Bayfield High School students took home big wins last month at the Denver Technology Student Association State Championships.
Eight students from BHS brought back team wins, including first and second place in the robotics category, first place in animatronics and a top-five finish in System Control – three of more than 35 technology-related categories students could enter in the competition.
The Bayfield Technology Student Association – or TSA – chapter was also awarded a Gold Chapter of Excellence Award.
“We are extremely proud of these kids,” said Brian McDonagh, an engineering instructor and TSA adviser.
TSA is “a national nonprofit career and technical student organization of middle and high school students engaged in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics,” according to the nonprofit’s website.
The organization focuses on supplying on-the-ground experiences to students to prepare them for careers in the STEM and tech fields.
More than 1,500 students competed at State, McDonagh said.
What set Bayfield apart from its competitors, he said, was the students’ made-from-scratch designs.
Many competitors used premade VEX Robotics kits for their creations, McDonagh said, whereas his students designed, 3D printed and assembled every piece of their projects from the ground up.
“Ninety-nine percent of every other schools, they buy a kit and they assemble the kit, kind of like Legos,” he said. “... And our kids, they design it completely from scratch and customize everything, and they just dominate.”
Seniors Reese Appenzeller, Parker Perkerewicz and Wyatt Hefner took home first place in robotics for their remote controlled vehicle named RAM ROD, which the team has been working on and improving for around two years. RAM ROD won second at last years’ State competition.
Seniors Kylynd Parrish and Tyler Berry and juniors Julian Polanco and Taj Houpt also entered a remote-controlled vehicle in this years’ competition and took home second place.
The robotic vehicles had to prove they were hardy and well-programmed by navigating a complex course filled with obstacles and tasks. Two students, each holding a remote, had to work together to dual-operate one robot.
The robots were carefully designed by the students to navigate the course smoothly and effectively, McDonagh said, and practice routes were set up in the classroom before the group headed to Denver for the competition.
“Every element of the robot – for example, the drivetrain, the gears, the material used for the wheels – they’ve all been designed and carefully chosen,” he said. “And (the students have) iterated on their designs multiple times to get the most effective design.”
Kylynd, Tyler, Julian and Taj, along with classmate Riley Murphy, were also behind the school’s first place animatronics creation – a scale model theater depicting the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing.
The small theater featured self-parting curtains, a moving astronaut floating through ‘space’ and a spacecraft that gently came to rest on the surface of the faux moon. Audio of Neil Armstrong’s famous quote – “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” – was programmed into the theater and played over the scene.
Like the process for making the robots, each step of designing, assembling and programming the scene was done from scratch by the students.
The project took several months to complete, the team said, and involved a fair share of complications, setbacks, trial and error, and sleepless nights. The animatronic required last-minute adjustments right up until the day of competition, the team said.
“It took a lot of failure and redesign – a bunch of iterations – to finally get to our final product,” Taj said. “… With the stage design, the one you see right now, it used to be half the size, but to account for the hydraulics, we had to double the size.”
The animatronic creation wasn’t the only project that saw failures as well as wins leading up to State, McDonagh said.
“They have built (these projects) several times, stress-tested various elements of systems. … They’ve blown things up by accident, through trial and error, and learning the hard way about voltages, and the importance of using the right voltages,” he said.
In addition to catching the attention of State judges, the students’ made-from-scratch designs helped cultivate an inside-out understanding of what was being built, and what needed to be changed and adapted when issues arose, Wyatt said.
“(At Bayfield,) we have that drive of, ‘It’s better if you do it yourself,’” he said. “Everything we did in-house. The motors on here, it was me who soldered these all together. … I think that’s why we’re so successful, is because we know the insides and outs of our robot. We have that drive to make everything better.”
Bayfield’s TSA students said the win proved that students from small, rural schools can be just as successful as those from bigger, more metropolitan districts.
“All these other schools in the Denver area that have ‘STEM’ or ‘Tech’ in their names (competed), and we single-handedly got first and second podium,” Kylynd said. “We can compete, you know? We’re just as good as all these other schools with ‘STEM’ (in their name,) if not better.”
Students from the Bayfield and Durango school districts competed in the TSA regionals in Durango in January. The Bayfield state champs will be going to the national competition in Washington in June.
Fresh off their wins, Kylynd, Tyler, Julian, Taj, Riley, Wyatt and Reese are already looking forward to how they can improve their creations for Nationals.
Improving the strength of the remote-controlled robots and working on making the animatronic creation look more lifelike are on the to-do list before June, Taj said; but the group is also taking time to celebrate their accomplishments and express gratitude for the mentors and faculty – like McDonagh, Principal Jason Wayman and Vice Principal Andy Duffy – who helped them achieve their wins.
“(We’re) so proud, and we’re extremely thankful for the people that have helped us,” he said.
epond@durangoherald.com
