I’m Owen Scott, from Clive, Iowa. I am 13 years old and go to Wake Middle School.
I’ve always loved science, because I’ve always wanted to understand what, why and how.
Why does the Earth spin? Why are there waves? How do computers work? How do rockets work? Can I build one? How do people program things? What is a black hole? The list goes on and on. I got involved with STEM because of a robotics club that my friend’s dad started. We competed in First Lego League (FLL) for three years, won best in state twice, as well as a project innovation award. Our team will be starting First Tech Challenge (FTC) this fall.
Our team’s research question was
“How can we improve human-animal interaction?”
We chose this question because the FLL theme for that year was “Animal Allies” and we were looking for a problem to solve for that competition. Our team met with multiple experts from ISU, and did lots of web research for more understanding of existing problems. We discussed the problems that affected both humans and animals, and began working on a solution for one in particular.
As a team, we discussed which problems we thought were most severe, which we thought could be solved, and which would have the most beneficial solution.
We chose to work on an issue that would impact the entire community.
Our problem was that birds were being killed by wind turbines. That turned our question into “How can we save birds from wind turbines?”
Our team’s biggest obstacle was coming up with an answer to our question. We looked at dozens of options to repel the birds, and none of them were the best way to handle it. We overcame this by creating our own solution.
We learned that the best way to solve a problem isn’t necessarily the easiest.
The applications for our solution are limitless. Not only can our device be used to repel birds from wind turbines, but can also be used to keep them away from things like John Deere combines (Our team’s coach shared our device concept with his colleagues, who thought it could be used for repelling birds from many structures).
*I had to keep the details of our device under wraps. It isn’t patented yet. Once it is patented, it could be implemented all over.
American Energy, Energy Corp. and Duke Energy were all fined more than a million dollars (sometimes more than two) for dead birds killed on their wind farms(There are 368,000 birds killed annually, which is a rapidly growing number.) such as bald eagles, migratory songbirds, et cetera.
I’ve always loved science, because I’ve always wanted to understand what, why and how.
Why does the Earth spin? Why are there waves? How do computers work? How do rockets work? Can I build one? How do people program things? What is a black hole? The list goes on and on. I got involved with STEM because of a robotics club that my friend’s dad started. We competed in First Lego League (FLL) for three years, won best in state twice, as well as a project innovation award. Our team will be starting First Tech Challenge (FTC) this fall.
Our team’s research question was
“How can we improve human-animal interaction?”
We chose this question because the FLL theme for that year was “Animal Allies” and we were looking for a problem to solve for that competition. Our team met with multiple experts from ISU, and did lots of web research for more understanding of existing problems. We discussed the problems that affected both humans and animals, and began working on a solution for one in particular.
As a team, we discussed which problems we thought were most severe, which we thought could be solved, and which would have the most beneficial solution.
We chose to work on an issue that would impact the entire community.
Our problem was that birds were being killed by wind turbines. That turned our question into “How can we save birds from wind turbines?”
Our team’s biggest obstacle was coming up with an answer to our question. We looked at dozens of options to repel the birds, and none of them were the best way to handle it. We overcame this by creating our own solution.
We learned that the best way to solve a problem isn’t necessarily the easiest.
The applications for our solution are limitless. Not only can our device be used to repel birds from wind turbines, but can also be used to keep them away from things like John Deere combines (Our team’s coach shared our device concept with his colleagues, who thought it could be used for repelling birds from many structures).
*I had to keep the details of our device under wraps. It isn’t patented yet. Once it is patented, it could be implemented all over.
American Energy, Energy Corp. and Duke Energy were all fined more than a million dollars (sometimes more than two) for dead birds killed on their wind farms(There are 368,000 birds killed annually, which is a rapidly growing number.) such as bald eagles, migratory songbirds, et cetera.