DOC TN-001 · REV B · WEST VALLEY, ARIZONA FINALIST — WEST VALLEY VENTURE CHALLENGE 2026
TrueNorth Robotics

FIG. 1 — ONLINE ROBOTICS, PROGRAMMING & AI · GRADES 6–8

Character is an engineering skill.

TrueNorth courses are recorded and animated by working engineers and delivered online. Every robotics project builds technical skill and the professional skills West Valley employers say they’re short on — and students earn a record of both.

Join the pilot waitlist → SEE THE COURSES ↓
8 MODULES 00 HEADING True north 01 SENSORS Communication 02 CHASSIS Integrity 03 MANIPULATOR Teamwork 04 DRIVETRAIN Initiative
1.0THE GAP

Technical skill alone isn’t what West Valley employers say they’re short on.

WESTMARC’s West Valley Pipeline 2.0 workforce plan calls for building professional skills into K–12 education alongside STEM. Most STEM courses only build the technical half. TrueNorth builds both, inside the same project.

PROFESSIONAL SKILLS NAMED IN THE PLAN

  1. 01Teamwork
  2. 02Communication
  3. 03Critical thinking
  4. 04Problem solving
  5. 05Initiative
  6. 06Digital literacy
  7. 07Professionalism
OPTION A

Self-paced courses, free or paid

Easy to start, but feedback is automated. No one reads the work, and character is never part of the lesson.

OPTION B

Live instructor-led classes

Often $80 to $300, on a fixed schedule, and centered on technical skill.

TRUENORTH

Character first, at your child’s pace

Centers on character and uses engineering to teach it. Self-paced, with a real engineer reviewing every milestone.

2.0COMMITMENTS

Four commitments, written like requirements — because they are.

REQ-N01

Character first

Every project SHALL teach accountability, integrity and teamwork as skills, and give students room to practice them. Students working solo still practice teamwork: the final project is improving a teammate’s robot and handing it off.

REQ-E02

Learn from professional-grade engineers

Courses SHALL be built and reviewed by working engineers from aerospace and autonomy.

REQ-S03

Fail fast to succeed faster

Students SHALL test early, fail safely and learn from it, building problem solving, critical thinking and initiative.

REQ-W04

West Valley students for West Valley industries

The curriculum SHALL map to the aerospace, technology and automation careers the region is recruiting for.

3.0COURSES

Three courses, starting with robots.

Each course has eight modules and three engineer-reviewed milestones. Each milestone earns one badge, named for a skill West Valley employers ask for.

TN-101
PILOT

Robots That Make Choices

Students program a simulated robot to drive, sense and decide, then face missions where the fastest answer and the right answer are different. The course ends with a handoff: improve a teammate’s robot without breaking it, and write the note for whoever inherits it.BADGES: ACCOUNTABILITY · PROBLEM SOLVING · TEAMWORK

TN-102
NEXT

Code Like an Engineer

From blocks to Python. Students learn to test, debug and document their code the way professional teams do, and keep a failure log that counts as much as the finished program.BADGES: CRITICAL THINKING · INITIATIVE · COMMUNICATION

TN-103
NEXT

AI You Can Trust

Students train simple AI models, test them, and catch them being wrong. They learn to use AI as a teammate: say what it did, check its work, and keep a human in charge.BADGES: DIGITAL LITERACY · INTEGRITY · PROFESSIONALISM

4.0HOW IT WORKS

How character is taught: practiced, observed and answered by a real person.

Each of the eight modules ends with a project where the student builds a working model of a character scenario. In one, a robot racing a timer reaches a teammate’s half-built structure in its path. Students program the choice, test what happens, and write about a time speed and loyalty pulled them in different directions.

  1. 4.1
    Build the modelProgram it in a free browser-based simulator, or on an optional low-cost hardware kit.
    Performed by: Student
  2. 4.2
    Write the reflectionDescribe what the model shows and connect it to a real experience from their own life.
    Performed by: Student
  3. 4.3
    Explain it out loudAt each milestone, record a two-minute walkthrough of the code in their own voice, and note what AI was used for, if anything.
    Performed by: Student
  4. 4.4
    Milestone review ×3 per courseWritten feedback on both the engineering and the character theme.
    Performed by: Engineer mentor
  5. 4.5
    Skill badge issuedAdded to the student’s record of professional skills they’ve demonstrated.
    Performed by: Engineer mentor
5.0SKILLS RECORD

Nine badges, each earned on reviewed work.

