Students express their love for engineering through Project RoboGoby

Project RoboGoby

Why did four students choose to take on a real world engineering project that was bound to take  a long time and have innumerable challenges? "For the love of engineering and problem solving," the "room for innovation" and to prove it is possible to do big things even in high school.

Four FHS students, Josef Biberstein, Travis Libsack, Nick Nelsonwood, and Liam Wade, have been working on a remotely operated vehicle(ROV)/autonomous underwater vehicle(AUV) research submersible. The self guided project was born out of the Advanced Project Design(APD) class that FHS offers. At the end of last year the former FHS teacher Mr. Amory gave the class the idea of pursuing their own project with real world application. A few of the students immediately took hold of the opportunity and have been running with it since. 

Biberstein was drawn in because he "enjoys doing science and engineering projects that allow [him] to develop skills which [he] can use in future projects," a sentiment shared by the whole team.

Libsack and Wade were further motivated by, respectively, a "love for engineering and problem solving" and for "being rewarded for thinking outside the box."

The specific project of creating an ROV/AUV submersible was decided on by a vote after looking at a few options. Mr. Amory helped to come up with a few feasible, interesting, and fun projects, the students then did some research and chose which project they wanted to pursue. The submersible was chosen for having "the most potential for innovation in its market," and because it would, as Travis eluded to, be pretty cool to be able to see places which not many people have seen before.

The foursome remain split on whether the workload is the same as was expected. Libsack and Biberstein felt the project would take the time commitment it currently demands, but it has left Wade and Nelsonwood surprised by the time it takes, or the effects that time has on ones other activities. 

As Josef Bibertstein said, as a group "we meet everyday in school to discuss our next steps and the progress so far." On top of that there is usually at least one meeting of the minds after school each week and always at least a small contingency meeting for 3-10 hours each weekend. Though the time commitment has been large the whole group agreed that the time has been well spent, and that the project is for the most part quite fun. 

Some of the better parts have  included "becoming an incorporated Limited Liability Corporation (Wade)," "when we first got our wireless camera feed working (Biberstein)," and more generally "creating something and having it do what you want it to (Libsack)." Another important component of making the project fun is that the groups functions as a cohesive unit and everyone is able to be "working on the project and joking at the same time," as Libsack said. He also feels, and his sentiments are no doubt shared by all four, that he is "working with the most interesting, funny, and smart group of guys out there." 

Most recently the quartet has been features in the Tri-Town weekly and has interviewed with WSCH 6. 

Written by Nick Nelsonwood

Instagram

I do not use Instagram myself and so this is the opinion of an outsider…

My answer to the question of whether people spend an appropriate amount of time/energy on creating the pictures that they post to social media is that it varies greatly. I love photography and taking good, worthwhile pictures and so I understand getting a great shot, that said I feel there is a line that should be crossed. I think that trying to take everyday, or even midly unique, experiences and photos and trying to make them look amazing is going to far. If someone has a genuinely different or awesome experience or picture to post, then spending some time making it look good is valid. However, if it is actually that unique then it shouldn't take much to get an impressive shot. 

I also find it a little difficult to sympathize with those who have "Instagram envy." If someone chooses to create an Instagram or look at another's Instagram (and it is a conscious decision) then they shouldn't complain about those choices. If one is constantly feeling left out, or wishing they were someone else then that is their own fault as they are bringing it upon themselves. If one is experiencing this but still feels the need to use Instagram then I respect that, but they are making that choice and so should not complain about it to others like they have no control or say in the issue.

Nick and Sam's Article

Published: Nov, 2

Obama gives a "Flaming" Speech

President Obama was speaking to high school students about his fiery passion for politics, when he literally caught fire. Yesterday, October 31, Obama was a guest speaker at Freepport High School during their falcon period. In the middle of his speech he caught on fire because so many of the FPAC lights had been trained on him that his suit overheated. Luckily, thanks to impeccable town planning, the fire station is quite close to the school. This meant that the fire department could respond quickly, and kept the fire from spreading to the crowd of confused students. 

The Freeport Fire Cheif, Darrel Fournier, said, "I see why people might think this is a big deal, but honestly it is our job and I am just glad that we could help," when asked if saving President Obama meant a lot to him. 

