The Catalyst Program targets high school students with disabilities that are in the occupational course of study or regular education setting in high school. The program allows students to have small group individualized instruction with hands-on STEM experience. The Amassian group partnered with Catalyst’s summer 2021 camps to give the students a day of hands-on education with clean energy devices and fabrication. The day began with an overview of new sustainable greenhouse technology using solar energy to promote self-sustaining greenhouses. The students were then led on a lab tour of the Amassian lab and given demonstrations by current graduate students on the fabrication process of solar cells as well as the Amassian group’s efforts in the automation of device processing. SolarPack visited the students and gave a tour of their solar car built by graduate engineering students at NC State before heading to the competition the following day. This allowed students to see real research being conducted on NC State’s campus towards sustainability. The day ended with students using the knowledge gained throughout the day to build their very own solar cars to race on the Centennial campus. Catalyst hopes to inspire students to continue to pursue their passions in STEM and the Amassian group is grateful to be a part of this effort in the NC State community.
Dr. Amassian sets up for a presentation
Dr. Amassian gave a talk about sustainability and robotics for the Wolfspeed Family STEM Day in August 2021. He showed different types of photovoltaic glass and the mini greenhouses that can be powered by solar energy while still letting light in for the plants.
