Downingtown STEM Academy and Coatesville High also place in tech battle
By Kyle Carrozza, Staff Writer, The TImes
DOWNINGTOWN – Bishop Shanahan, Downingtown STEM Academy, and Coatesville High School placed first, second, and third, respectively at Monday’s Governor’s JOB1st STEM Competition held at the Chester County Intermediate Unit.
Shanahan’s team took first place out of eight with their LED-lit folding stop sign. Team members Stephen Anderson, Connor Wadt, Andrew Johnson, Angela Herb, and Matthew Horger, along with Coach John Janasik, said that their idea was inspired by Caln Township to make a better way to replace stoplights during inclement weather and power outages.
STEM Academy’s second place team presented a fracking fluid decontaminator to address some of the problems raised by the state’s recent shift in extracting natural resources, and third place Coatesville created an antitheft device for personal belongings that sets off an alarm when items are being tampered with and is activated and deactivated by using a person’s fingerprint.
The competition pitted local high schools against each other to recognize and develop solutions to real world technology-based problems. Teams received $500 and partnered with STEM professions to conduct research, design, build, and present their solutions. In addition, teams were presented with a “project in a box”, a surprise project where they were given various materials to build parachutes to protect eggs during an eight foot drop.
Coatesville tinkers with its Surelock antitheft device.
Judges, consisting of IU representatives, secondary educators, and STEM professionals, scored not just the students’ products and results of the egg drop but also took teamwork and problem-solving skills into account.
The Shanahan team said that their work was collaborative, but each brought unique skills to the table with team members focusing on aspects design, manual labor, and business partnerships. From conception to finished product, they said the project spanned over a few weeks.
Their final design folds horizontally and has lights around the perimeter and underlining “stop.” It is meant to be used at intersections when the power used for traffic lights goes out. The illumination will help people see the sign where they are not used to looking for one and also helps visibility during the inclement weather that often causes power outages.
“The main point is to keep people safe,” said Anderson.
They also noted that with all the team members being juniors, such safety precautions could be especially meaningful for people their age.
“We’re all new drivers, and it’s tough; we don’t know the roads well,” he said.
Shanahan will move on to the statewide competition in May. The team will receive an addition $750 for the competition, and they said that they plan on implementing a motor to allow municipal employees to unfold the stop signs via remote without having to leave their cars.
