SCIENCE HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS INVENT TRASH-COLLECTING DRONE

AS CARING for one’s health is as important as caring for the environment, a group of students from Mandaue City Science High School (MCSHS) showcased the drones they had made to help clean rivers during a three-day science innovation expo.

Keeping in mind the health risks that volunteers of cleanup drives are usually exposed to, senior high school students Christopher Mendoza, Kyle Christian Ballar and Kyle Adrian del Castillo introduced their Eco-Waste Collecting Arduino-Based Surface Faring Drone during the science innovation expo, which is part of the Regional Science and Technology

Fair (RSTF) 2019.

“While going to school everyday in Mandaue City, I always see Butuanon River filled with trash, which causes flood. That’s what inspired all of us to make this invention,” Mendoza said.

The MCSHS students had interviewed city health officers, before they made their machine. They also reviewed the data on the contaminants found in Butuanon River and the possible diseases these could bring.

“Clean-up drive volunteers are prone to cadmium, mercury and lead exposure,” Ballar said.

With their invention, del Castillo said volunteers could participate in clean-up drives while maintaining distance from the rivers since their drone, controlled by bluetooth, has a high wireless connection.

“The drone works in a way that when it gets the trash, it has a capacitance sensor which detects plastic. The conveyor belt in the drone starts to function—it drags the trash and stores it within the drone,” Ballar said.

Del Castillo said about 116 drones could compensate the force of 400 volunteers.

The MCSHS students are among the 600 elementary and high school students who took part in the annual RSTF 2019, which started on Wednesday, Nov. 13, at the Department of Education’s

(DepEd) Ecotech Center in Barangay Lahug, Cebu City; it will end on Friday, Nov. 15.

The other innovations presented during the expo were the Project Kinder Box of the DepEd Lapu-Lapu City Division, which aims to provide instant micro-room and tools in times of disaster, and the Lateral Anti-Collision and Detection for the Blind of the DepEd Cebu City Division, which aims to aid blind persons in walking.

DepEd 7 education program supervisor Cesar Restauro said the event is an avenue for learners to exchange creative ideas in the field of science.

Some participants, he said, could end up participating in the National Science and Technology Fair in February 2020.

“This is one way of promoting the science curriculum. This event highlights how our learners apply the theories they have learned in the classroom,” Restauro said.

The science innovation expo is the newest category in the RSTF 2019. Aside from competing with their inventions, student-inventors also participated in the science quiz bees, and science and investigatory projects with sub-categories on life science and physical science and robotics intelligence machines. /