Page 4 - TransTodayWIWinter2023
P. 4
4 | Transportation Today Wisconsin™ Online Edition: www.transportationtodaywi.com
Cudahy High School Junior Takes on Impressive Welding Project
manship, Dakota worked on refurbishing curricular activities at Cudahy High School,
a corroded work truck owned by another including jazz band, track and field, power-
teacher, who uses it for his summer concrete lifting, and theater. Her involvement in such
pouring business. a diverse range of activities highlights the
Mr. Backes, recognizing Dakota’s school’s commitment to offering a broad
exceptional talents, did not hesitate to choose spectrum of opportunities to its students.
her for this significant task. Dakota, thrilled Dakota Schroeder stands as a shining
by the opportunity, credits her confidence example of how Cudahy High School not
and skills to the support and encourage- only encourages its students to explore their
ment she has received from Mr. Backes. The passions but also prepares them for life
project involves meticulous work, includ- beyond high school. Her story is an inspi-
ing sanding down the truck’s paint and tack ration to her peers and a testament to the
welding large pieces of sheet metal. dedication and skill fostered within the walls
This endeavor is not Dakota’s first of Cudahy High School.
foray into the world of metalwork. Over the
past few years, she has crafted various metal
items, selling them for a total of around www.cudahysd.org
$200. Her ambition and skill have not gone
unnoticed, as she is currently in the process
of interviewing for an internship, aiming to
continue this professional journey through
Clare Canfield junior at Cudahy High School, took on a her senior year. Dakota’s ultimate goal is to
School District of Cudahy challenging welding project under the guid- become a full-time welder after graduation.
However, Dakota’s talents and inter-
In a remarkable display of skill and ance of her Metals teacher, Mr. Backes. ests are not confined to welding alone. She
dedication, Dakota Schroeder, a talented Demonstrating an impressive level of crafts-
is also an active participant in several extra-
$3,000 in STEAM Grants Awarded to Three Area School Districts
Three school districts in the Central Wisconsin Electric Cooperative (CWEC) service area each received $1,000 in STEAM grants to be used for projects and initiatives related to science,
technology, engineering, art, and math.
The STEAM grants were introduced by CWEC in the second half of 2022 because the co-op values education and training and understands that classrooms may have limited funding to pursue
the projects needed to educate students in local communities.
School districts that received the initial grants are as follows.
project has students school thing. Some of those nights we’d The energy bike, which will consist of a pedal
designing, fabricat- be here pretty close to midnight. Now it’s a bike to power a generator, will provide stu-
ing, and testing a class we’re trying to develop as we go. We dents in the district a concrete example of how
small one-person design, we do the engineer’s design which is electricity is produced.
vehicle with a focus the process where we develop a prototype and Chad Pritzl, high school science teacher
on high mileage build a car out of PVC so we can see any errors at Tigerton High School who is also oversee-
during various chal- before we get to metal.” ing the energy bike project, said he originally
lenge events around Ploeger said the most useful skill students got the idea for the energy bike while he
Wisconsin. will learn from the project is problem-solving. worked for a different school district.
The chal- “No matter what career a person goes “We brought it to school as a demon-
lenge events are into they will have to problem-solve,” Ploeger stration and I thought it was a really neat
part of Challenge said. “In the course of this project, there will experience for the students to see the work
uSA, which began be loads of problem-solving and with that required to produce electricity,” Pritzl said.
in the early 2000s. the frustration of things not working out as “That connection is lost I think. And this really
Ploeger estimated planned. The students will learn to plan, learn brings it home.”
that 25–30 schools from their mistakes, and make improvements To complete the project, Pritzl said a
currently partici- to the vehicle. After the last event, students variety of things will need to be purchased,
Bowler High School students Braydon Pukall, Tristan Thiex, Brady pate in the events, will learn to reflect and determine what went such as a generator, so the grant will help pay
Strassburg, and Beau Brunner, who participate in Challenge USA, along and that number is well and where improvements could be made.” for those costs.
with their advisor Timothy Ploeger, with a chassis they built for the growing. Ploeger In addition to learning about how elec-
Super-Mileage Vehicle competitions they compete in.
said the project is tricity is generated, Pritzl said students will
Bowler High School funded by solicit- www.bowler.k12.wi.us also learn about energy efficiency and energy
ing sponsorships from area businesses, so the storage in batteries.
Super-Mileage Vehicle STEAM grant is appreciated. Pritzl said he will use his science back-
The district received $551.84 for a “It will really help us out a lot. We can ground and team with Tim Schmidt, who
super-mileage vehicle project. The project is maybe get some new engines or batteries that Tigerton School District teaches Tech. Ed. at Tigerton High School, to
a student activity that provides various edu- need to be replaced, so that will go a long ways Energy Bike complete the project with students.
cational venues in and outside the classroom, towards that,” Ploeger said. The Tigerton School District received “Hopefully we can have a few students
said Timothy Ploeger, project supervisor, and “We started as a club back when we $1,000 for the construction of an energy bike.
Tech. Ed. teacher at Bowler High School. The first started it,” Ploeger said. “It was an after- Continued on Page 12