MOUNT OLIVET — Two Robertson County High School seniors recently created a project for the district to be better prepared in case of an emergency.
Wyatt Cooper and Andrew Unthank said they were trying to come up with a project for their Student Technology Leadership Program when school safety came to mind.
According to Cooper, the idea behind their project is a 3D printed map with numbers and colors outlining each area of the school for first responders to use.
“I pitched the idea to (Billie Jo Gifford, STLP advisor) about school safety,” he said. “We started brain-storming school safety, the 3D printer and came up with a map. This is meant to be used by first responders, police or anyone who would have to come in during an emergency. It’s 3D and it’s supposed to simple, so you can just look at it and figure out exactly what part of the school you are looking for — it shows the area of the school.”
Cooper said they chose not to over complicate the map with individual classrooms and instead broke it up into hallways.
“We color coded it by the hallway colors,” he said.
According to Cooper, the exits in the building had already been numbered by School Resource Officer Steve Cavis. Cavis gave the students a map and then Cooper used a paper map to find the school room numbers.
Cooper said it was a lot of work, but it was worth it.
“I love it. I wanted to do something that could potentially save lives,” he said. “The staff and students here — we’re kind of like one big family. So, this is just something we came up with.”
There is still more work to be done, according to Cooper.
“It’s not finished yet,” he said. “There is another floor that’s supposed to go on it. It’s a lot of work, but it’s worth it.”
Unthank said he was proud of the work they completed on it.
“We just wanted to make a difference,” he said. “We wanted to have an impact and do something positive, especially with school safety becoming a more pressing issue as the days go on.”
According to Unthank, the students have worked on the project since August.
Gifford said she was proud of the student’s efforts.
“We had this brand new 3D printer and (Cooper) took it out of the box,” she said. “It was a lot of independent study and self-driven on (Cooper’s) part. He and (Unthank) became a team for the regional competition and they advanced. All of their collaboration and the obstacles they’ve overcome to make it work. We’ve had issues and they have worked through all of them like champs. It’s a really neat, real life experience. To have the determination and perseverance to push through it — I’m proud of them. They’ve done an amazing job.”
Robertson County Schools Superintendent Sanford Holbrook said he believes the project is a valuable one and applauds the student’s efforts.
“Wyatt and Andrew have really put a impressive 3D floor plan of our building together,” he said. “This is great tool to use when our safety team looks at ideas on improving the safety of our building at RCS.”
