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🚗 Smart Cars · Year-end Exhibition

Smart Cars — a self-driving car you built yourself

The full autonomy stack — for kids. From line-following to LIDAR-based mapping and ML-driven perception. Your child builds and programs their own self-driving car. Bilingual online classes.

📚 4 seasons ⏱ 110 hours/year 🚗 Mini car platform + sensors shipped 🎪 Year-end exhibition track + virtual race
Open enrollment — Autumn season starts soonFree 90-minute trial class.
Smart car
Choose your child's age band.

For under-10, smart cars are introduced through play. Simple 2-wheel platform, big colorful sensors, block-based code. The car "sees" and reacts — which to a child feels like magic.

One-year path — elementary track

Playful introduction to autonomy.

🍂
Season 1 — Autumn

Build your first car

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • Car parts (wheels, motor, battery)
  • Building the chassis (snap-together)
  • Block-based driving commands
  • Remote control from a tablet
  • Class race day
🚗
End of Season 1Working RC mini-car + Season 1 certificate.
❄️
Season 2 — Winter

My car can see

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • Distance sensor — stop before obstacle
  • Color sensor — follow road colors
  • Light sensor — find dark/light areas
  • Combining sensors
  • Mini-tracks at home
👁️
End of Season 2Self-stopping car + Season 2 certificate.
🌸
Season 3 — Spring

Follow the road

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • Simple line-follower
  • Reading traffic signs (colors)
  • Stopping at "red lights"
  • Designing your own track
  • Team time-trials
🛣️
End of Season 3Line-following car on student-designed track + Season 3 certificate.
🎪 Exhibition
🏆
Season 4 — Summer

Virtual race + showcase

Bootcamp + online exhibition
  • Final track design + decoration
  • Time trials recorded for showcase
  • Live online exhibition
  • Parents-watching family race
  • Audience awards
🥇
End of yearAnnual diploma + car to keep + race video.

For 10–14, real autonomy concepts. PID control, camera-based lane keeping, sign recognition with simple ML. By year-end, your child's car does what a Tesla simplified to teen-level — and they know how every line works.

One-year path — middle school track

Self-driving demystified.

🍂
Season 1 — Autumn

Car + control basics

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • Ackermann steering vs differential
  • Build the car platform
  • Python on ESP32 / Raspberry Pi Pico
  • Motor control + PWM
  • First autonomous straight-line run
🚗
End of Season 1Built smart car + Season 1 certificate.
❄️
Season 2 — Winter

Camera + lane keeping

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • Raspberry Pi + camera setup
  • OpenCV intro — image basics
  • Lane detection (Canny + Hough)
  • PID lane-keeping controller
  • Real-time video processing
📷
End of Season 2Camera-driven lane-keeping car + Season 2 certificate.
🌸
Season 3 — Spring

Signs + objects + simple ML

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • Traffic-sign classification (TensorFlow Lite)
  • Object detection (MobileNet / YOLO Tiny)
  • Stopping at stop signs / pedestrians
  • Simple obstacle avoidance with ultrasonic
  • Behavior state machine
🛑
End of Season 3Sign-aware autonomous car + Season 3 certificate.
🎪 Exhibition
🏆
Season 4 — Summer

Full track race + exhibition

Bootcamp + online exhibition
  • Standardized track with signs + lights
  • Optimization for speed + safety
  • Time-trial submissions
  • Live online race day
  • Awards + bridge to Aerospace/Smart Home
🥇
End of yearAnnual diploma + portfolio + race times.

For 14–19, the full autonomy stack — perception, localization, planning, control. LIDAR, depth cameras, ROS, deep learning. Capstones look like research papers from autonomy labs.

One-year path — high school track

Research-grade autonomy.

🍂
Season 1 — Autumn

Perception + sensors

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • LIDAR fundamentals + 2D scan processing
  • Stereo + depth cameras
  • IMU + wheel odometry
  • Sensor fusion with Kalman filters
  • ROS 2 perception pipeline
📡
End of Season 1Working perception stack + Season 1 certificate.
❄️
Season 2 — Winter

SLAM + localization

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • 2D SLAM (gmapping, Cartographer)
  • Particle filters + AMCL
  • Costmaps + navigation stack
  • Map building in a custom environment
  • Localization accuracy testing
🗺️
End of Season 2Self-localizing car + Season 2 certificate.
🌸
Season 3 — Spring

Planning + deep learning

24 class hours + 1 workshop
  • A*, RRT, Dijkstra path planning
  • MPC / pure-pursuit controllers
  • End-to-end driving with deep learning
  • Simulation in CARLA / Gazebo
  • Safety + failure-mode analysis
🧠
End of Season 3Full autonomy stack demo + Season 3 certificate.
🎪 Exhibition
🏆
Season 4 — Summer

Capstone + global exhibition

Bootcamp + global online exhibition
  • Research-grade capstone (open problem)
  • Paper-quality writeup
  • Public demo + Q&A with industry judges
  • University autonomy lab connections
  • Strong addition for engineering applications
🥇
End of yearAnnual diploma + autonomy portfolio.
🚘
🇩🇪 Berlin
Diaspora alumni stories

Smart Cars → TU Munich robotics scholarship

Dorsa joined from Berlin at 15. Her capstone — an end-to-end neural net trained in CARLA — became her TU Munich application centerpiece. She's now a robotics MSc candidate.

"At TU Munich I'm building autonomous systems. Five years ago I was driving a tiny model around my apartment. The bilingual training meant I learned the vocabulary in English from day one."

🏅 Smart Cars certificates

Official Novin Zehn certificate each season + annual diploma + autonomy portfolio.

1Autumn certificate
2Winter certificate
3Spring certificate
4Annual diploma + capstone
📈 Beyond year one

Two paths forward

Go deeper into autonomy, or branch into aerospace and aerial autonomy.

📞 Book your free trial class

A teacher chats with your child and shows real Smart Car footage. 90 minutes, free.

Common questions

What parents abroad ask us

How big is the car? Where does it drive?

Indoor mini-car (~30 cm). Drives on printed tracks or any flat space in your home.

Is LIDAR included?

2D LIDAR included in middle school and high school kits.

Do I need a Raspberry Pi?

Included in the kit.

Simulation requirements?

High school track uses CARLA / Gazebo cloud-hosted. No high-end GPU needed at home.

Can my child join mid-year?

Yes, with 2-week onboarding.