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By: Your StereoTypical Asian, 12/23/2018

Saturday, December 22^nd marked an important date for the Thunderbird Youth Club (TYC). The TYC held their second annual EXPO at the Old Atlanta Recreational Center. The day started by children giving robotics related presentations. There were three robotics teams that participated in some form of FLL, or First Lego League. One of the teams consisting of mainly middle schoolers participated in the regular FLL competition which involved programming EV3 Robots and researching real life problems. Then came two groups of younger children who took part in the non-competitive FLL Jr. All three teams worked very hard throughout their season and had impressive results. We are all very proud of them for their hard work and time investment. After these three teams came a variety of individuals or groups that demonstrated some form of programming. These participants either used Scratch or Arduino. The TYC offers classes for Scratch, a drag and drop coding program, and an Arduino class in which everybody must build and program a circuit. Some of the people who took Scratch classes showed some impressive games and math related projects. People who used Arduino mainly focused on Christmas themed lights and music.

After everybody presented their projects, every single person went to the gym to enjoy some basketball. The TYC offers basketball classes in four teams. In the order from youngest to oldest, the teams are: A, B, C, and D. First, there were 2 games with Team A & B. These little ones had fun running around shooting hoops. But don’t be so quick to judge, for they had lots of spirit and determination too. Next, Team C competed in a game on one court, while some moms played basketball on the next court. Some of the moms were playing basketball for the first time, but didn’t let that fact stop them. Last but not least came Team D and the dads. You might not believe it, but some of the dads haven’t even played basketball before. No matter who played, or how you performed, everybody was included in a friendly way.

After the basketball games, there were a couple games of tug a war and dinner. Tug a war was probably the most pressurized event of the day. The super long rope had at least 15 kids on each side, eventually having more because the parents joined. Each side won a couple times, but who wins does not matter, because what really matters is having fun. Dinner featured fruit drinks and sodas, pizza from Riverside, and homemade goodies. As the last part of the day, everybody sat down in some comfortable chairs and ate dinner. Parents ate with parents, kids ate with kids. However, the story does not end here. Even after most people left, some generous souls gave their time to help clean up. People help vacuum the floor, move the tables, and stack the chairs. Thanks to effort from every single person out there, the 2018 EXPO was a great success! Join the Thunderbird Youth Club next year to learn, interact, and grow. Who isn’t excited for the 2019 EXPO?