Obama was surprised that this "unusual and terrifiying incident" would happen in a small Maine town, but said that the helpfulness of freeport students and citizens has inspired him to return here in the future despite this awful fire. 

Mr. Strong is rumored to have said he never knew the damage that so few lights could create and would look into using fewer lights.

Since this incident the president has fully recovered, has a new suit from Jos. A. Banks, and has resumed his tour of the state. There was a brief investigation into arson, but it looks as though it was not caused by any funny business. 

Check out The New York Times article at nytimes.org for more information. For a students thoughts on this incident, check out the journalism blog at FHS.

ICB Questions

1) Why the precise bonds/knots?

2) Reason for putting bodies where they are and shooting them where they did?

3) How will Bobby Rupp respond to being a suspect?

I feel Bobby will react in one of two ways. The first being that he will be offended and surprised that the police feel he could kill his girlfriend and her near perfect family. The other is that he will have expected it and just take it in stride, worrying more about why she died and such then why he in suspect. In either case I feel that he will be cooperative, and try to help with the investigation in any way possible. probably playing his last evening at the house over and over in his head, looking for something that if he had just noticed, he could have saved Nancy's family. 

4) What clues are left that eventually point to Dick and Perry?

5) Do we get the murder from Rick and Perry's perspective too? 

         If so, why not first? If not, why?

In Cold Blood 3,2,1

3 Things learned about Capote

      -Homosexual

      -Set out to intentionally create a new genre of non-fiction

      -Died for drug and alcohol intensive lifestyle

2 Things learned about Clutter murder

      -Last person to see the family was the daughters boyfriend

      -Nancy was "tucked" in

1 Question

      -Is there any apparent motive for the murder of an entire family?

      

NYT Reflection

From this documentary it would seem that there are only a couple simple rules for deciding when and how to report political stories, without compromising import secrecy. The most important of these ideas is one that could be applied to any news story published: make sure that all facts are present, and true. If one is unsure that the entire story is present, or that parts (or all) of the story might be untrue, don’t publish it yet. One must wait until the whole story, or the truth, is exposed, and then publish that story instead. An example from the video that shows the problems which can come about because of not heeding this advice is the story about WMD’s that Judith Miller covered. The story claimed that the government knew about WMD’s in Iraq, and that we should go to war to protect ourselves and any others involved with Iraq. The story came out as being false information within the year, but the “damage” had been done, as people had showed their support for the war and the Bush administration had launched an attack. Judith Miller tried to defend herself, and though the whole thing may not have been her fault, she should have made sure that all her facts were checked a couple times so that she wouldn’t be influencing people with lies. A second very important rule is to asses what type of impact the story will have on everyone involved. If the story seems to put many people at risk, then it is probably not a great article to publish. If the impact on people is purely that their feelings might be hurt or that a negative view of a leader is going to be exposed, then it is probably a fine article to publish, as everyone will be better informed and no one is going to die from the coverage. One way to make sure that one or two specific people aren’t put in danger is to take out names and publish the article as a basic story that doesn’t call anyone out. That said, it is important not to withhold too much of the story or it will just leave the public more confused, because they know that something big is happening but not what the whole story is. One example of too much editing is the video that was posted by wikiLeaks, they edited out much of the thirty minute film so that it only showed the military killing civilians. In the actual video, that was very hard to find, there was evidence that the people killed were not simply civilians as they had rocket launchers and such. Thus the NYT decided that they didn’t want to publish too much about the video, and instead ran a story about how wikiLeaks was affecting the media world. It seems that most decisions about what to publish, and how to publish, in terms of highly political matters can be boiled down to these two rules. If the story definitely reliable and won’t cause too many people to be at physical risk (though maybe only after removing their names), then the story can and should be published, otherwise either move on or continue following the story until a clear answer develops. 

Opening Moment

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/10/11/malala-yousafzai-nobel-peace-prize/2964649/

This is an article about Malala Yousafzai being in the running for the Nobel Peace Prize. She was shot in the head and neck last October by the Taliban because she ws a girl going to school. She fully recovered and has returned to being an advocate for the education of woman and girls in the Middle East.