Students at Hoover High School are hoping to win the national level of a science, technology, engineering and mathematics contest. The campus is already the state victor of the Samsung Solve for Tomorrow STEM Competition, where schools from across the country compete at both state and national levels to win Samsung technology for their schools.
The contest is made up of four rounds: state finalists, state winners, national finalists and national winners. For the competition, participating teams created a STEM invention intended to solve a problem faced in the community. These solutions must also be sustainable.
Five students from Hoover High School took home the win for the state level of the contest. The team created a device that would automatically turn knobs and open doors for people who are disabled or have issues with dexterity who struggle to open doors.
While these devices presently do exist in some capacity, they are often very expensive, costing thousands to install and often damaging doors and entryways. Hoover High’s goal was to create a device that would solve these problems both cheaply and sustainably.
This device won Hoover High School the victory for the state of Alabama. The campus brought home the prize of more than $12,000 worth of new Samsung technology for the school.
The Hoover High students must submit a three-minute video explaining the project by Thursday, March 7, for the national phase of the competition.
Martin Ledvina is the co-director of the Engineering Academy at Hoover High School and the sponsor for the winning team. He said the win came as a complete surprise for him and his students.
“After we submitted the first round, and we became state finalists, I totally didn't have any hopes. I’d never done this competition before. So, it was a huge surprise. Everybody is so excited. The students are so excited.”
Ledvina said the benefits of the competition go beyond new technology for the school, though the new Samsung tech was nice. He said, for him, the contest is about shaping young minds and helping the community.
“I think that's what makes it very exciting. We all need, in society, to think about sustainable solutions to all kinds of issues and identify what those are. This really helps me to pull some of that into my curriculum here in the class,” Ledvina said.
The best part for Ledvina, however, is the happiness of his students.
“That’s what makes my work worth seeing. This the joy of the students, and that's what I'm here for.”
Ledvina said he is excited about the future of the contest and of the program itself.
“I'm definitely going to continue in doing [the contest], and I'm going to promote it to the students and try to get more students enlisted to compete in the in future years now... I'm going to try to get other faculty members to join in, so we can fill more teams.”
If the Hoover High team is one of the 10 teams selected to be national finalists, the school will receive an additional $50,000 in Samsung products and classroom resources, as well as a trip to the location of the competition to pitch their creation to judges for a chance to become a national winner. The three national winners will receive a $100,000 prize package for the school.
To learn more about the competition and see the other state finalists, click here.
