This December 3-9, students across San Diego Unified are taking part in Computer Science Week, also known as the Hour of Code Week. For this year's Hour of Code Week, over 193,272 registered coding events are taking place worldwide - including hundreds right here in San Diego.
While schools worldwide are participating, one event at Dana Middle School has gone beyond the key strokes of a computer. Students were tasked by their engineering teacher, Shereen Bastani, to design an electronically controlled safe which incorporates input & output functions, as well as analog and digital features including buzzers, motors, servos, led lights and a programmable microprocessor.
The students worked for the last two weeks in teams of two or three designing the ideal protective safe and writing a programmable code which would serve as the central intelligence to electronically control their safes. On December 3, 2018, students presented and demonstrated the functionality of their working safes to their parents and classmates. The presentations and designs were very impressive and testimony that great instruction leads to great results.