Principal's Blog: Kicks for Cancer, Activities Fair, Internship, Hackathon & Much More

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Kicks for Cancer

By Ray Pavlik

This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Lois Wells Memorial Kicks for Cancer. Lois is the mother of our very own Steve Wells. Tomorrow, 9/24, 16 of the top men's and women's teams in the state will play matches on the CCHS turf fields and wear special pink and blue game jerseys honoring people in their lives who have battled cancer by wearing the names of their loved ones on their backs.  It is common to see players have, Nana, Pop or Mom and Dad on their jerseys as they play.  

As part of the fundraiser we sell these jerseys to the public; 100% of the proceeds go to Dana Farber to support women's cancer research.

We would love to have all members of the community in attendance this weekend.  The girl's soccer team plays at 4:30 and the boy's team soccer team will play immediately after at 7:00 pm.  The campus will be full of athletic competitions all weekend.

For a complete list of games please go to Schedule Star. Bring your entire family, there will be an amazing raffle, food, and lots of fun. Last year we raised nearly $47,000 and hope to raise $50,000 this year!

CCHS Activities Fair

By Lauren Reese

The Student Senate organized the Activities Fair this past Tuesday in an effort to inform students about the wide variety of extracurricular opportunities available to them. Over thirty clubs set up tables with information about their clubs and staffed their tables with current club members, who happily answered questions and welcomed new sign-ups. The Student Senate encourages all students to participate and become engaged in the school community.  

The Senate is also organizing the current freshmen elections and encourages all freshmen to cast their vote—let your voice be heard! The Student Senate meets twice a month to discuss school-wide issues, voice concerns of their fellow students, and generate ideas about how to make CCHS the best place possible for students and staff. If you have any concerns or ideas about what could make CCHS a better place, talk to your senators or come to our next meeting on Monday, September 26th at 6:30 AM.

For a complete list of clubs please visit our website.  

CCHS staff member Owen Curtain is responsible for creating content on our wallboard in the cafeteria.  The link below highlights the content he created for the activities fair and provides an example of the great work he is doing at CCHS.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkJGr_yQnbE 

Senior Internship Program Information

By Alison Nowicki

For the second year, CCHS will be offering a senior internship program in the Spring of 2017.  This program matches interested students at placements, such as The Concord Journal, elementary schools, advertising agencies, and area hospitals, from Monday, April 24th through Thursday, May 25th. More information about the program can be found here.

An informational meeting with the program coordinator, Peter Bagley of Babson College, will be held onWednesday, September 28th at 7pm in the CCHS Learning Commons.  

If you are interested in signing up for the program, fill out this form.

For additional information on the internship program please click here.

Hackathon

By Anthony Beckwith

Several of my Coding Club students went the to LexHack last weekend.  A "hackathon" is an event (usually 24 hours long) where people try to invent/code a new app all in one sitting, working in teams.  Tech companies hold them, as do colleges and other organizations, usually providing lots of food, places to rest and sometimes a live band.  

This one was hosted by Lexington High School  and was 16 hours long and provided mentors for students that had little coding experience.  My students signed up and formed 2 teams. They performed admirably and represented the school very well.  

William Wheeler Exchange

By David Nurenberg

Do you want to take advantage of an amazing opportunity to live and study for one month in Hokkaido, Japan?  For more information please follow read the William Wheeler Flyer.   

The Voice

Check out the latest edition of the student newspaper, The Voice.

Photo by Madi Green

Digital Photography 

By Adam Gooder

Students in my Digital Photography class will be shooting a "48 Hour Photo Diary. Some students are capturing one image every hour from the moment they wake up on Friday morning to the moment they go to bed on Saturday; others are shooting Sunday and Monday.

Students are being asked to record one digital image per hour while awake over the course of 48 hours–at home, at school, with friends, and everywhere in between. Students must carry their cameras (or cell phone) with them everywhere they go. They may take one image each hour, so they must be selective and thoughtful about what they shoot. The image can be spontaneous and intuitive: close or wide; an object, person or landscape; straightforward or symbolic. The collection of images can be as varied as the student’s day.

For more information about this particular assignment, or to view additional information about this class, please read my blog.

3D Printing

Kiefer Read, class of 2019, spent his summer months working and refining his 3D printing skills. Below is an example of some of the great work he is doing.  

My name is Kiefer Read, and I am currently a student at CCHS.  I didn't have a summer job or internship, nor did I want one as a rising sophomore.  As such, I had to fill my own time this summer.  What I did have on hand, however, was a 3D printer and plenty of filament.  I had wanted to do this particular project for a while; I decided I would do it this summer.

This project was to design and assemble an entire drive module, which would be 2 wheels driven by 1 motor.  With conventional bicycle chain, this isn't too daring a feat.  However, I had no intention of using any bicycle chain.  I wanted to make the entire thing 3D printed, literally.  This included the chain, my first successful attempt at Print-in-Place(PIP) 3D printing.  

Print-in-Place printing means that moving parts are printed in place, with no assembly at all for that mechanism.  In this case, it meant every single chain piece had to be connected to the one before and after it.

This is easier said than done, as there are limitations on the structures the printers can lay down.  For one, there can be no more than 45-60 degree overhangs.  Any larger an angle past that and the print starts to become very messy.  Bridges, when the material is stretched across a gap to create one surface, also have their limitations.  They cannot stretch further than usually 30-40 mm, which is often enough to allow for some basic mechanisms.

The program I used to create the module is called Onshape, an online industrial MCAD program.  Fortunately enough, despite being professional, it remains free for all users, making it an outlier in a world of $800-4000 licensed programs, such as programs called ZBrush and Solidworks.  Onshape does support multiple objects being created and edited at once, so almost every part was designed in place, as it would be assembled.

The design was gradual and went through several minor iterations to make things work.  After about a month of designing, printing, and redesigning, the pieces finally came together.  The module, comprised of a total of 23 separate parts, was complete.  

While it certainly could work better, it accomplished the original goal: everything was 3D printed, even the adhesives.  Specifically, there were no adhesives; everything was friction fit.  For those who dislike post-processing, there are no supports required, though they could certainly help.  More important, it fits on smaller print beds.  All of these parts were printed on a Printrbot Metal Simple, a 6" x 6" x 6" print bed, a 156 mm x 156 mm x 156 mm printed be for the metrically inclined. However, only one thing matters about the design.  It met the gold standard; it works.

Currently, the design is entirely free and open source.  If you want the .stl files for either remixing or printing, they can be found here.

PSAT Registration
By Amy Byron

Attention Sophomores and Juniors

Registration for the PSATs will be open at 7:00 AM on Tuesday, September 6th. We are using a new registration service this year, Total Registration, which can be found at this link. The PSAT registration fee will be $35. Please follow the directions online for payment information and do not send payments to the school. 

Registration will close at 7:00 PM on October 7th. Please put these dates on your calendars. If you have any questions please contact me at abyron@concordcarlisle.org.