2026 Techsters Season

Techsters started its 2026 season with an introductory meeting where members got to know the board and learned about the club’s goals. The board also previewed the rest of the season, including Python, Java, and robotics.

For the first six sessions, members focused on building a foundation in Python and Java. The board members began with the basics and gradually moved into more detailed concepts as the sessions progressed. And after learning each concept, the board gave members small coding challenges to practice what they had just learned and apply their skills independently, making the session more interactive and fun.

After the programming sessions, the second half of Techsters moved on to robotics with EV3 robots. The board taught members the basics of robotics, including how robots follow commands and complete tasks. Members also learned a little about FLL and how to get involved in robotics in middle school. As the sessions continued, the activities became more competitive. Members worked through robot challenges, competed against each other, and tested whose robot could complete the maze the fastest.

Finally, the season wrapped up with a final meeting with Iccha, the founder of Techsters, and Mrs. Markman. They spoke about the high school robotics team and explained how current 8th graders could join as freshmen. They also talked about college, future opportunities, and how technology can play a major role in different careers.

The board members ended by sharing advice about high school life, including classes, workload, clubs, and the challenges students may face. On their journey, members gained a better idea of what to expect and how Techsters could help them explore their interest in technology. The final session ended with donuts, making for a fun and memorable way to close out the 2026 season.

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First Meeting of Techsters 2024

Welcome to Techsters first meeting of our 11th season in 2024! To kick off this exciting year, we were honored to have our club’s founder, Iccha, share her inspiring journey of creating this club, alongside her experiences as a UMS and college student. Following this, we engaged our club members in a dynamic Blindfold activity, aimed at introducing them to the world of algorithms and emphasizing their pivotal role in instructing computers. Subsequently, we had the club members interact with Akinator, offering members a firsthand glimpse into the outcomes of coding instructions. Wrapping up this session, members played the games of Blooket and Kahoot. It was undeniably a fun and special start to our 2024 season!

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Last Meeting of the 10th season

Since this was our last session, we needed to close up the season with a pizza party and a show & tell. After finishing the show & tell and seeing these amazing projects created by our members, members ate pizza as Mrs. Markmann played a movie. Thanks for everyone who volunteered, all projects presented really revealed all of our members’ talents. Some of the board members who are also current high schoolers got the chance to talk to members, especially upcoming freshmen, about different clubs and programs that they can join if they are interested in coding. To wrap up this session, board members were given certificates of appreciation as they worked really hard to execute their ideas and plan out each session. Additionally, we wanted to thank our advisor, Mrs. Markmann, for her hard work and planning. This was Mrs Markmann’s last season and session after conducting 10 seasons, being Techsters’ advisor for a decade, since it was established in 2013. As the years went by, the club was able to advance and sessions were attracting more people, and this truly could not have been done without Mrs. Markmann.

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FIRST MEETING OF TECHSTERS 2023

Today we kicked off our first session of 2023! We started strong with an even bigger group than last year’s. We began by introducing our board members – who we are, what we do, and what kinds of things we will be exploring this year (get ready for the return of python after 2 years, as well as more website design, JavaScript and Robotics). As it has seemed to be a favorite among members for the past few years, we continued our session with an introduction to algorithms. Students were asked to pair up as one student guided the other blindfolded student on how to perform an activity. Of course, along with this, we introduced some fundamental concepts of algorithms. Later on, for the first time, we watched the “Google: Don’t be Evil” documentary, diverging from. a tradition of watching “Inside Bill’s Brain”. Students were engaged as they learned about the history of Google and how it has evolved from a small user-focused startup into what it is today, as a large, profit-focused enterprise. We all got together and had some meaningful discussions about the effects. of using technology and what you are really giving away when you use technology. Finally, to wrap everything up, we finished with a Blooket covering everything we has talked about at the meeting, plus a littler bit of tech trivia! Overall, we had a great first meeting and we are so excited to share another year of Techsters with all of our members! 

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ROBOTICS & GUEST SPEAKER

Another session to work with the EV3 robots! Once members entered, they got the computers and robots. After getting set up and connecting the robots to the computer, they went right into it. Some worked on the challenges from last session if they did not complete all of them while others were able to start the new ones. As board members walked around, they were impressed to see members who made their robots play songs, say words, spin, and move its arm up and down. For the rest of the session, Sami Muhammed, president of the Robotics high school club came and talked about the robotics team. He also explained how current 8th graders can join next year when they are freshmen. He wrote down the different sub-teams that they are able to join and their roles. Great session as this season is coming to an end, come to the show & tell and pizza party next/last session(3/30)!

