This year, 70 SMILE students participated in SMILE’s 24th annual High School Challenge Weekend. Students arrived to the University of Rhode Island on Friday, April 27th, from Central Falls, Newport, Pawtucket, South Kingstown, Westerly, West Warwick, and Woonsocket. Each team was assigned the task of creating a car that was dual powered and could carry a cargo on a straight track. The motor was powered by a battery pack, while the headlights were connected to a solar panel. In addition, the students had to incorporate a transmission and a power switch into their design. There were a number of challenges the teams could tackle, these included overall fastest car, lightest vehicle, most creative design and most cost efficient.
After beginning with a quick engineering challenge of building the tallest tower out of index cards, the groups were underway using the engineering design process to solve this challenge.
As usual, volunteer mentors were an integral part of the event. URI students from different organizations, as well as professionals from Schneider Electric were a valuable part of the day.
After a morning of ice-breakers and preparing for the challenge, the students made their way to Hope/Butterfield for a much deserved lunch. Following lunch, the students listened to Chris Kearns, a former URI student and an engineer from the Office of Energy Research in Rhode Island as he spoke about solar energy in our state. Much to our surprise, solar fields are becoming a presence in Rhode Island. They can be found at superfund sites as well as along route 95.
The talk coupled with the lunch seem to be what the students needed in meeting success in building their vehicles. By midafternoon, many of the students were testing their vehicles on the track. With each run, students returned to their workstations to make improvements on their designs. Midafternoon brought another student break, with students attending a Q&A about life at URI with current URI students. The SMILE students enjoyed hearing first-hand accounts of college life.
Once the long day of engineering was complete, SMILE students enjoyed some much-deserved downtime in the URI pool and on the Keaney basketball courts before heading to the Holiday Inn in South Kingstown.
On Saturday, after a breakfast of donuts, egg wraps and hot chocolate, the students headed over to two of the newer buildings on campus, the Center for Biotechnology and Life Sciences and the Pharmacy Building. In Tyler Hall, a high tech computer lab, the students experienced first hand what is involved with Bioinformatics; a science that looks at collecting and analyzing complex data such as genetic code. They were asked to manipulate computer-generated proteins to determine how they were folded.
It was another successful challenge weekend. Coming to a college campus, interacting with college and industry mentors, accomplishing a challenging task, and working with other motivated students from around the state are just a few of the major highlights that SMILE students get to experience to set them on a pathway to college and success. Many of our High School SMILE senior are heading off to college and we wish them success in all that they do. Our freshmen, sophomores, and juniors will return to SMILE next year to build on what they have learned and be excellent role models for the younger students. Of course, a special thanks also goes to Amgen, Pfizer, Schneider Electric, Toray Plastics, van Bueren Family Foundation, and Verizon Foundation – whose funding support made this event possible.