CSA, MDRobotics on Canadarm 1 & 2, the ISS
-Partnering with FIRST Robotics on their Cdn Regional Kickoff each Jan. for 50+ teams.
-Robot Competitions including developing-growing the Eastern Canadian Robot Games from an idea 4 years ago to the largest public robotics competition in Canada this year (Nov 13-14) with us expecting over 150 teams from all over the World.  We've also worked for the last 4 years partnering with the Ontario College or Art and Design on their SumoRobot Challenge held in March which also features
many interesting categories including Dancer-Painter robots.

I hope to hear shortly from interested potential co-presenters at your earliest convenience.
Best Regards,

Blair Clarkson
Coordinator Special Events & Attractions
Visitor Experience Branch, Ontario Science Centre
Ph:(416) 696-3195,  Fx:(416) 696-3199,  Cel:(416) 676-9427
email: [log in to unmask]

"Imagination  is  more  important  than  knowledge."  Albert  Einstein.
"The  man  who  has  no  imagination  has  no  wings."  Muhammad  Ali.
"You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus." Mark Twain

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