Two Northern Cambria teams place in top 3 in national TSA competition
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Northern Cambria Middle School had two teams place in the top three at the Technology Student Association National Virtual Conference which took place in June.
The team of Alyssa Yahner and Emilee DePetro placed second in the nation in Technical Design, and the team of Alyssa Yahner, Julie Dumm and Emilee DePetro placed third in the nation in the Off the Grid competition.
TSA has more than 250,000 members nationwide. Students in high school and middle school compete in more than 60 competitive events from AutoCAD drawings, to programming robots, to giving presentations, writing children's stories and debate, to name a few.
This year students competed virtually at the regional conference in February and the PA State Conference in April.
In the Technical Design competition, Alyssa and Emilee, who were PA State Champions, had 24 hours to solve a hypothetical design challenge, creating 3 concepts and then a CAD drawing of their final solution.
For this year's national challenge, the students had to design an organizing device for an elementary student's classroom cubby using only materials that a student could bring from home. Their design incorporated using cardboard boxes to create a shelf for the student to organize their supplies.
In the Off the Grid competition, the team of Alyssa, Julie and Emilee worked on their project the entire year. In this competition, the students had to design and build a house for a family of four in a developing country with off the grid concepts. Their design incorporated solar panels and a water wheel for electricity among other things. After placing third at Regionals, the team made many changes to update their CAD drawings and other parts of their documentation. These changes made it possible for them to win the PA State Conference. Even after states, the students sent their information to a former NC graduate, who is an architect, and with her assistance they were able to make changes to their design to make it better. These students knew that they made it into the top 12 and had their interview with the judges virtually.
Adviser Matt Kline said, "I am very proud of these students and all of the students that took on the challenge this year. This was one of the hardest years that I have ever advised.
"Emilee, Julie and Alyssa will be eighth-graders next year with the hopes of repeating the success of this year. They are already starting to think about next year," Kline said.