S. Vishnu Sharma
IIT Mandi successfully concluded the second school camp on Robotics and Artificial Intelligence (PRAYAS 2.0). In this fully residential program students learnt about the fundamentals of robotics and artificial intelligence to make a fully automated system early in their careers.
One hundred students were selected from over 3000 students throughout the state of Uttar Pradesh and were given an opportunity to be a part of this camp, say sources from IIT Mandi.
Along with this, a total of 50 Uttar Pradesh Govt. School teachers and 50 Industrial Training Institute (ITI) trainers, nominated under the Uttar Pradesh Skill Development Mission (UPSDM) were also a part of this camp.
Second season
Speaking about the second season of Prayas 2.0, Dr. Tushar Jain, Head, Centre for Continuing Education, IIT Mandi, said seeing the success of PRAYAS 1.0, they have taken a step ahead in PRAYAS 2.0. Firstly, the teachers and trainers are also invited to this camp.
This will help them to include the learnings in their curriculum and adopt them in their teaching methodology to reach a wider student base in UP with new initiatives at the local level, said Dr Tushar from IIT Mandi.
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Secondly, we have scaled up this program for over 200 participants. In PRAYAS 3.0, we plan to organize the robotics competition also and take this program to a new level, he said.
The camp
During the four-week camp, students had classes on Robotics and Artificial Intelligence where they learned to use various programming techniques, sensors, actuators, communication devices, and power devices to assemble various components to build a robot, say IIT Mandi sources.
The students built several robots using the customized kits provided to them and programmed their bots in Python to make them workable.
Another interesting part of this year’s Summer Camp was the Mega G20-S20 Meet at IIT Mandi that gave the students an opportunity to showcase their projects to Mukesh Agnihotri, Deputy Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh, during the Once Day Conclave on Skill India at IIT Mandi.
Along with this, the students also participated in events such as World Environment Day, and International Yoga Day, among others.
Activities such as regular Yoga and aerobics classes, Bhagavad Geeta sessions, motivational documentaries, plantation, and cleaning drives, visit to tinkering labs, were also a part of the camp, say sources from IIT Mandi.
Unique initiative by IIT Mandi
PRAYAS is a unique initiative by IIT Mandi to inspire the youth and promote skill development. It gave them an around development experience of social, technical and human values skills.
The event concluded with a prize and certificate distribution ceremony at IIT Mandi campus. The young participants were also provided with a Take Home Robotics kit to help them further tinker with the technology.
About IIT Mandi
IIT Mandi has nine Academic Schools and five major Research Centers. The Schools are the School of Biosciences and Bioengineering (SBBE), School of Chemical Sciences (SCS), School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (SMSS), School of Physical Sciences (SPS), School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering (SMME), School of Civil and Environmental Engineering (SCENE), School of Computing and Electrical Engineering (SCEE), School of Humanities and Social Sciences (SHSS), and School of Management (SOM).
The Centers are Advanced Materials Research Centre (AMRC), Centre for Design and Fabrication of Electrical Devices (C4DFED), BioX Centre, Indian Knowledge System and Mental Health Applications Centre (IKSMHA Centre) and Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics.
The Institute offers B.Tech. programs in seven different streams, one M.A. program, ten M.Tech. programs, nine Ph.D. programs, and one iPh.D. program. The unique, project-oriented B.Tech. curriculum is centered around its 4-year long Design and Innovation stream. Since the inception of the Institute, IIT Mandi faculty have been involved in over 275 Research and Development (R&D) projects worth more than Rs. 120 crores.
