Franklin High School team powers way to engineering prize | OregonLive.com

Franklin High School team powers way to engineering prize | OregonLive.com

Franklin High School team powers way to engineering prize

Published: Thursday, July 15, 2010, 4:13 PM Updated: Thursday, July 15, 2010, 5:18 PM

Carolina Hidalgo, The Oregonian
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View full sizeArkasha Stevenson/The OregonianFranklin High School students Nick Roberts and Zoe Chrisman- Miller worked with teammate Conor Black (not shown) to build an award-winning windmill for a national engineering competition. The team won third place in the Mathematics Engineering Science Achievement competition- the first Oregon high school team to place in the top three.

Franklin High School's state engineering design champions walked into a national competition in Denver last month, scoped out the competition and instantly felt intimidated.

Their quickly built wooden model windmill looked as though it wouldn't stand a chance against the complex metal structures competing in this year's Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement design contest. The national competition on wind-energy design brought together seven groups of students who had won their state contests.

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The contraptions' task: Harness wind energy from a box fan to lift as much weight, as fast as possible; quickly drag a weighted car; and effectively respond to changes in wind direction.

The students' task: Fashion an efficient windmill with no outside help.

"Our school is not a tech school," said Nick Roberts, 17, one of three Franklin students who competed, "so we felt a little ..."

"Out of place," finished teammate Zoë Chrisman-Miller, 16.

Along with friend Conor Black, 17, the group fashioned a windmill out of balsa wood, scrap wood, nails and duct tape.

They tested and perfected the blades, finding that oval blades were more aerodynamic than rectangular ones. And they put together a research paper and a cardboard display. They earned a spot in the national competition in mid-May by besting about 15 other groups from Portland-area schools.

Out of eight mostly Western states that participate in Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement, Oregon has the fewest chapters,