Inspire the Innovators of TomorrowThe world has no shortage of areas that need further engineering and science innovation. Producing renewable energy, developing better medical devices, and ensuring a global supply of clean drinking water are only a few areas where future innovation can remarkably impact the way people live. National Instruments believes that today’s students must be equipped and prepared to be tomorrow’s innovators and works closely with educational organizations and companies such as the LEGO Group to deliver the technology necessary to support hands-on, project-based learning that inspires and engages students. Leading science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) educational organizations and universities around the world use NI technology and tools to prepare students to drive the next generation of innovation. These educational initiatives will ultimately help create a highly skilled, technically literate workforce ready to pursue careers in many fields. "The saturation of technology in most fields means that all students, not just those who plan to pursue a STEM profession, will require a solid foundation in STEM to be productive members of the workforce." – National Governors Association 2008 Highlights
2008 Challenges
2009 Commitments
Inspiring Innovators from Kindergarten OnNI provides powerful, industry-standard tools including graphical system design software and low-cost, modular hardware so educators can connect curriculum with hands-on, project-based learning. These NI tools help eliminate educational barriers such as learning complex programming languages and instead focus the student's attention on learning problem-solving techniques. With NI technology, kindergarten students can begin learning graphical programming techniques that they can develop through high school and college and eventually take into their careers. In support of these efforts, in 2008, NI and the LEGO Group announced the LEGO Education WeDo, a new robotics platform designed to deliver hands-on learning to students ages 7 to 11. This platform makes it even easier to reach more children with graphical programming concepts. The easy-to-use software can operate on both the Intel Classmate PC and the One Laptop per Child XO, which enables children in the most underprivileged regions of the world to access this technology. View a video of a student programming a robot with LEGO Education WeDo. Providing Innovative Technologies to Support K-12 FIRST Programs
On a global scale, NI has partnered with several organizations that are leading the effort to revolutionize STEM education in today's schools by developing tools and programs that educators need to teach STEM concepts in fun and engaging ways. With the collaboration between NI, the LEGO Group, and For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), approximately 150,000 students in all FIRST competitions have access to a progressive programming platform, starting with LEGO Education WeDo and LEGO MINDSTORMS® NXT-G and continuing through industry-standard LabVIEW. This robotics software continuum introduces students to age-appropriate technology in an engaging, hands-on learning environment and encourages them to discover the excitement of science and engineering through a range of robotics competitions. NI also supports this effort through classroom mentoring. In 2008, FIRST selected the CompactRIO embedded control platform as its next-generation FIRST Robotics Competition robot controller. Beginning in 2009, NI will grant a multimillion dollar in-kind donation over the next five years to FIRST to provide the CompactRIO system to participating teams, reaching more than 45,000 students worldwide each year. 
"Our goal is to have a FIRST team in every high school and to change the culture in our communities to celebrate excellence in science and engineering the same way we celebrate sports. It's the support of partners like NI that is helping FIRST make that goal a reality." - Dean Kamen, Founder of FIRST and President of DEKA Research & Development Corporation View a video of the FIRST Robotics Competition. Developing Tools for Higher Education and ResearchToday, more than 6,400 universities in 110 countries use the LabVIEW graphical development environment to educate students and perform research that will improve the world. Through collaborative product development with companies such as the LEGO Group and Vernier and the support of proven STEM programs such as Project Lead The Way (PLTW), one of the nation's leading providers of pre-engineering and science curricula, NI is committed to facilitating a pipeline of engineers and scientists who are already familiar with industry-standard tools such as LabVIEW software upon entering higher education institutions. In addition, in 2008, NI introduced the LabVIEW Academy program, which provides classroom curriculum and hands-on exercises to community colleges, two-year colleges, and four-year universities to prepare students to take the Certified LabVIEW Associate Developer (CLAD) exam with confidence. Case Study: MIT Remotely Connects Future Engineers Worldwide with LabVIEWProviding a hands-on learning environment is essential for training future engineers. However, the resources necessary to enable this type of experiential learning are not uniformly available at universities worldwide. Using LabVIEW, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) are helping bridge this resource gap with iLabs, a framework for offering students remote access to state-of-the art engineering labs from anywhere in the world. Under-resourced universities in countries such as Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda are using iLabs to significantly increase the number of available hands-on learning and research tools. Case Study: Project-Based Learning Helps Students Understand DSP Concepts at Georgia TechStudents at the Georgia Institute of Technology learn fundamental digital signal processing (DSP) concepts with the help of LabVIEW graphical programming, NI SPEEDY-33 DSP hardware, and LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT. In a project-based class, students connect with real-time hardware easily using LabVIEW and visualize the signals in the interactive LabVIEW environment. With graphical dataflow programming, students can understand the effects of different variables on their experiments as well as learn to build basic DSP systems. Case Study: Advanced Cancer Research Using Next-Generation Medical Imaging
Researchers at Kitasato University in Japan have created the world's fastest optical coherence tomography (OCT) medical imaging acquisition system using LabVIEW and the latest multicore technology. Dr. Kohji Ohbayashi and his team are exploring new methods for early cancer detection using this noninvasive device that does not subject patients to unnecessary stress or discomfort. The team's ultimate goal is to save more lives from this deadly disease.
ChallengesAs NI strives to inspire the students of today to become the problem solvers and innovators of tomorrow, the fragmentation of educational systems around the globe presents a constant obstacle because almost no education or curriculum development programs or educational standards are truly global. In addition, each region of the world faces its own unique educational challenges. For example, the U.S. faces a gap between the nation's growing need for and declining production of scientists, engineers, and other technically skilled workers, while many other countries are struggling with providing access to the technologies necessary to train the students interested in these fields. NI aims to develop tools and resources appropriate for regional educational systems when possible. For example, to support green engineering curricula and research in the U.S. and Canada, NI provides region-appropriate content and tools to the top 50 universities in that region. |
