RC project for innercity kids - the kids are BUZZING!

[tymill]

Cheers to everyone that's helped out so far with the South Camden Community School Radio Racecars project. All of your donations and help have made a huge difference so far!

The initial one-week project starts up next week, and the kids are BUZZING!!! There's a great sense of excitement around the school about the big pile of RC cars and paraphanelia building up in Mr Miller's lab. Boys and girls that I'd never expect to be interested are banging on the door to beg to be in on the project...

After school today, even the Deputy Head Teacher couldn't resist coming outside and driving one of the cars around the quad a bit when we were doing some preliminary testing of the track layout!!!

I've every intention of extending the project into an ongoing club for the kids through the next school year - so all of your kindly donated kit and bits is certain to be a part of the project. Thank you ALL very much!

Plenty of photos to follow!

Further, it's still not too late to get some stuff down to the school if you're keen - even the most basic stuff like tools or cool stickers or painting masks would help out, but the most useful would be old cars of any description of course.

The school address is:
South Camden Community School
Charrington Street
London
NW1 1RG

Thanks!
Ty

[tymill]

a couple quick shots of some kids helping sort out the bits prior to the project's start....

(faces blurred, but you can tell they're excited!)

[tymill]

The project has been an awesome success! Thanks again to eveyrone who's helped out!

21 students aged 12 to 15 were involved, and in the end they built up 7 running cars from the bits that you've all donated. They got the cars going, painted up some amazing shells (thanks Andy and Horizon!), tested them, and did some serious racing in the playground... AWESOME!

We also managed a great field trip on Wednesday to Brooklands Museum, the birthplace of UK motorsport and aviation, where the kids had a chance to compare their cars to real race cars, go on board a Concorde, and race each other on the museum's F1 simulator. As an extra bonus, Steve and Chris Brooke came along and introduced the kids to a range of different types of off road RC cars and showed them some pretty impressive stunt driving.

The focus of the week was creativity, and it's amazing what solutions some of the kids came up with to problems that they encountered... Check out the Falcon/TL01 hybrid!!!! The pride on the kids' faces shows it all!

The best news is that the interest is HUGE for me to lead a weekly RC club next year - so who knows.. you might be seeing team SCCS at the local track soon! There will be plenty of scope for you all to help out if you're keen too - from visits to sharing bits of old kit - it's all great!

Nevertheless here's some photos...

(nb. I checked with the guidelines, and it's okay to show images on this news website with the kids as long as they're not identified by name)

[David Church]

Ty, looks like a great success!!!!!!!!! Well done to you for all your hard work, and a big thanks to all that donated stuff!!!

[espana]

well done ty,nice to see the kids doin something outside together rather than in bedroom with ps3 or pc.if i ever work out how to get that money u sent for p&p with paypal,i will send it back to u as a starter fund.good luck-eddie.

[jimmy]

Awesome work Ty!

[Rich D]

A credit to you Ty - wish i had a tutor like you when i was at school

[Guy]

Excellent work Ty, the photos say it all!

Did you get my pm about parts, etc?

Cheers

Guy

[emzy]

That all looks awesome Ty - well done on the project!!

[tymill]

Well, we're a year on - but the South Camden Community School radio racecars project is still running full steam ahead! This year's creativity week project with the rc cars was a bigger success than ever, and the results were amazing.

This time around, we focussed much more on the designs of the cars, and I'm sure you'll agree there's some interesting ideas coming out from these guys. We did a trip to the london motor museum www.londonmotormuseum.co.uk to get inspiration, and they definitely got some ideas from seeing the lowriders, kustoms and donks. check out the high-riding optima with the "gucci" colour scheme. Not exactly my style - but this is the yoof.

Again thank you all very much who have donated to the project last year, as the materiel that you've graciously offered has made this possible 2 years in a row. We've also had a successful after school rc club on mondays where the students tinker about with the cars. Thanks!

Cheers again,
Ty

[tymill]

Well, hey - it's YEAR THREE of the South Camden Community School "Radio Racecars" project!

Thanks again to everyone who's donated their materials and time to the school to help these kids get a great introduction into the learning and experience of designing and racing RC cars.

It's amazing how each year's group of kids come up with new and interesting ideas for their cars, and it would not have been possible without your kind donations over the years. All good!

We run a 3-day "creativity" project for mixed ages at the end of the school year (now) and I keep up a monday afternoon RC-club for the hardcore kids that get hooked....

Anyhow - here's some photos from this week. Perhpas you might recognise some of your donated kit!


















Regards,
Ty

[Mrs oOple]

Brilliant news, thanks for the update - really pleased to hear it's still going strong. Any future Dub C's amongst your crew?

[tymill]

Quick Update:
"The radio race cars project back in year 9 inspired me to sign up for A-Level Physics" - one of my AS Physics students this year.

Awesome.

[jim76]

inspirational stuff Ty. top work

[cruisetom120]

Amazing, Dun a great job....

[Naushad]

I really think what you've done is inspirational.

Well done.

[Rebelrc]

Amazing work Ty