From smart home kits to flying drones

From February 10 to 14, 2025, student Lukas H. from the Johann-Georg-von-Soldner-Realschule in Feucht-wangen had the opportunity to complete an internship at the campus. During this week, he gained valuable insights into the areas of sustainable energy and building technology. The ninth grader has always been interested in sustainable living – a topic that continues to fascinate him.

To begin with, he was given a tour of the premises and got to know the team. The intern was soon able to take on his first administrative tasks. “That was a good way for me to settle in,” he explained. He found an English-language meeting particularly interesting: “It was exciting to hear and learn technical terms in English.”

On the second day of his internship, Lukas delved deeper into technology: he assembled an IoT (Internet of Things) smart home kit, which was equipped with a total of 17 different sensors and attachments. “I particularly enjoyed this work. It was fascinating to create a functioning system,” he said.

Wednesday was all about practical work with a microcontroller. “With campus coordinator Dr. Hofmann, I assembled and programmed an electrical circuit to measure and display the temperature,” Lukas described. He found the opportunity to write his own code and then check the results particularly exciting. “Checking and logging is an important part of working on campus, which I only really realized here,” said the student.

On Thursday, the intern learned about the principle of hydronic balancing, which optimizes the even distribution of heat in heating systems. “The test rigs we used for this illustrate very well how heat works in a system,” explained Lukas. Another highlight was the insight into current projects, such as the development of ventilation systems and heat pumps. “It was interesting to see how these technologies are used in practice,” said the teenager.

At the end of his internship, Lukas was able to fly a Tello drone with tablet control and try out a thermal imaging camera under the guidance of Mr. Abel, laboratory engineer and head of the Bavarian Drone Academy Ansbach. “Flying the drone was a great experience. It was also impressive to see the details that a thermal imaging camera makes visible and how the heat is distributed in the room,” he said enthusiastically.

The time on campus was a valuable experience for the student. “I enjoyed the smart home kit and flying the drones the most. I will remember the week as very enriching and interesting and can only recommend everyone to take advantage of this exciting opportunity as well,” concluded the fifteen-year-old.

The entire campus team wishes Lukas all the best for the future and hopes that this week of work experience has helped him to make progress in his career.