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FIRST MEETING OF TECHSTERS 2022

What a great way to start this awesome season with 55 new members! It was so nice seeing everyone who showed up to today’s session. We began by introducing the club and activities that are usually hosted throughout the season. All the board members then introduced themselves and then we transitioned into watching a couple different parts of Inside Bill’s Brain, which established the mood for the following activity. Members were asked if they would like to lead or be lead by people. Then they were given blindfolds and a paper that includes ideas of how they can use algorithms to guide the blindfolded person to complete a certain task. Many were very creative and used objects around them to make it even more challenging(as the blindfolded person will need more detailed steps). Afterwards we transitioned into playing the Akinator, where one of the members chose an animal and they had to answer questions, so that the animator could guess the animal. As we wrapped up, we played a very quick game of Kahoot. Overall, it was a great meeting. Thanks to everyone who attended today’s meeting and we hope to see you all next session(1/26).

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Last Session!

It was time for our last session of the season! This session started off with an appreciation message to everyone that had contributed to the Show & Tell session. Then board members reminded all 7th graders to fill out the board member form if they do want to become part of our team next year. After that, members put their cameras on, and we took an awesome group picture. Then members had the opportunity to talk about anything that they wanted to or ask any question if they did have any. Next we had an amazing opportunity to meet and talk to Cristina Source who works as a Nasa robotics engineer! She talked about her career and recommended us some books to read if we are interested in this field/topic. Afterwards we had a Q&A session, where everyone asked the questions that they desired. Lastly we played a quick Kahoot game. This season was amazing, many members(girls and boys) joined. We had a really great opportunity. This season was a BLAST, we hope you enjoyed every session of this season as much as we did! Thanks to everyone for your effort and enthusiasm this season. We could not have done all this without you guys! Thanks to all the board members for all your awesome effort and contribution to all the sessions, it would not have been possible without your help! Hope to see you all the following season!!!

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T-shirt Design

We had an awesome session where we listened to our guest speaker, Mrs. Zimmer! She worked as a graphic designer but now she is currently a teacher teaching graphic design. She taught us the steps to making a logo and showed us a couple short videos which were very informative. Members learned how to have meaning behind their logo. She also introduced a couple of websites/apps and some resources that can be used to create the logos. For the remainder of the time, members got into groups or started working individually on their logos. The next session, the members worked on their designs for a good amount of time in the beginning. Then they places their designs onto a slideshow without their names(anonymously). They were also given a google form so that they could vote for the design that they liked the most. The winning design was amazing, it looked really cool. It was designed by Eesha Gadde, Congratulations! Members looked really excited while designing their logos. Hope everyone had fun! 

  • Winning Logo, Congrats!

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Guest Speaker!

On February 11th, 2021 we had an amazing guest speaker, Ashley Baldwin! We listened to her experiences and her journey from high school until now. She told us that she took an AP computer science class during her senior year of high school. She also told us a lot about how she switched her career and how she discovered her desire and what she wanted to work as. Ashley mentioned a lot of the companies that she worked in like understood.org and Dosomething.org but she currently works at Teachable. She informed us about what a project manager is and what they do. Lastly we had a Q&A where members asked the questions that they had regarding anything she said or just in general. There were amazing question. Thank you so much Ashley Baldwin for taking time to come and teach us about all those things! The members were very interested and engaged. 

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1st Meeting of our 8th Season!!

Today was our first meeting in our new season!! We started the meeting off with a great introduction of how Techsters works. Then we introduced our social media accounts and the board member introduced themselves. After that, we watched an informational but fun video about AI (what it is and its history). Then everyone was put into a breakout room to play a tic-tac-toe game where someone is a piece of paper (follow the steps on the website) and the other person just plays regular tic-tac-toe with them. The purpose of this game was to show how computers can’t function without you telling it what to do exactly (Algorithms). This game got us into a great conversations about technology gurus and other interesting things about technology. Lastly, we watched portions of the Bill Gates movie. Even though we are virtual, a lot of people showed up (about 40) and were excited which is a great way to start this new season. Being virtual can’t dampen our spirit. 

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