  • One badge per milestoneThree per course, nine across all three. Nothing is awarded for watching a video or finishing a quiz.
  • Awarded only by an engineerA practicing engineer reads the project, listens to the walkthrough and decides whether the skill was shown.
  • Backed by the evidenceEvery badge links to the project it was earned on and the written feedback behind it.
  • Written in employers’ wordsThe badge names are the skills West Valley employers list, so the record reads the way a job description does.
RECORD
Sample, for illustration
BADGE
Accountability
COURSE
TN-101, milestone 1. Grade 7 student.
PROJECT
Finish fast, or protect the team? The robot went around a teammate’s structure and missed the timer by three seconds.
ENGINEERING
Your robot stopped short of the structure on nine runs out of ten. On the tenth, the distance reading came in late. Log that run and tell me what you would change.
CHARACTER
You reported the failed run without being asked, and you explained what going around cost you. Owning the result when it isn’t the one you wanted is what accountability looks like on a real team.
REVIEWED BY
Pavan Vasudev, avionics software engineer
6.0FOR FAMILIES

For families who want capable engineers and good people.

Built for Arizona middle schoolers learning at home, in micro-schools or alongside traditional school. Lessons are recorded, so students work when it suits your family.

Join the pilot waitlist →
GRADES
6–8
DELIVERY
Online, self-paced
MODULES
8 per course
TIME
About 2 hours per module, 16 per course
REVIEWS
3 milestone projects, by an engineer
EQUIPMENT
Free browser simulator; hardware kit optional
ESA
Approved-vendor status being pursued
PRICE
$149 per student, per course
Q.01

Can I use my ESA?

Families can pay directly now. We plan to pursue approved-vendor status for Empowerment Scholarship Account payments. At $149, a course is about 2% of a typical $7,000 to $9,000 ESA award.

Q.02

Does my student need a robot kit?

No. Every project works in a free browser-based simulator. An optional low-cost hardware kit will be available for students who want to build physically.

Q.03

Who reviews the work?

During the pilot, Pavan reviews every milestone submission himself. As enrollment grows, other practicing engineers will join, and advanced robotics alumni will help review under an engineer’s supervision.

Q.04

How do you handle AI tools?

We teach students to use AI the way engineers must: openly, and checking its work. Every submission says what AI was used for, and each assignment says whether AI is off limits, allowed as a tutor, or allowed as a teammate. At each milestone, students explain their code out loud, so the understanding has to be their own.

Q.05

What do students record?

Voice and screen only, never a camera, and only with a parent’s consent. Recordings are heard by the reviewing engineer and are never published.

1,790

ESA students live in Goodyear’s two ZIP codes, 85338 and 85395.

23,500

Arizona ESA students are in grades 6–8, TrueNorth’s launch age range.

$12M

spent by ESA families on online learning programs in a single quarter.

Source: Arizona Department of Education ESA program data.

7.0FOUNDER
Pavan Vasudev

Pavan Vasudev

25 years as an avionics software engineer and technical program manager, starting at Honeywell Aerospace and leading engineering teams of 50+ at Performance Software. Today he works with aerospace and autonomy companies as a technical account manager. He has lived in the West Valley for 22 years and led youth robotics here for 17, through Litchfield Robotics, teams that grew mostly by word of mouth because of the values they hold themselves to.

“Kids succeed when families trust the process — and we know how to guide them through it.”

PMP · MBA · DO-178C AVIONICS · FIRST ROBOTICS COACH SINCE 2009

8.0PILOT ENROLLMENT

Be one of the first 60 families.

The first course is being built now. Join the waitlist and we’ll tell you when enrollment opens. Founding families help shape the first course.

  1. DONEConcept, three-course plan and pilot outline
  2. NOWPilot design and learning platform setup
  3. NEXTFirst course published and independently reviewed
  4. YEAR ONE60 paying pilot families, then school licenses