META24 WORKFORCE LAB · GRADED TO THE CORE · PROJECT-BASED · A COURSE IN INDUSTRIAL DESIGN & MANUFACTURING · MIDDLE SCHOOL · UPPER SCHOOL · GRADE 6–12 · 0.25 CREDIT · META24 LAB COMPETENCIES
Automation, Robotics & AI
The Course · Automation, Robotics & AI · in The Fab Shop · Industrial & 3D
4 weeks of The Fab Shop · Industrial & 3D: What Automation Is — Sense, Decide, Act · Robotics — Arms, Axes & the Cell · Code + Machinery — Making Machines Talk · AI in Manufacturing — Powerful, and Only as Good as Its Data
The weeks are the course’s own, read from the lab; the catalog pads the last weeks with the capstone and the floor so the course fills a whole term.
THE MIX · HOW MUCH OF EACH CORE SUBJECT THIS COURSE CARRIES · IN ORDER
READING & WRITINGMATHCODING & AITECHNOLOGY & TRADESSCIENCEART & DESIGNHISTORY, GEOGRAPHY & HUMANITIESBUSINESS & ENTERPRISE
The squares are a picture of a course — how much of each core subject its own rooms carry, read from the rooms’ text — never a score of a student. Every course in a lab is graded to the core across the board; the squares say which columns it feeds most.
WHAT YOU WILL BE ABLE TO DO
- Strip away the buzzwords and every automated system — a thermostat, a robot arm, a whole smart factory — is the same three-part loop: SENSE the world, DECIDE what to do, ACT on it.
- A robot is a programmable machine that moves in space to do physical work
- Automation is machines cooperating — and machines only cooperate if they speak a shared language
- AI is real and useful on the factory floor — spotting defects a human eye would miss, designing lighter parts, predicting breakdowns
AT A GLANCE · 9 WEEKS
Q1 What Automation Is — Sense, Decide, Act → The floor — The assignments · weeks 1–9
ALSO IN INDUSTRIAL DESIGN & MANUFACTURING · THE FAB SHOP · INDUSTRIAL & 3D
A quarter
9 WEEKS · ONE QUARTERQuarter 1 · What Automation Is — Sense, Decide, Act → The floor
WEEKS 1–9 · IN THIS OFFERINGTHE WEEKS · THE ROOMS EACH ONE OPENS
WK 1What Automation Is — Sense, Decide, ActTHE COURSE · AUTOMATION, ROBOTICS & AI
Strip away the buzzwords and every automated system — a thermostat, a robot arm, a whole smart factory — is the same three-part loop: SENSE the world, DECIDE what to do, ACT on it.
WK 2Robotics — Arms, Axes & the Cell
A robot is a programmable machine that moves in space to do physical work. The art is matching the robot to the job: an articulated arm, a fast SCARA, a delta, or a collaborative cobot — each a different shape with…
WK 3Code + Machinery — Making Machines Talk
Automation is machines cooperating — and machines only cooperate if they speak a shared language. This week is where code meets metal: the G-code that drives motion, the Python that ties systems together, and the…
WK 4AI in Manufacturing — Powerful, and Only as Good as Its Data
AI is real and useful on the factory floor — spotting defects a human eye would miss, designing lighter parts, predicting breakdowns. But it’s not magic: an AI is only as good as the DATA you train it on.
WK 5–9The floor
The floor: the work is done in the room, logged in the room, kept in My Work.
THE PROJECT · WHAT THE QUARTER IS FOR
The assignments · weeks 1–9
The question. What does The Course ask you to be able to do by week 4?
The make. Every week's assignment and the quiz as practice: What Automation Is — Sense, Decide, Act · Robotics — Arms, Axes & the Cell · Code + Machinery — Making Machines Talk · AI in Manufacturing — Powerful, and Only as Good as Its Data …
The evidence. Handed in through The Course inside The Fab Shop · Industrial & 3D, kept in My Work; the Report reads it from there.
A course is a quarter, a semester or a year — nine, eighteen or thirty-six weeks — a project a quarter. Offered as the year, a semester or a quarter, it is the same course seen through a window. A lab is a family: its year, each of its tracks as a course, and its rooms. The evidence is what a student hands in through the room; the Report reads it from there. Nothing in the catalog is a grade.
THE PASS · THIS COURSE AND EVERY OTHER ONE
One pass includes Automation, Robotics & AI and every course in the catalog. Pick a pass, or enter a school code; checkout stays on this page.