• Alex Roland, 2018 Skimmer Car Champion

    Record breaking 160'

    Skimmer Car Winner 2018

     Eighth grade student, Alex Roland, of Akron Middle School was the winner of the 2018 Creative Design and Engineering class skimmer car competition.  Students were challenged by their teacher, Mrs. Christina O'Malley, to use their engineering and science skills to balance the forces of gravity and lift while overcoming the forces of friction and drag. Students designed and aerodynamic cabin with Auto CADD Inventor using new skills in geometric transformations.  A 3D printer was used to produce and test their prototypes.  Alex's car traveled a record breaking 160 feet! The competition featured a $100 prize donation to the winner's charity of choice compliments of Brian and Jayne Perry. Alex chose to donate her winnings to an elementary student within our district that is battling cancer.  To learn more about this charity visit: https://www.gofundme.com/pray-fight-win-4-liam

  • 8th grades students of Mrs. O'Malley's Creative Design and Engineering class, volunteered to coach 1st graders of Mrs. Stanley's class in Robotics.  Kids learned about basics of robotics (input (sense), process (think), and output (act)) through the hands-on experience of Cubelets.  See more on donation of Cubelet robotic kits by Akron Lions' club.

  • 8th grades students of Mrs. O'Malley's Creative Design and Engineering class, volunteered to coach kindergarteners of Ms. Kwiatkowski's class in Robotics.  Kids learned about basics of robotics (input (sense), process (think), and output (act)) through the hands-on experience of Cubelets.  See more on donation of Cubelet robotic kits by Akron Lions' club.

  • Students traveled to the City of Buffalo this October to take guided tours through Frank Lloyd Wright's Darwin Martin House and Buffalo City Hall.  We observed other architectural greats of Buffalo, such as the Guarantee Building, Albright Knox, Richardson Homestead Complex, and Electrical Tower among others while traveling by bus.  Funding for this field trip was provided by the NYS Connect Kids to Parks grant.

  • Students focus on 21st century learning skills, career readiness, and honing creative, critical, and self-regulated thinking skills in Creative Design and Engineering class. Each unit culminates with a project where students use math, science, and new technological skills and/or tools to construct a prototype that solves a challenge based on a given design brief.  Pictured above are students solving structure design challenges with spaghetti and team building exercises with Breakout EDU.