Polytechnique Montreal hosts annual science expo for summer camp kids

Students from Polytechnique Montreal showcased their projects to hundreds of kids aged 9-17 on Wednesday morning.

Seven different groups of students from the engineering school held demonstrations and answered questions from the future generation of scientists.

“Today is a special day where we mix our club, our society — technical society,” says Maud Cohen, the president of Polytechnique Montreal. “Our students work on vehicles, technologies, throughout the year, and they do competitions around the world, and we present to the student camp.”

One of the teams, Formule Polytechnique Montreal, built a driverless race car.

While that was not demonstrated Wednesday, the team still took their drivable one for a spin in front of the crowd.

“The experience showing kids what we do is great,” says team captain Jonathan Pratt. “We don’t get that many opportunities to show off what we do. In competitions, it’s the judges, and they’re not as appreciative of everything.”

Formule Polytechnique Montreal just recently finished fourth at a competition in Michigan, but the science expo holds a special place in Pratt’s heart.

When he was 10 years old, he attended the camp, and remembers being inspired to do this when he grew up - a true full-circle moment.

“It’s great to now be able to give back to a camp that meant a lot to me,” Pratt adds.

The science expo has been running for over 30 years, with the goal of inspiring the next generation of engineers in Montreal.

Gisele, an 11-year-old camp attendee, says it’s an eye-opening experience to see the projects up close.

“I like how they show us and they explained to us what they did. And every little part, it was really interesting,” she said.

Other demonstrations included space rockets, drones, exoskeletons and robotic arms.