Empower Mats.


Empower Mats: Facilitating the participation of blind or visually impaired students in competitive robotics programs.

See the current Empower Mats Products. CLICK HERE. Help your visually impaired and blind student succeed in competitive robotics programs.

Empower Mats.

XCORP 2014 announces a new product line for its educational offerings: Empower Mats: Tools to empower students who are blind or visually impaired to participate in competitive robotics programs.

Robotics is a great way to introduce youth to the principles of mechanical engineering, computer science and artificial intelligence. Robotics has helped thousands of students develop their creative problem solving, collaboration, and teamwork skills while having fun in the process.

Youth with visual disabilities, however, have been at a disadvantage because most products are designed with only sighted youth in mind. The goal of Empower Mats is to give youth with a variety of disabilities an opportunity to participate in mainstream robotics.

What's different about Empower Mats? Our creative line of robotics training mats will provide tactile guidance to locations and paths, with braille descriptions where needed. The goal is to create a mat that allows all students to participate without interfering with the robots of other teams.

These innovations are made possible through a grant from a national foundation and in collaboration with The Maryland School for The Blind, TechBrick Education, LET'S GO Boys & Girls, and other national institutions.

Empower Mats will create new opportunities for students who are blind or visually impaired to be involved in STEM activities, possibly opening new doors for them to pursue STEM careers. It is likely this technology will assist students with other disabilities and sighted students as well.

Our vision is to develop accessible programing environments for EV3 and similar systems. In the near future, we hopeto involve students who are blind or visually impaired in FIRST LEGO League, Dash & Dot, BeeBots, SumoBots, and similar table-top robotics challenges.

For more information contact:

Marco Ciavolino
443-616-2233
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

XCORP2014 / Enktesis LLC
http://enktesis.com
410-838-8264

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*enktesis, LLC assists clients in a range of web technology solutions, marketing communications, business development, and communications research efforts

Empower Mats
https://empowermats.com

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Tools to empower visually impaired students to participate in competitive robotics programs.

Robot Mats
https://robotmats.com

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Build the skills of your current team with our universal training mats. They provide every scenario required to teach all the fundamentals programming and similar robotics systems.

Creative Play Mats
https://creativeplaymats.com

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These amazing mats feature imaginative, play-producing, images designed to provide just enough imagery to spur creativity.

TechBrick Education
https://techbrick.com

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TechBrick is an independent robotics and STEM education program for home-schooled, public, and private school students in Harford, Baltimore, and Cecil counties in Maryland.

This project is being funded through a generous grant from the Vision Advancement Foundation (VAF) of Oklahoma. The VAF exists to provide excellence in eyecare, especially among those with distinctive needs.

FIRST®, the FIRST® logo, FIRST® Robotics Competition, FIRST® Tech Challenge, FIRST® FORWARDSM , RAPID REACTSM, and FREIGHT FRENZYSM are trademarks of For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST). LEGO®, the LEGO logo, and the Minifigure are trademarks of the LEGO Group. FIRST® LEGO® League, and CARGO CONNECTSM are jointly held trademarks of FIRST and the LEGO Group. neither of which is overseeing, involved with, or responsible for this activity, product, or service.