Litchfield High School robotics club split into two teams last week for a tug of war match using Legos.
Doosan Bobcat North America sponsored the event in recognition of National Engineers Week, a celebration of how engineers make a difference in the world and an effort to increase students’ understanding and interest in engineering and technology careers.
“We want to promote our STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) careers,” Michelle Falling, a human resources business partner at Litchfield's Doosan Bobcat manufacturing plant, said, “and really get students excited about engineering. And so, we hold events throughout the communities that we’re in.”
With its announced expansion, which will create 200 jobs in Litchfield, this STEM activity also sought to find candidates to fill those positions, Falling said.
“This certainly is a feeder program for us,” she said. “We want to identify students that are interested in engineering who could be potential future employees of Bobcat.”
Doosan Bobcat in Litchfield will have 50 job openings in November in areas such as welding, assembling, material handling and fabrication, Falling said. The remaining 150 jobs are not yet set in stone, she said.
“It really depends on what attachments we bring to our facility,” Falling said.
Principal Jason Michels explained to students in the robotics club that the STEM activity was an opportunity for them to discover career paths to advance in here in Litchfield.
“Really the end goal is, what's your set of skills?” Michels asked the students, “What can you learn today, but after you graduate from Litchfield High School, I want to see you … have a career where you can carry your skills with you. We're all selfishly wanting, (Falling) is wanting, hopefully, some of you would consider a career at Bobcat."
For the tug of war match, Doosan Bobcat’s manufacturing engineers, Craig Santema and Ryan Dallman, brought a few sets of boxes that included Lego pieces for creating robotic vehicles. But first, Santema and Dallman discussed physics and mathematics concepts to test the student’s level of understanding.
Santema and Dallman had students break up into two teams and construct a vehicle. Each team then attached their vehicles via a string, and whichever direction the string moved would decide who won. In other words, the vehicle that pulled the other vehicle won.
Michels complimented Santema’s and Dallman’s engineering knowledge and recommended students consider working at Bobcat if they wanted to improve theirs.
“Because the skills that these guys have are very rare and they're in really, really high demand,” Michels said. “So one of the things that (Falling) does is she tries to find young people that want to refine their skill sets back at Bobcat.”
