Adopted Project

DPEA showcase presented many interesting and unique projects, including a Rube Goldberg gumball machine, a complex and maze-like take on a classic gumball dispenser. “There's a lot of motors, switches and buttons and it (the gumball) just goes through obstacles and the students can interact with it.” Said Andrew Hamers, one of the 7 members in charge of the gumball machine. 

 

Many of these projects were adoptions from past years, and past students. The projects sometimes had not worked out before, and needed tweaks and new hardwiring, while some just got picked up halfway through the process and simply needed to be finished, as was the case with the gumball machine. 

 

“The students from last year started working on this idea and they did a little bit of a design process and made some of the parts.This year the students in machining took over that (project), and they picked up where they left off” said Andrew. Andrew did some of the programming, while others did electrical work, and put the whole thing together. 

 

One DPEA student shared that it was rare for the showcase to have new projects, or for the students to showcase projects that they came up with themselves that same year. Students would adopt and add their own ideas and tweaks to previous students work, creating a cycle of collaboration and uniquely designed projects.