Student-made drones – including one built by four Foxcroft School girls-- will take to the skies above the School's oversized riding ring on Sunday, Oct. 26. The flight demonstration culminates the Da Vinci Challenge, a workshop led by Kashmir-Robotics as part of a worldwide initiative to develop unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that can help save endangered species from poachers.

The public is welcome to the flight test, which begins at 1 pm and will be followed by an awards ceremony and reception. Please RSVP at www.kashmir-worldfoundation.org. For additional information or directions, visit www.foxcroft.org or call 540.687.4511.

Teams from The Heights School, Potomac Falls High School, Saint Mary's Catholic High School, and Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology will participate alongside host Foxcroft, the only all girls' school taking part.

The Da Vinci Challenge is a four-session workshop during which students build their own Quad-Copters or Hex-ocopters from advanced carbon fiber components, learning the fundamental components and electronics of un-manned aerial vehicles (UAVs) along the way. They also use CAD and 3D printing to customize their drones and upon completion receive a Drone Operators Certificate as well as their fully-operational copters to take back to their schools.

Kashmir-Robotics is the tech arm of the KWF, which last year launched the Wildlife Conservation UAV Challenge inviting scientists, artists, and engineers around the world to develop UAVs optimized for protecting rhinoceros from poachers in South Africa. Some 139 teams from 29 countries responded and, KWF CEO Aliyah Pandolfi says, she was concerned to see that the best ideas and brightest students were not from the United States. She wanted to do something about that and created the Da Vinci Challenge.

Dr Maria Eagen, Chair of Foxcroft's Science Department and an aerospace engineer, put together a team that includes juniors Patia Fann of Purcellville, VA, and Jasmine McGreen (Cornwall, NY), freshman Saylor Hart (Keswick, VA), and senior Gaby Panettiere (Miami, FL). She took them to the first workshop (October 2) at Tysons corner – and discovered the need for a launch pad for final flight demonstrations for the students' drones. She invited KWF to consider Foxcroft's 500-acre campus in western Loudoun County.

Pandolfi visited last Wednesday (Oct. 8), and was sold. "For one thing, the scenery is beautiful," she says. "There is plenty of space in the big riding area for several teams to test and fly their drones at the same time, and there is flat space along the fence for spectators to observe. As we talked, it made more and more sense because of the possibilities of a long-term partnership with Foxcroft."

Foxcroft's Head of School, Catherine S. McGehee, is delighted with the prospect. "This is the kind of partnership I am hoping to build," says McGehee, who became head in July. "It is aligned with Foxcroft's mission in that the Kashmir Foundation approaches teaching robotics the ways girls learn technology best, and it also has a focus on animals, which is part of Foxcroft's DNA. I am excited about the possibilities of moving forward."

"We developed the Da Vinci Challenge as a program to give American students a a fun and engaging opportunity for hands-on aviation engineering and science, as well as art and design," says Pandolfi.

"Like Foxcroft, we want to motivate girls to explore fields they might not generally consider. If they have projects without the labels of science or engineering, situations where they simply come together and build something fun, or something that could make a difference in a situation they care about – like endangered species -- they will learn the things they need to understand to complete the projects."

Perhaps these student-made drones are stealth aircraft as well as counter-poaching devices – carrying STEM education to youngsters under the cover of fun!