On Monday, May 16, a representative from First Energy visited Cathedral Prep’s emerging technologies class to evaluate how their contribution to the class has helped their learning. First Energy was generous enough to fund the class in a small experiment to understand clean energy sources, which has been a success.
The class was given the equipment, which ranged from wheels to batteries to solar panels in an effort to help the students expand on their knowledge and hands-on learning for cleaner energy sources. The demonstration involved three trials for each type of energy source: battery, plug-in, and solar panel, which was rather experimental due to circumstance. The plug-in cars were limited in terms of testing them because the extension cords were not long enough for the cars to get enough momentum. That caused limited space for the cars to travel since it was not long enough to get to maximum speed.
On the other hand, the battery cars did really well in their trials. Some students were creative with their projects and had more than one motor on a car, which gave it more power. Cars were able to travel across the gym with no problems, other than determining the course the car will take.
Since the trials were done indoors, the students who built the solar panel cars went outside with the representative to demonstrate the solar panel car. It did surprisingly well for a first time trial but nowhere near as good as the battery car.
Mr. Bhatti oversaw the whole process and helped students with what they needed. He hopes that First Energy has seen what the student body is capable of and continues to fund more projects to expand on their knowledge in the future.